Aug 31 - Butterfly 88

This butterfly was one of many that we saw while walking the trails in Iguazu. He was one of my favorites because he looked like he was getting ready for a race or something with his 88 plastered on the side of his wing. The little red mark just adds to his uniqueness as well. I used minimum depth of field to really make him stand out. I don't have a macro lens, so I made due with what I had, but I think it turned out really well. During this trip Apryl took some pictures of the butterflies and actually overall I think took some really good ones and had the best butterfly picture of the trip.

Aug 28 - Flower Statue

I took this "flower" picture in the rose garden at the City of Hope where my wife, Apryl works. The statue of the Virgin Mary was just sitting there in the middle waiting for you to take a picture of it as you are walking through the Rose Gardens. I didn't want to just take a picture of it and since I was taking different angles of the roses anyway, I found this one and it came out better than I expected.

Aug 27 - Orange at Night

Wandering in Old Towne Orange brought me to this picture. I didn't have a tripod, so I leaned the camera against a light pole and brought the ISO up so that I could have a quick shutter speed. This did produce some graininess and so putting it in black and white gave it a whole new look.

Aug 26 - Lake Tekapo

You've seen the picture from inside that little church there in the lower part of the picture. Now you see why the church was placed here in the first place. Just a beautiful location on Lake Tekapo on the South Island of New Zealand. Otherwise, I don't have much more to say.

Aug 25 -- 100 Year Bloom

This goes back to Death Valley during the 100-year bloom. In the background the mountains still have their snow, while the yellow flowers in the foreground are at their peak.

Aug 24 - Men in the Mountains

This is a fun picture that was taken in the Sacred Valley in Peru. If you look at the mountain in the shade on the left, you can see a face with a large nose. He is looking out into the valley. Then look across the valley and in the right middle of the page you can see another man looking towards the left. Both of these are just natural occurrances but the Incans took them seriously and felt that these men were overlooking and protecting the Sacred Valley.

Aug 21 - Lake Michigan Lighthouse

My friend Ryan and I hit up Chicago for some baseball a couple of years ago. This photo was taken while on a speed boat on Lake Michigan. I like it because its isolated without a busy background and just seems to have a lot of character. It was a gloomy day that day, didn't know if we were going to get rained on during the game or not (we weren't). So that's why the sky isn't as vibrant as I'd like it.

Aug 20 - Eiffel in Peru?

So, I was trying to decide what to post today and I though, oh, I'll post another Eiffel "masterpiece" that we saw in Peru. I thought I don't remember it being a great photo, but it's an interesting subject, so I'll post and talk about it. Then I got to looking at the photo and I think it's really good actually. It has good composition, no crazy flash glare and the lighting from the sconce on the white stone reminded me of the barrel picture I posted earlier.

Anyway, back to the staircase. This was in an out of the way restaurant called ZigZag in Arequipa, Peru. It was recommended in our guidebook, both for the staircase and the food. The antique staircase was designed by Eiffel (yes, that Eiffel.) and although was one of the reasons we visited, the food and dessert here were amazing.

Aug 19 - Eiffel at Night

Last year Apryl and I went to Paris in November. Although it was cold, it wasn't horrible and all the touristy things were easy to get into. Since we were near the Arc, we decided to go up to the top and wait for the Eiffel Tower light show. This one is a little out of focus, but it's the best one I have and I still think it's pretty cool. It prompted us to get a little travel tripod for our future trips (including our honeymoon).

Aug 18 - Elephants at Sunset

So, yes, I have a lot of cool shots of Etoshia. This is another one. The elephants were here just enjoying the day, watching the sunset with a bunch of humans watching them. Although the image is technically underexposed because I had the light meter near the sun instead of the "subjects" I really like the sillouette look. It also brings in more of the sky's colors. I took another photo immediately after this with the light meter on the elephants, but the picture isn't as "cool".

Aug 17 - Cliffs of Moher

This photo was taken in Ireland at the Cliffs of Moher. I'm sure you've seen pictures of them, or been there yourself if you've been to Ireland as they are one of the most popular tourist places. As I've said before, the hardest part about taking pictures of popular tourist places is the tourists.

I took this a little farther away from the standard photos of the cliffs where you see all of them lined up (I have a picture of that, maybe I'll show it another time). This is a picture of one individual cliff and I like it not only because of the action of the waves but also because everything turned out so bright and blue. Most of my Ireland pictures are kind of hazy, because Ireland is kind of hazy. As in, its usually overcast or misty everywhere we went. At this moment, the clouds went away and the humidity hadn't yet climbed. People didn't tend to walk this far, they went to the viewing location, snap pics and headed to the gift shop.

Enjoy!

Aug 14 - Hotel del Coronado

Last weekend we went to a wedding in Coronado. It was a beautiful ceremony right in front of the Hotel del Coronado. While taking pictures of the wedding, I snapped this up. It's one of Apryl's favorite pictures from the wedding. The sky and sand were really bright, so I liked bringing it into B&W as it settled all the colors down and made the hotel really stand out. Apryl says it also looks like it was taken years ago and makes it look historic.

Enjoy your weekend!

Aug 13 - Peruvian Fruit

On our first day in South America, Lima, Peru specifically, we took a Culinary Tour of the city. Our first stop was at a Farmer's Market. Fairly similar to our farmer's market, this place had all the "exotic to us" fruits of Peru. I took a ton of photos here because I just loved all the different colors of the fruits. Some of them tasted pretty good too!

