Category Archives: Photography

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Bedruthan Steps, A Valentine’s Day Destination

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Bedruthan Steps – Valentine’s Day 2011

I feel as if people must get tired of reading our story especially during the months of January and February when I refer to the many meaningful ‘first’ events that occurred in the early days of our relationship. So for you, I experimented with the shorter version of our story below.

Divorced, 47 year-old American woman meets Englishman by accident and is surprised by love. Marrying after a year of long distance dating, she leaves her country for his, exchanging her big city ways for wellies and quiz nights in a tiny Cornish village. Love grows deeper, life gets sweeter, and happiness is an everyday blessing as consistent as morning coffee.

What do you think? Did I tell the story like you remember it?

For those of you who are new visitors, the longer version is the sweetest and if you want more, you can find it here along with photographs taken at Bedruthan Steps each year since we met. We didn’t snap one when I arrived on Valentine’s Day in 2008, (thank goodness, as I was fresh off an overnight flight from Atlanta) but we’ve had one each year since then.

The photos below were taken two days ago when we returned to Bedruthan Steps to celebrate our first meeting on Valentine’s Day, 2008. With a rainy week expected, I was grateful for a bit of blue sky even if the wind was a bit fierce.

 

Bedruthan Steps

 

A National Trust Land Rover

This is what the area to John’s right looks like. The National Trust folks were out repairing some stone steps a bit farther down the path where the winter weather had made a few crumble.

Distant Lighthouse At Bedruthan Steps

Happily Standing Too Close To The Edge

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The Write About Love Project

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Last September, the universe sent me a message.

Written on a gravestone in a Paris cemetery,

were three little words for me to figure out.

If you’d like to see what I came up with,

click on the link below

and go to

‘ The Write About Love Project ‘

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To London And Back Again

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Remember when I said I was taking the slow train to London to see my friend David earlier this week … well I’m back. I actually came home three days ago, but I’ve been working so hard on a new project that I am just now getting back to my blog to share some of the photos from my trip.

David met me at Paddington Station and after dropping my one little bag at the hotel we began our walk around London.

London’s City Hall is the lopsided looking building above.

I can never get enough photographs of Tower Bridge, especially at night.

I took this shot of David photographing the Tower of London. I like the way he’s right where the walls come together to make a triangle.

After taking about 20 photos trying to get catch the cupid at Piccadilly Circus, I gave up and decided that this one would have to do.

This is the Sofitel St James where my friend David graciously shared his suite which was named after the first actor to receive a knighthood, Henry Irving.

This shot of Trafalgar Square is a little different and you can see Big Ben in the background to the right.

David is in the background of this photo looking as if he can’t decide what to have for brunch. I went straight to my favorite area, the dessert table. Despite wanting a little nibble of everything, I went with an apple muffin with big apple chunks. That means I can count it as fruit … right?

I was attracted to this statue because of the bird on the shoulder and the shadow it cast. I was glad I took the photo as it gave me a chance to see what Edith Cavell did with her life. Take a look if you have a minute.

The cafe in the crypt at St Martin-in-the-Fields.

I was a little shocked to see the trash behind The Queen’s guards near St James Park.

I love this view of the London Eye from St James Park.

Someone was passing out peanuts to the squirrels in the park and the one below got a bit close thinking I had a nut for him.

This was taken at Roast, a restaurant David took me to for a yummy late lunch.

This was my lunch of mashed potatoes, applesauce, and pork belly. Mmm!

We were on our way to the theatre where we had a date with some red shoes when I snapped this one.

This was a fish stall in an open air market. It was pretty fishy even in the open air.

We had dinner of dim sum a this beautiful restaurant before making our way to the theatre. We were off to see The Wizard!

Andrew Lloyd Webber’s newest show was in its second night of previews … does it look familiar to anyone?

This was the last bit of my trip home. I had to change trains at Plymouth and when I got on I found an unusual non-paying rider in the seat across from me.

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Taking The Slow Train To London

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Okay, so it’s not really all that slow and I don’t mind at all because my ticket price (bought in advance) was a great deal, and I’m seated at a table with a power source for my computer. I’m taking the little netbook with me that John and I carried all over New Zealand so I can get some writing done while I’m riding.

