Full moon rising over the Atlantic Ocean at St. Augustine Beach, Florida
The full moon is technically today 2/27, although it was fuller at moonrise last night than it will be tonight. The night that the moon rises just before sunset is what I have heard referred to as the “photographer’s moon” because it rises almost-full while there is still sufficient light on the landscape to show detail.
Last night’s moon rose through a band of thick haze on the horizon into a cloudless sky, so there wasn’t a lot to be excited about. But it was still pretty, we had a nice place to watch from and it was cocktail time! I may try again tonight but moonrise coincides with dinner time so I may need to make do with one night’s photos.
White balance may be a little wonky on this but I think it is pretty true to the scene as it was presented.
I treated myself to an early morning and was rewarded with a pretty nice pre-sunrise sky. I credit Monte and his early morning excursions for the motivation to drag myself out of bed at 5:45. It was worth it! I also was able to get a nice cup of coffee in the lobby on my way back to our room. Double nice!
What would it be like to be the letter carrier for a community full of retired letter carriers? That’s a bit of a running joke in Nalcrest, that is a retirement community exclusively for retired mail carriers. Nalcrest was designed by and continues to be operated by the Nalcrest Foundation, Inc., a branch of the National Association of Letter Carriers, the union representing United States Postal Service city letter carriers. It was the brainchild of William Doherty, the first United States Ambassador to Jamaica and NALC President from 1941–1962.
The community consists of 253 acres, 153 acres of which are developed into 500 garden-style apartments. The remaining 100 acres (0.4 km2) are undeveloped and includes a manmade lake of 15 acres around which the community is developed, and that is connected to the 7,500 acre Lake Weohyakapka.
We have friends who spend the winter there, and this is the third year we have visited. It’s an interesting place with many friendly people from all over the US and Canada. But you won’t find any dogs or cats. Evidently the story about dogs and mail carriers not getting along is true. 😉
Mural depicting Melvil Dewey, creator of the Dewey Decimal System and instrumental in bringing the railroad to Lake Placid Florida, known as the Town of Murals
Known as the Town of Murals, Lake Placid has over 40 murals dedicated to scenes, important events and notable people from the town’s history. More to follow later!
Mural depicting assistance by local mechanic Swain Bowers to three tourists who turned out to be Henry Ford, Thomas Edison and Harvey Firestone in Lake Placid Florida, known as the Town of MuralsLake Placid Florida, known as the Town of Murals
O’brien Feed Depot and Hardware store near O’Brien, Florida
Kathy & I were tired of the (relative) cold and decided to make a quick escape to warmer climes. We have friends in central Florida who give us a good excuse to head that way, so we left home on Friday for about 10 days. I had found this old feed store on some website or another and had it saved in my map folder. Today we were close enough to make a slight detour and check it out. I found a few other interesting scenes nearby that I’ll share over the next few days or when we get back home.
In the meantime it was a sunny and toasty 70 at one point during the day. Yay for heat! 🙂
Rooster sculpture atop O’brien Feed Depot and Hardware store near O’Brien, Florida
Torrence Creek Greenway in Huntersville, North Carolina
Kathy & I took advantage of today’s break in monsoon season with a 3-ish mile walk along the Torrence Creek Greenway in Huntersville. A portion of the trail runs along the edge of Cedarfield, our former neighborhood. In the years since we moved there have been some additional trails built. We know that portion quite well and I have taken hundreds of photographs of the area in all seasons. Today I had only my phone, but the photos will give a sufficient overview.
Torrence Creek Greenway in Huntersville, North Carolina
Water levels were high after last night’s rains, but other than some mud in low-lying places it was mostly dry. We spotted some early spring bluets and even a few dandelions along the trail, plus a pair of red-tailed hawks shadowed us on our walk back to the car.
Torrence Creek Greenway in Huntersville, North Carolina
There are a number of places to access the trail, but we parked along Bradford Hill Lane near the intersection with Gilead Road. It’s easy to find and about a 10-mile/20-minute drive from our neighborhood. The trail is all paved, mostly flat with lots of options for various routes and distances. The trails are well marked and numerous signboards with maps provide useful information.
Bluets along the Torrence Creek Greenway in Huntersville, North Carolina
I tried to add a link to the website for the Greenway, but both the Mecklenburg County and the Town of Huntersville pages have broken links. 🙁
Tom’s Trail Summary:
Length: From Bradford Hill Lane to Rosewood Meadow Lane is 1.6 miles, or 3.2 miles round trip. There are several options for shorter and longer loops, or out-back for a shorter distance is possible.
Terrain: Flat
Surface: Paved with a few muddy spots after heavy rains. Good walking shoes are sufficient.
Comments: The trail is shared with cyclists and dog walkers. No motorized vehicles. Pleasant walking along the Torrence Creek with some road noise from Gilead Road and barking dogs from nearby neighborhoods. Will be pretty in the spring as trees and plants green up. I tried to find a link to a trail map but the county and town links were broken!
