Some generally random photos I also took recently.

Trying to eke out the honeymoon pics a little bit, still have San Diego, Las Vegas to do and possibly some other transit pics - for another time!

This evening I was playing with some photos I took on a walk with friends in Monaghan - a Coillte property I think. We were on the Dartrey estate, and there seems to be plenty of scope for a return visit! The weather wasn't great so we just did an out and back walk, but I got a couple of interesting shots. Lovely bluebells too, but not as nice as in my local woods in Monasterevin of course!!

Kind of a grey day...


I loved this detail from a tree by the lake.


And the Rhododendrons were in bloom also, quite a few of them.






So that's a short post to round out the bank holiday weekend - a pretty busy one, with bloom on Saturday, entertaining family Sunday and doing some hardcore lazing today (though we did tidy up a little, honest) with the help of a Hitchcock movie as well as the movie Touching the Void.

This weekend has been finished off with some very tasty Dungarvan Black Rock Stout, very well put together. Tasting notes on the side (vanilla, aniseed) very helpful and seemed accurate to me. That'll go on the perennial list then too!

Oh, and busy Tuesday too - the talented students of the DIT photography school are opening their final year exhibition in Temple Bar, at the Gallery of Photography and the National Photography Archive - looking forward to seeing these! It's on now, and open for a couple of weeks - drop in and see and enjoy.

More info here! http://www.ditgraduatephotography.com/

Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles was our 3rd last stop after Santa Barbara, and we spent 2 nights here near Rodeo Drive. It really is a sprawl, cars everywhere, and clogged up freeways running through the city. We drove in at about 3:30 pm or so and it was the first time I experienced stop-start traffic on the trip. Still, thanks to our satnav system we got to the hotel happy enough and got settled in. Hotel/valet parking, by the way, can be expensive ($20-$30 a night) so if you're planning a trip this might be something to keep in mind.

Of course we went for a walk around to get our bearings, up towards Rodeo Drive. Yes, my wallet was nervous but when we got there it relaxed as it didn't have anything to worry about :P



The full day in between we took a hoponhopoff bus tour, which took us around most of the sights and we were happy to see most of them from the bus. We did get off at a couple of locations including a car museum (which had some great exhibits including a supercar area and cars from film/tv)





Some thoughtful people had also put up a sign - but I think I'll report it as false advertising.




We also decamped from the bus at Hollywood Boulevard, where we saw all of the pavement stars you could see (that gets boring!)



 and the Chinese Theatre, where I realised I have bigger feet than Bruce Willis. Oh, and this sign.



We then switched buses and got down to Santa Monica beach, where there's a nice pier and a sunset (every evening!).



On the way to San Diego we hit the flower market and Universal Studios (a great day out!)

Yosemite National Park, California

After San Francisco, we drove south toward Monterey for lunch, before heading east to Yosemite National Park.


View Larger Map

Monterey is a nice coastal town, in a similar way to Dun Laoghaire, with a Fisherman's Wharf (pier with shops on) and a yachting harbour. We only stayed long enough for a sandwich above the waves, before we were chased east by some serious looking weather.

We crossed big country on some small roads, passing nut and fruit plantations, and as we headed up into the hills, some meadow.


As we drew closer to our lodge (Tenaya Lodge, near Fish Camp, just outside the park) we stopped in Oakhurst for a quick hamburger - this was our first Carls Jr, and what a burger! Best fast food type burger I've had, hands down. Anyway, I was glad we had this snack. As the road snaked its way up towards Fish Camp, reasonably steep drop-offs protected only by trees on the downhill side, the amount of snow and ice still around markedly increased.

Was I nervous? Well, I was hoping we weren't driving into somewhere that we'd be unable to drive out of 3 days later because of snow, and there was more ice on the road than I expected, so it was a little tense. We got up without snow chains, thankfully!

And Tenaya lodge is a lovely spot to arrive at, with braziers burning outside the front door, and a huge lobby inside. We got our keys to our apartment, and made our way there. Some of the snow had stuck.



So that was nice - about 0 degrees in the evening, dropping as it got later. There was a nice electric fire in the room though, so it was pretty cosy. We had been following the news a little bit on our trip, and were wary that that US Federal Government were potentially closing down because of a stalemate over budget. With that in mind, and assured the Park would be open on Saturday anyway, we booked 2 seats on a bus tour.

Boy was I glad! I could enjoy the scenery, I wasn't driving, and there was plenty of snow and ice on the roads so the rangers were sticky on having snow chains fitted (we of course in a rental car, didn't have such things!). We had a nice day touring all the spots in the park, stopping for the occasional photo op,

El Capitan.

and picnic lunch in the valley floor (by Yosemite falls, but more on that later). A couple of snow showers fell just to upset the nerves (were we being snowed in!!!!!???) but other than that the sun shone all day.



The park is stunning. The scenery, the rocks, the mountains are just amazing, and really very imposing.



You could spend weeks in here photographing the place, it's hard to get a bad one (though I managed, I can assure you!) Sometimes disappointing because there is nothing to give you scale, but these are just a couple of the photographs. More to be shared later!




There are a few more images at my pix.ie album, here.

Honeymoon - the pictures start here.

So, everything's downloaded (all 1500 or so files.....) and I've started to go through them with a view to picking out the most shareable. I've put a few on my pix.ie account so far, feel free to browse and laugh at them.



San Francisco was our first stop, after quite a lengthy pair of flights (5.5 hours transatlantic, and another 5 hours or so transcontinental). Hilly spot! Time differences meant that we were waking up bright and early at about 6am, but getting tired by 8pm or 9pm. San Francisco is a lovely city with plenty to see and do. Highlights for me here were the Golden Gate bridge (another post), the cable cars (see above) the sourdough bread that is everywhere, and eating lunch in the Zoetrope café and realising at the end that it's owned by Francis Coppola!

It's a hilly city - this picture might help you. We walked the hills the first day, heading North from our hotel (The Hilton Union Square on O'Farrell St) without realising exactly what we were letting ourselves in for!



We were to wear ourselves out consistently every day, even with the public transport pass we bought on day 2. The Hilton is very well located, but we were a small bit disappointed with being able to hear not just that our neighbours were on the phone, but all of their travel plans and details through the hotel room wall. Also the in-hotel coffee shop and restaurant were expensive but we could have expected that.

Chinatown was part of our first day's exploration. I was puzzled by some of the signs, and not just those that were in Chinese:


And there was plenty of interesting street art too


Dominating the skyline from almost every viewpoint is the Transamerica Bank Building, or the Transamerica Building. Striking in it's height and form, it looms above everything. Very interesting.



Feminists and U2 fans (it's a line in the song "Trying to throw your arms around the world") will recognise the line "A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle" well, we saw this in SF which kinda puts a lie to the whole thing:



As I mentioned the sourdough above, these below will illuminate what I meant. SF is famous for its sourdough bread, which is risen using natural yeast rather than cultivated yeast. The bread has a sour taste and a lovely dense texture which is amazing toasted. Or, scooped out and filled with soup as these guys do:




So I'll finish the post with a couple of photos of the cable cars. They are powered by cables running beneath the tracks (where the museum is), and the cars/trams each have a clutch or grip which is used to grab onto the continuously moving cables when they want to move, and let go when they want to stop. There are of course independent brakes on the tram!


There are turntables at each end of the line (certainly on the Powell & Hyde Line), where the driver and brakeman turn the car manually to go back in the direction it came from


As the cable cars pass quite closely to each other, and passengers hang off the side, it is important not to lean out


So I hope you enjoyed the first rather long post. More to come!