Aug 12 - Rio de Janeiro

Rio de Janeiro was an absolutely beautiful city. I really had no idea. The beaches are clean, the water is clear, the topography was a mix of bays, lakes, mountains, hills, islands and jungle. There were skyscrapers next to favellas (illegal little shanty towns)

There are views like this everywhere you go, all you gotta do is walk or drive up one of the many hills. Sugarloaf mountain in the middle has a cable car that takes you to the top where you can see the bay and city from there, but I liked the view from here better, which is about a third of the way down the mountain where Christ the Redeemer sits.

Aug 11 - Whitehaven Beach

Whitehaven Beach is considered one of the Top 10 beaches in the world. It is situated on an uninhabited island in the Whitsundays off the coast of Australia. The only way to get there is by boat. Only a limited number of people are allowed to arrive each day and they must leave by dusk.

The sand is so smooth and the water is so clear. It was a beautiful day, with the clouds slightly overhead to make sure the sun was not too harsh. It is definitely the most beautiful beach that I have ever put my feet on.

Aug 10 - Barrel Room

I don't show off, or really take many indoor shots, but I really like this one. This is in the cellar of Concha y Toro, the largest winery in South America. I really like how the lines of the barrels just lead your eyes to the end of the photo and make you feel like the room goes on forever. I think I did a decent job with the lighting too, which is one of my weaknesses, so I'm always proud of the photos where the indoor lighting turned out well, either by my hands or just how the room is already lit.

Aug 7 - Machu Picchu

The latest New 7 Wonder that I visited with my lovely new wife is Machu Picchu. We spent two days here. The first day we had a tour guide that took us in and out of the facility and showed us all the cool things that were incorporated into the ancient city. After lunch we hiked up the last two miles of the Inca Trail to the Sun Gate. This photo was taken part way up and is the "standard" photo location for Machu Picchu. I have some other more unique angles that I'll post here from time to time, but I thought I'd start with the standard.

So that's it for the New 7 wonders.. We still have the Great Wall of China, Petra and Taj Mahal. Not necessarily places we are planning on visiting in the near future, but places I definitely want to visit in my life time.

Enjoy the weekend!

Aug 6 - Christ the Redeemer

Today's Seven Wonder comes to us from Brazil. This Christ the Redeemer statue is the "newest" Seven Wonder and was only built 80 years ago out of concrete. There was a huge campaign by both Catholic organization and Brazilian tourist organizations to get this statue on the list of Seven Wonders and it looks like it worked.

It's kind of the "oddball" of the list because it is so new and well.. small.. It's only 100 ft tall. Think of the others on the list, the Pyramids, the Great Wall, etc. Besides that, if you were to pick one statue on a list like this, wouldn't it be the Statue of Liberty? Or if you were picking a "modern" item to be put on the list, wouldn't it be the Eiffel Tower. I don't know if Americans and Europeans were just not interested in this competition or if this campaign effort was just that successful. Probably a little of both.

We did enjoy the statue, along with the rest of Brazil, it was packed up there that day due to a local holiday. It has beautiful views of the city, which I'm sure I'll post here in time. Enjoy your Thursday, Friday is almost here!

Aug 5 - Chichen Itza (Revisited)

So, I know you've seen Chichen Itza before and I just found a slightly different angle of it. Trying to get one without people in it again. We loved Chichen Itza and spent as much time as we could here. It's just so interesting to see how a completely different culture celebrated life and religion. Any time you walk through these sites (and we've done a few now) you wonder how life would be if they weren't killed off by the Europeans (in this case, the Spaniards).

It also makes you wonder about our "throw away" culture. We don't "like" buildings that are older than 70-100 years old and we tend to tear them down. Heck, we tear down our stadiums after 30 years (see previous post about the Coloseum, its been around almost 2000 years). When people come to visit whatever is America 500 years from now, what are they going to see, what are they going to know about our architecture if everything is torn down. Anyway, just a random thought.. Enjoy your Wednesday!

Aug 4 - Roman Coloseum

The Roman Coloseum is the first New Seven Wonder that I visited, although I visited it before it was voted on. I hope that means it still counts. Trying to see Rome in only two days is a big achievement and sacrifices had to be made, so in this case, we decided not to take a tour of the interior. If I knew it was going to become extra special, I might have made more of an effort, but Apryl and I both want to go to Rome again, so I'll make sure to put it on the list.

Another one of those tourist attractions that are hard to take without people in it, I tried to minimize them as best as possible, although having them helps give you an idea of the size of the Coloseum.

Tomorrow you'll see something I've already posted, but it goes with the series and I'll try to find a different angle.

Aug 3 - Giza, Egypt

As you probably know, the New 7 Wonders was voted on a few years ago. The big hubbub should be whether or not the Pyramids had to be voted since they are the last remaining of the Original 7 Wonders. First it was decided that they would be an automatic selection, then Egypt said they didn't want to be a part of it at all. So now it is the New Seven Wonders + Giza Pyramids or something like that.

So here are the Pyramids. The picture isn't the greatest and if I were home right now, I'd clean up the color, but instead you are lucky enough to see it how I saw it, or at least how my camera saw it.

For the rest of the week, I am in Colorado Springs, but you'll still get a post each day. They will be of the New Seven Wonders that I have been able to visit. Hopefully I'll eventually get to see the other three.