I mentioned in an earlier post how we had recently had our bathrooms and bedrooms repainted, and that I had been given the “assignment” of providing prints for the walls. I’ve been thinking for a few months about the proper theme and color palette for each room. I’m still cogitating on the bedroom and master bath, – actually waiting for a new chair and draperies to arrive – but I finally settled on a scheme for the hall bathroom.
Grid of 8-inch Squares on a 10×28 Gallery Wrap
I’ve always tried to stay away from using other photographer’s work in my bathrooms, not being sure how that would come across. 😉 I’ll admit to previously having a John Shaw print and a Les Saucier print in our master bath, but neither of those two gentlemen are ever likely to set foot in our house, let alone the bathroom.
20×30 Canvas Float Wrap
In general, Kathy & I are going for images that capture our sense of travel, showing a sense of the places we have visited without being “literal.” When we decorated our sunroom with prints from a St. Martin artist, we wanted it to “feel” tropical without sea shells and palm trees. The colors and fabrics express that well. For our bathroom we wanted a splash of color – ideally Caribbean-inspired. I think we got there with these three selections. We’ll then get to hunt for accessories to go with what we have and these prints. Another reason to get back on the road again soon!
For now these are just files – my print lab starts their “sample sales” soon and I’m hoping to save a little $$$ by waiting a few weeks! 🙂
The greatest danger in times of turbulence is not the turbulence – it is to act with yesterday’s logic. – Peter Drucker
The last few days I’ve been working on compiling some of my blog posts from early in the pandemic into book form. As I read over some of the things I wrote in March and April last year, I’m struck by how little we knew at that time and what our (my) attitudes were. I’m not sure we’ve really learned a lot in the last year, but what we know now seems a lot different from what we knew then.
These are a few more of the photos from our visit to Murray’s Mill. I’ve been experimenting with some in-camera JPEG ‘recipes’ and these are photos made with one called “Dramatic Monochrome” from Fuji X Weekly.
Side view of my computer. The big blue fan is a cooling fan while the small fan (currently red) changes colors. Ooooooh!
My computer brain, that is. 🙂 My trusty machine was getting a little long in the tooth, having begun life as a pseudo-Mac about 7 years ago, then was transformed to a Windows machine about 4 years ago. The hardware was good, but the choices were made primarily because they were compatible with the Mac OS. It still made for a decent Windows machine but was not ideal.
Fortunately, I have in-house tech support who is willing to work for food and drink. My son Kevin helped me pick out new hardware, and I ended up keeping the case, power supply and video card. I (actually he – I just stayed out of the way and tried not to break things) replaced the motherboard, processor and memory plus a new SSD. I already had upgraded my photo drives from 2TB to 4TB, so they stayed intact. Not replacing everything saved me a bit of money, and that made the CFO pretty happy since it gives her more to spend on decorating. 😉
For those who care (and know what it means!), here is a summary of my upgraded hardware:
GeForceGTX760 Video Card
ASRock X570 PHANTOM GAMING 4 ATX AMD Motherboard
AMD RYZEN 7 3700X 8-Core 3.6 GHz Processor
CORSAIR Vengeance LPX 32GB DDR4 SDRAM
WD BLACK SN750 NVMe M.2 500GB Hard Drive
SanDisk X210SD 512GB SATA Hard Drive (Currently unused)
WD 4TB Desktop Performance 7200 rpm SATA III 3.5″ Internal HDD (X2)
CORSAIR TX650M Case with 650W power supply
It’s a pretty sweet setup. Getting everything back up and running took a little time, but at least that was something I know how to do! 😉
Murrays Mill Historic Site located in Catawba, North Carolina
Earlier this week, Kathy & I were itching to go somewhere. It was a chilly day and we didn’t want another 3-mile hike so we headed north to Murray’s Mill Historic site.
Murray’s Mill Historic Site is an easy 30-minute drive from our house and is operated by the Historical Society of Catawba County. The website says that the mill is open most days, but it did not appear to be open on the day of our visit. There are a number of interesting outbuildings including a blacksmith shop. A small general store there had a sign that said it was open, but we didn’t go in.
We walked around the grounds, and while it was a chilly day, the fresh air and scenery was nice. There is a “literacy trail” with signboards along a walkway describing a children’s book “Dragons Love Tacos.” In warmer weather they have other activities going on. Something to do on a nice day.
Spillway at Murrays Mill Historic SiteMurrays Mill Historic Site located in Catawba, North CarolinaMurrays Mill Historic Site located in Catawba, North CarolinaBarn on the grounds of Murrays Mill Historic Site located in Catawba, North CarolinaMurrays Mill Historic Site located in Catawba, North CarolinaGeneral Store at Murrays Mill Historic SiteMurrays Mill Historic Site located in Catawba, North CarolinaIs This What They Mean by ‘Lean In?’Christmas Is OverLens Flare, Anyone?