It will be my first train trip alone since moving to the UK, but I expect it to go smoothly. We’re about four hours by car from London and the slow train takes about the same amount of time when you factor in a few stops along the way. There’s an express train if you are in a hurry, but I’ll be there in time for lunch and that’s good enough for my pocketbook.

My imagination tends to go wild when I ride the train thinking about all the people who have traveled the rails before me. One of the bloggers I read did a few posts on traveling by train in the 1940’s and has some photographs that you may find as interesting as I did if you’d care to make the trip over to her place here. She’s an American like me, who fell in love with a man far from home and now lives in the UK.

I’m off to London this morning to spend a few days with David, my dear friend and former next door neighbor. You may remember he came to visit for a few days last summer with his partner Steven. David takes amazing photographs so I’m sure it will be one big photo shoot for the two of us. I never feel as if I’ve had enough time with him since leaving Atlanta and I’m looking forward to long conversations and adding to a memory box that already has some sweet memories of good times together.

 

 

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Traveling Light To London – Packing The Essentials

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London Skyline From The London Eye

This Monday I will be traveling by train to London to spend a view days with my friend David who came for a visit last summer with his partner Steven. He invites me to join him every time he comes London and I’ve not been able to before now. To get in the mood for my temporary transition from a country mouse to a city one, I’m posting a few pictures from my last trip to London.

These were taken last September when my sister came to visit and John joined us in London for my big birthday. I loved his present of a Canon G11 which is able to isolate accent colors when you shoot in black and white mode. This camera is definitely one of the essentials I’m packing for my trip.

This is another shot from the London Eye. If you want to get a look at London from the air, this is well worth the cost of the ride.

Artists like the one you see here, always amaze me.

Be sure you double-click on this picture to see the man on the pier. I didn’t see him when I took the photograph, but thought he added something to it when I saw him later while editing the image.

This shot reminded me a bit of photographs I’ve seen of Venice even though it’s the Thames and that’s not a gondola.

This is the bag I am taking for a three-day trip. It’s actually an old leather briefcase-handbag I used to use for work. Even though I’m pretty good at packing light, this maybe an interesting challenge as it’s not very big and a bit narrow. I’ll let you know once I get it packed.

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Looking Back At 2010 & One Word-Encourage

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New Year's Eve - December 31, 2009

In January of 2010, I wrote a post where I revealed that my word for that year would be ” Encourage.” You can read why I chose it by clicking on the highlighted word, encourage.

Following the lead of several bloggers I had long admired, I chose a word that I thought might help me be more mindful of those who by word or action had a positive effect on my life or the lives of others.

Whenever the opportunity presented, I included links and names so my readers might also enjoy the gifts that some of the people I noted here brought to my life.

During the year, I never bothered to keep track of how many times I used the word encourage or the category, ” One Word – Encourage.” Looking back earlier today, I discovered 33 posts with stories and links to people who inspired me and in their way provided a bit of encouragement without even knowing it.

As 2010 moves aside for 2011, I wanted to share a link to those 33 posts in case you need a bit a light in your life right now and if there is someone who has been an encouraging presence in your life, please feel free to leave a comment about them below. If it is a place or an experience rather than a person, I hope you will share that with us as well.

Warmest wishes to each of you for a Happy New Year and many thanks for stopping by to read or comment.

33 Posts meant to Encourage:

1) I began the year with a walk in the snow and shared a bit of my neighborhood and the people who live there.

2) John helped me provide a special image for you when I wrote about ” The Dance Of Life.”

3) ” Seeing The Boundary Stones ” was a thank you of sorts for some encouraging comments from my readers when I was feeling kind of blue.

4) Only a few months after taking what would turn out to be our last walk with a dear friend, I wrote about her in ” The Last Walk – Measured Steps.”

5) ” The Light Of Friendship,” does not need an explaination … just thanks.

6) A clear example of how ” Believing Can Make It So.”

7) In ” Reaching For More, “ I encourage you to stop by my friend Mariellen’s place after sharing another one of my stories first.

8 )  ” Hanging On When It Looks Hopeless “ is about a gift I learned from my darling husband John.

9) More words of gratitude for my readers and their kind comments in what followed after a difficult time while “ Cleaning Out The Attic.”

