Fort Fincastle

We visited Fort Fincastle atop a modest hill, where the existing cannons almost appear to be aimed at the intruding cruise ships at rest in the harbor. The racks holding the cannon were pushed by six or more men when needed to adjust the aim, although the harbor was never attacked and Nassau was never forced to war in her defense.

We finished up our visit to Nassau with a short shopping excursion, of which no photos exist, so the next post will be on to Half Moon Cay, a paradise of a private island.

Nassau

It was our third visit to Nassau, and only once were we scheduled there. Hurricane Charlie and Tropical Storm Bonnie diverted us there and now we have come to enjoy it. Here we see a street view of downtown Nassau . . . and a bumper sticker supporting President Obama with the slogan "everybody wins."

Ardastra Gardens

After spending some time with the flamingos, we enjoyed walking around the small but interesting Ardastra Gardens. Lots of shade trees, bright flowers, and several animals including this talking parrot and the spotted jaguar seen here. A very pleasant place to visit.

Stretch, Baby, Stretch

The flamingos all walked into the nearby pond after their performance, and here we see two of them in some artistic experiments.

One is a deep richly-colored cartoon drawing effect, which I think shows the reflection in the ripples.

The other is a creative crop of the image in the previous post. In my imagination, I asked a flamingo to stretch tall for me as I snapped it. On the laptop, that image was 12x8 and we needed a print 16x6 to fit an interesting frame. The reality is that I managed to stretch the image into a crop that worked for the print.

Ultimately the flamingo stretched its neck all the way into our living room. I am sure he will be happy there.

Flamingos

Our bus tour of Nassau took us to Ardastra Gardens, a wonderful riot of color and action under a pleasant canopy of trees. Shortly after our arrival, we were directed to a Flamingo Show, where perhaps two dozen assorted sizes of flamingo showed us an ability to march around a ring, following commands of Left Face, Halt, and About Face . . . well, following them somewhat.

The color and the action worked together to get the day off to a great start. Some cruisers were unhappy that we were missing Grand Turk, but Nassau is a great place to visit and we were taking full advantage.

Sailing, Sailing

Happy to be home from a two-week vacation and ready to share some shots from Washington DC and from our seven days aboard Carnival Pride. We saw DC first but I think I will look at our cruise photos first, beginning with our "Welcome Aboard" photo and our "Welcome to Nassau" shot.

When you board a ship, the ship's photographers take a souvenir shot but when we did not like ours, I set out to replace it with one of mine. The same thing took place when we got off to visit Nassau.

You might note that the first card shows stops at Grand Turk, Half Moon Cay and Freeport. But you might note that Grand Turk is crossed out and replaced by Nassau due to Tropical Wave Bonnie. Freeport is also crossed out, cancelled by what became Tropical Storm Bonnie. Lots of changes, but who cares? Real cruisers are ready to change itineraries, stay on ship, do whatever comes up . . . it is still all good!

All Four Lakes & Cul-de-Sacs

From the air, the shape of the cul-de-sacs is quite clear, and the location of all four of the Four Lakes in Lisle is obvious. Look in any direction during a Hot Air Balloon flight and your eyes will find tons of details worthy of your attention.

Hazier Horizon

As we level off and head toward Argonne National Laboratory as it turned out, it was easy to see how much hazier the morning sky looks off toward the horizon. The feeling is such that I wanted to fly as far as the balloon would take us, in whatever direction the wind wished.

Head Southeast

As we soared to flight altitude, the other balloons looked smaller and smaller and the roads and buildings looked neater and neater. From the steep angle looking down, everything look precise and perfectly placed.

First Flight

In 1985 I was offered a Ride-along in the host balloon and I turned up early, before sunrise, for the honor. What a thrill it was! Seeing the balloons fill and lift while heading up with them was a wonderful rush, and we soon looked down on Lisle Community Park, where I guess I played and umpired and coached more games than anyone else. In seconds the field I knew so well from walking and running on it looked like a perfect scale model.

Up Up and Away

Two more images from early Eyes to the Skies Hot Air Balloon Festivals.

Rumpled at First

Laid out on the ground, rumpled though huge, the envelopes of Hot Air Balloons fill radpidly and since heat rises, the balloons fly majestically.

Soaring

Still more photos of Lisle Hot Air Balloon Festivals from the 1980s.

Colorful

More views of Hot Air Balloons.

Hot Air Balloons

Planning a visit to Washington led me to my collection of Hot Air Balloon photos. I have updated my slides into digital ones and I have several from four balloon flights I made during the 1980s. In my role working summers with the Lisle Park District, I was the onstage emcee for Eyes to the Skies Hot Air Balloon Festival (and I also did posters, so I coined the Eyes phrase).

Some of my best memories of the fests were the chances I had to fly. In the next several posts, we will look at ballooning.

Polar Coordinate Sunset

We have not looked at a Polar Coordinate image in a while, so we complete our look at the color orange with a sunset, rearranged by the Polar Coordinate structure into a flaming ball in a yellow sky.

Fire

Another look at the power of the color orange. Fire, under control, is a basic need of civilization. Light, heat, the ability to cook and sterilize. Fire, out of control, is all-consuming death, the perfect image of hell. This fire, thankfully, is under control.

Fruit & Flower

The color orange is seen well in pumpkins and the daylilies seen here.

Powerful Color: Orange

One of my archive sets is a set of color collections. For a few posts, we will look at the powerful advancing color orange.

Birthday Party

Since Grandma & Poppa were unable to be in Boston in May, we missed the birthday parties of both Carolyn and Bobby. What better reason than to have a party in July when they were here in Illinois?

Since the girls are close to the same age, it is easy to get good shots of them together, often with their arms around one another. The boys have nearly two years difference between them, so my favorite shots are separate ones.

Party day was fun time, for sure!

The next post will begin a look at some Color Studies.

Bigger Bubbles

After the boys had their fun, the two seven-year old girls showed them how to generate some REAL bubbles.

Music and Water

Our local grandchildren love the water area at the DuPage Children's Museum, of course, with bubbles and running water enough to play with. Our Boston visiting grands loved it as well as seen with the two boys in the bubble area. The rhythm room was quite popular on this visit as well, as we see three of the four pounding on one pink instrument.

Goggles

In the woodshop at the DuPage Children's Museum, each child must wear goggles at all times. From the standpoint of the museum, this is a safety issue. From the standpoint of the photographer, you know you will get a great goggles shot. Here are three of my four grandchildren.

Heritage Portraits

It was Grandma's idea, not mine, but it was a great idea. On the way to lunch with the four grandchildren, we took two portraits off the wall in the hallway. In the parking lot, we had the foursome place their hands on each of the portrait. With some post-processing, we now have photos of the great-grandchildren "in touch" with their heritage a generation older than we grandparents. We have the photos both with and without the names and we think that sometime in the future the grandchildren will like these as much as we do now.

Identical Twins

I recall using the term Identical Twins with reference to the two seven-year olds at least five years ago. Since they like acting like twins, it went over well and I wrote that term on my Facebook page. One of my FB friends, a former student in my English class, reminded me that was a line in the theme song to the TV Classic Patty Duke Show. (Thanks for the tip, Alyssa!)

Here the girls, dressed alike, are seen in a hall of mirrors at the DuPage Children's Museum. They spent two days trying to pass themselves off to people as twins. The boys are sharing their enjoyment of dinosaur toys in our family room.

Nothing makes a grandparent happier than seeing his or her grandchildren happy and enjoying time together. I am a most happy Poppa today.