[photojournal] #1 The Other Side of the Mountains.

[libertango]

One of the things I've really been wanting to do is share more of my photography. I've been very pleased with some of the results I've been getting lately... pleased enough that I'm in danger of not being as self-effacing as usual. :)

So, I'm going to start making more photo posts. This one is the first. In these posts, I don't want to show more than two or three images each time, just to keep the emphasis sharply focused... and to let me post frequently. :)

I have a wacky work schedule. Wednesday-Saturday, 7a-6p. What that means is that akirlu and I have only one day off in common -- Sunday. As we're still relatively new in the area, we've been going on various day trips.

Sunday, October 31 was one. We went to Ellensburg, and went on to Yakima, simply because we hadn't been on that side of the mountains very often.

The wind in Ellensburg was whipped up. It made the sky startlingly blue. Ellensburg is home to Central Washington University, which has a fine old Victorian building on campus.





While we were driving through Snoqualmie Pass on I-90, the sun was just breaking through the clouds, illuminating the snow on the slopes:





Later, we got to Yakima. Why Yakima? Well, mostly because the first brewpub of the post-Prohibition era opened there, in 1982. The web page for it is still up. But it's no longer there.

However, we did toodle about a bit, and I got a picture or two. This is the Larson Building, a fine Art Deco tower of its type.





More pictures (though not necessarily of this trip... I mean, more pictures) to come, I hope.

Comments

[singingnettle.livejournal.com]

Very nice.

I think I will also sign up for Photobucket so I can add illustrations to my posts!

[atlaz.livejournal.com]

Great photos. We're going to be driving through Snoqualmie within a week or two ourselves and hopefully it'll be picturesque like that, not deep snow and a blizard like it was a few years ago. I much prefer the North Cascades highway for beauty (pretty much the same views but smaller roads, less traffic and mostly unspoiled areas), but it's really not safe if there's a high chance of snow and you don't have chains and (maybe) 4WD.

Not sure if you've done it, but a really nice trip is to go over on the Bainbridge ferry and get onto highway 101 past Crescent Lake (unfailingly beautiful). Conceivably you could do the peninsular loop in a single day but it's worth taking a couple of bites of the cherry and seeing Hurricane Ridge (probably not in winter), Ruby or Rialto beaches and the Hoh rainforest.

[daystreet.livejournal.com]

I grew up in Seattle and have relatives in Spokane and Idaho and so I've been over "the passes" a million times. Your pic of Snoqualmie reminded me of how much I always looked forward to the bit where you drive along the shore of Lake Kachess. Somewhere in time, when I was a kid, somebody told me "They've never found the bottom of it", which is crap, of course, but I believed it at the time. I would always stare out the car window at this creepy Bottomless Lake as we drove by. Used to fascinate me.

Wait, wait, wait

[hal-obrien.livejournal.com]

You guys are over here right now?

{blink}

See above re my schedule. Do you have a Sun, Mon, or Tues available for lunch, or coffee, or dinner, or something?

Re: Wait, wait, wait

[atlaz.livejournal.com]

We're over there around turkey day and so far we're pretty busy with all the family and friends we're going to see so we're not sure if we'll have any free time yet. If you want to drop me your contact details then if we're around on any of those days we can get in touch. It's the only problem with not only having so many people to see, but also so many miles to do to see them all (close to 1000 for a round trip to see one set of family).

Re: Wait, wait, wait

[hal-obrien.livejournal.com]

OK, that sounds a bit familiar, now that you mention it... And I think I decided at the time that it wasn't worth kicking up too much of a fuss, because I wouldn't expect to be a high enough priority.

As may be... I'll send along my contact info in a separate e-mail, and what happens happens.

(And, as I read this over, I want to assure it ain't a passive agressive swipe... I really do think and agree family and more established friends rightfully come before me, and I'm just thinking realistically.)

Re: Wait, wait, wait

[atlaz.livejournal.com]

Oh, I wouldn't take it as a swipe (if only because I rarely notice that sort of thing). When I say friends, we're not really covering miles to see them, we're mostly getting to see them in the same place as family members but other than that we're really sticking with Naomis family. It's a shame because we both have people we'd really like to see, but until we start getting extra trips to the US in, or Spokane becomes closer to Seattle, as you said we end up prioritising. It feels slightly odd to prioritise people, but there you go :)