10) This one addresses some heavy mother-daughter stuff and links to a few people in, ” I Get By With A Little Help From My Friends.”

11)  After the death of actress Dixie Carter, I wrote a little something that included a significant woman in my life in ” Dixie Carter – A Strong Southern Woman.”

12)  A joyful story of how a group of women brought about something close to a miracle with hope, hard work, and belief. It is way more uplifting than the title, ” Bringing It to The Masses – No More Twitter Bashing. “

13)  This has to be read … I can’t explain ” When Grief Comes Without Warning “ without crying.

14)  ” A Leaping Ginger Cat Takes Flight “ helped me share a course designed to help creative types become airborne.

15)  I linked outrageously in this post where I gushed about my new blog crush. Penelope Trunk is a woman who continually shocks me with a fair amount of what she has to say and while I don’t always agree with her, I always leave thinking something new.

16)  ” Mister Rogers & Me – A Nantucket Film Festival “ shares the film success of couple of brothers who tell the story of Fred Rogers and his impact on the life of one of the brothers.

17)  I take you on a little ” Walk In The Park With Mariellen Romer “ in this post. It’s a sweet trip about reaching for your dreams.

18) ” Chewing On A Dreamy Idea ” is about inspiration and some of the places it came from for me last year.

19)  Letters from friends and how RSS feeds are like a modern-day mail box are only part of the story in ” RSS Feeds – Like Getting A Letter From A Friend. “

20) I wrote, ” Building A Home One Mouthful At A Time “ while considering how others accomplish difficult tasks.

21)  More special stories and moments from my past in ” Sharing A Story – My Teary Moment With Kenny Loggins. “

22)  I talked a bit more about the process and linked to some inspiration in ” Kelly Rae Roberts – Taking Control With Flying Lessons. “

23) ” Missing The Good Stuff “ has a link you really ought to see.

24)  This post was all about asking for what you want in ” Someone From Evansville Indiana Has The Ability To Change My Life.”

25)  I was a lady in waiting holding my breath here when I wrote, ” No Word From Evansville But Gifts Of Another Kind Instead.”

26)  Remember what I said about asking for what you want … this was a gift of enormous proportions for me as I was able to heal in part a bad memory when my Evansville reader responded to post 24. I shared her message in ” Welcoming Rita From Evansville Indiana.” Thanks again Rita!

27)  A post about being saved as a child and drowning is part of this post in ” When Drowning – Remember – Hope Floats. “

28)  Carolyn and Kim always inspire through their own blogs or by the things they say in comments. I had a chance to meet up with Kim on a trip to Paris and I talk about our meeting and her in ” To Carolyn From Paris. “

29)  In these tough financial times I found Donna Freedman a great person to check in with for consumer tips and she shows up in a Paris post titled ” Shakespeare And Company – Surviving And Thriving. “

30)  This mega cool post is where I make my music video début courtesy of my friend Benjamin Wagner’s ‘Forever Young video.

31) ” Special Delivery – First Giveaway Produces A Winner ” documented my first giveaway when I gifted a copy the music CD ‘ Forever Young’ to one of my readers.

32)  I was grateful for reader support in ” One Step At A Time “ where I talked about receiving a rejection for a job involving writing.

33)  ” Mother Love – Quietly Sharing The Wisdom “ shares a story of how I met a blogging friend in New Zealand and the impact of her words.

Whew! 33 links is a lot of work … I hope you enjoy a look back as much as I did. Feel free to pass all or some of this post on to someone you think might need a little encouragement and I’ll be back with more in 2011.

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Dinner For Two At Lake Tekapo

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Okay … so it wasn’t really dinner for two. We had dinner lakeside at Lake Tekapo last night with a large group of folks who all pitched in making a big cookout for about forty people. I made my grandmother’s potato salad with John’s help (tons of chopping) and we had a lot of compliments even though it was missing a couple of ingredients.

Here are a few our dinner companions post meal and cleanup waiting for a little Hokey-Pokey ice cream for dessert. Hokey-Pokey is said to be a favorite flavor of travelers through New Zealand and I have definitely become a fan.

