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Lake Living.32

Mostly Hessian Lake, at Bear Mtn State Park, with one image in the middle below showing a turtle-abundant lake at Storm King, with a bit of Andy Goldsworthy’s Storm King Wall rising up out of the water on this side of the lake 🙂

Posted by  |  July 26, 2024 | Categories: Hudson Valley - Storm King, New York, United States | Tags: , , | 2 Comments

Mountains.42

Our farewell, this and the next post, to Bear Mountain, the state park and bridge over the Hudson named after it, and other things we saw during our short stay there a few months ago for our small-family gathering to celebrate memories of Mom :-).

Posted by  |  July 25, 2024 | Categories: New York, United States | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

From The Air.52

Definitely Mt St Helena top right corner – Mt Tam top left edge, and for anyone who doesn’t know the Bay Area, that’s the Bay Bridge connecting SF (left) to Oakland – Berkeley and the east bay then on to rest of the US. (That’s I-80, connecting from the GWB in NYC to the Bay Bridge right across the whole continent. Though, given how things are going in the US, one must consider that perhaps SF and the bay area might by next year prefer to not be so well connected to the rest of the US, which might make sense considering what so much of the rest of the US seems to think of our part of the country. Hmmm….any younger voters reading this who think there’s “no difference” between the two main choices you’ll have in November: please do not let the perfect be the enemy – and very possibly destroyer — of the good.)

Posted by  |  July 25, 2024 | Categories: California, San Francisco, SF Bay Area, United States | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

Islands.62

A royal island, in fact, as this was taken from an island in the gardens at Charlottenburg Castle in western Berlin.

Posted by  |  July 24, 2024 | Categories: Berlin, Germany | Leave a comment

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City Lights.62

Posted by  |  July 24, 2024 | Categories: Berlin, Germany | Leave a comment

Urban Canals.172

Technically this probably isn’t urban, but it’s such a busy waterway near Europe’s largest port that it feels urban. This is the view looking downstream (towards Rotterdam and the North Sea), from the bridge I biked over as noted in the prior post.

Posted by  |  July 23, 2024 | Categories: Netherlands, Noord Brabant, Zuid Holland | Tags: | Leave a comment

Country Canals.72

The story behind these two photos above & below is that on the day I’d booked a pre-paid hotel for myself in the lovely Noord-Brabant town of Bergen Op Zoom, I awoke to find that the trains which normally run regularly between A’dam Centraal & Vlissingen (both of which we’ve shown you in the posts linked there) were stopping at Dordrecht. This was due to overhead power lines being out on the bridge over the last big-water crossing in southern NL before the border w/BE a bit further south. All the options being offered included many connections as we did a loop east and then back west, so I said “f-it, I’m sure I can bike from Dordrecht to the next train station south of the water, pop my bike back on a train there, and then continue to Bergen Op Zoom as planned. I mean, after all, it’s not like the bridge is out, and this being NL, there’ll be at least an adequate bike lane and route all the way in.” As demonstrated in the photos below, it was possible, and by the next day I was able to take the train straight through from Vlissingen home to A’dam. ‘Twas fun and felt rather adventurous, if I do say so myself…Later on I realized that Zevenbergen, to which I biked, was actually farther away than the station at Hoge Zwaluwe (I wonder if at least Sam will bother and have time to map-search these places, hmmm…), but had I known and biked there instead, I’d have missed these lovely canals and farmlands above and below, and just been industrial all the way except some of Dordrecht city which was often quite pleasant.
Since this is the main highway connecting all the largest Dutch cities and ports including Rotterdam to the largest Belgian cities and ports including Antwerp and Brussels…well, as you see it’s a pretty long and busy bridge. Still fun, though loud. There was a gas station on the other side where I biked on up and rewarded myself with an iced coffee from the counter of a franchise whose name is common.

Posted by  |  July 23, 2024 | Categories: Netherlands, Zuid Holland | 1 Comment

Village Views.82

Breakfast by the Hudson in Peekskill, NY

Posted by  |  July 22, 2024 | Categories: New York, United States | Tags: , | 1 Comment

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Signs of the City.92

Posted by  |  July 22, 2024 | Categories: New York, United States | 1 Comment

Coasting.102

Above, the piece of the southeastern coast of England, and below 15 minutes later with the Dutch coast dimly visible behind many offshore wind turbines. All from mid-May’s return to A’dam after the US weeks.

Posted by  |  July 21, 2024 | Categories: England, Netherlands | Tags: , | Leave a comment

Coasting.101

Lime Kiln Lighthouse, San Juan Island, Washington State – courtesy of Sam 🙂

Posted by  |  July 21, 2024 | Categories: United States, Washington State | Tags: | 2 Comments

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Signs of the City.91

Posted by  |  July 20, 2024 | Categories: Berlin, Germany | Leave a comment

City Lights.61

The days around the solstice brought spectactular sunsets from my apartment. This was nearly 11pm on the 22nd of June :-). I must cherish this, when we’re six months on and I’m winter-depressed again…

Posted by  |  July 20, 2024 | Categories: Netherlands, North Holland & Amsterdam | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

Islands.61

There are two islands in this photo of the canal / moat that surrounds the lovely Noord Brabant town of Heusden, where I spent a week at the start of July. More to come from those evening after-workday-from-home walks.

Posted by  |  July 19, 2024 | Categories: Netherlands, Noord Brabant | Tags: | 1 Comment

From the Air.51

Since I’m scheduled shortly to be flying off again for very distant parts for work reasons, I thought I’d fondly remember another of these lovely moments as our plane gained altitude after departing from my beloved spiritual-home airport of SFO. If you follow the line of the lower fin on the plane’s tail, I’m pretty sure it’s Mt St Helena that you’ll see as a bump on the far horizon.

Posted by  |  July 19, 2024 | Categories: California, Marin County, San Francisco, SF Bay Area, Sonoma & Napa, United States | Leave a comment