Update:

We’ve just arrived in Christchurch where I am posting this now from an outdoor café. This is our last stop before we fly to Auckland to spend a couple of nights before leaving for Christmas with my family in Atlanta. It’s been a wonderful trip and Christchurch looks at first glance as if it has enough charm to continue adding to the memories we’ve been busy making.

 

 

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Still Thinking Of You From Dunedin New Zealand

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As Mariellen pointed out in a comment on my last post, I have managed to wean myself  somewhat from my computer. I have been a bit busy with my camera with 8622 photos at present and we still have a week to go in New Zealand.

I sit down to write a post and while trying to decide which images to include I get lost in my photographs and you get nothing. That combined with difficulty in getting a connection at times makes it seem like I don’t care about you. Of course you know that’s not true and I will be back soon.  I have so much to tell you.

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Putting Our Feet Up At Punakaiki’s Pancake Rocks

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We left Punakaiki yesterday after spending  four nights there resting from days spent exploring all there was to see in that lovely place. After asking a local how many people actually live there, I discovered that the number was even smaller than I had imagined.

She said that she was not exactly sure, but somewhere between 30 and 100 people lived in or close to Punakaiki with most providing services in some way to people like us who come to stay for a few days or those who pass through quickly stopping only for a few posed photos in front of the famous Pancake Rocks. I am going to show you some of what you miss if you think all Punakaiki has to offer are pancakes without syrup.

You can see that the rocks resemble a stack of pancakes from where they take their name.

John and I had the good fortune to be able to stay at a sweet little place just down the beach here about 30 steps from the sea.

In addition to some lovely sea views there was a path along a river in a park not far from where we were staying.

There was almost no one around until we spotted this man in the bushes photographing the river with a baby on his back. I had just snapped the photo below when I saw him and realized that he was photographing his wife and son on the river.

Our day trips included some cave time for me with John keeping an eye on the tide coming in while I went exploring. I’ll show you what I discovered next time.

One of my favorite photos of John lately … taken at sunset not long before I took the picture below.

Punakaiki Beach At Sunset

 

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Caught With My Pants Down By Dolphin Watchers

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Yesterday was quite the adventure beginning with a four-hour hike up and down some pretty serious hills seeing views like the one below.

We were stepping lively in order to meet our boat pick up so we could get back to Picton. You haven’t heard from me in a few days because we have been tucked away in an isolated place with very limited internet access. It was dial-up and could only be accessed from 4-6 pm each day. I almost broke out in hives when I discovered that which is a clear sign that I am way too attached to my internet connection.

The Cougar Line (no jokes please) is the boat that picked us up and later brought us back from a location so special it deserves a post of its own later. Note the front of the boat. You can’t see it, but a door lifts up and opens allowing people to walk up steps from the inside to the deck above.

Three guesses where I was when the boat slowed and the hatch opened? Do you see the skylight opening above the toilet … when people climb up those steps and stand on the walkway they are right over the skylight and able to look down into the ladies toilet.

We were safely far enough from shore that I thought I had time to whip into the loo for a quick break before reaching our next passenger pickup stop. Imagine my surprise when we slowed down and I saw a head appear above me.  Any concern I had was quickly forgotten by the sight that greeted me on my hasty exit from the toilet.

As you can see no one was really paying ANY attention to me. When I stepped out, I saw that our boat was surrounded by about twenty dolphins who were having a great time jumping in and out of the water.

See the dolphin breathing above … they were so playful swimming right next to the boat as you can see below. I was giggling like a little girl at times because I was tickled to see them so close.

The photograph below gives you idea of how close they were to the boat and there were times they got even closer. I was surprised how close!

As the boat began to leave the area, some of the dolphins seemed to want to stay with us and picked up speed swimming along beside us for a short while longer. It was a highlight seeing so many at one time. I’ve seen a few in the past, but nothing like yesterday.

I will try not to let so much time pass before my next post, but some of you will be cooking and eating turkey with friends and family in a day or two so you won’t be reading blogs anyway.

It will be Thursday here in about three hours and while I doubt I’ll be having any turkey or dressing I will spend some time thinking about all the people and things in my life that I am thankful for. I don’t have to have Thanksgiving to recognize the gifts in my life and I hope whether you celebrate Thanksgiving where you are or not, that you have the gifts of friends and family around you each day.