Photo-an-Hour: Pittsburgh

Among “photo challenges,” the photo-a-day one is pretty popular, and it’s a great way to get yourself in the habit of doing even some small creative thing daily.  I was intrigued, though, by a “photo an hour” challenge I’d heard about from a fellow blogger.  I liked the idea of something a little more intensive: documenting a day with images deliberately taken at set intervals.

I don’t always practice enough, often falling into the “Well... it’s not worth shooting if it I wouldn’t hang it in a gallery...” way of thinking.  What is that about?!  Instagram and a smartphone got me photographing daily life more regularly, which has been great for keeping my eyes fresh, but I wanted to try photo-an-hour because it would force me to be “on assignment” all day.  Painters carry around sketchbooks, pianists practice scales… how do I practice as a photographer?  I thought a day in Pittsburgh would be a perfect place to start...

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9am - In the elevator of the hotel.

10 am - Breakfast in the park.  Yes that is my new Siena camera bag from JoTotes.  I looove it.

11am - Drove across the river to see the Allegheny Observatory in Riverview Park.  (Ha, yes, my photo is pretty much the same as the one on their website.)  I couldn't get into the building, but walking around the outside was nice too.  It's definitely on my "come back again" list.

12pm - It was a hot day.  Valentine had a drink from the fountain.  Mostly, though, he enjoyed watching the water swirl down the drain.

1pm - Walking through the doors of the Carnegie Library.

2pm - Passed this gorgeous door on my walk to the Cathedral of Learning. 

3pm - Did some journaling in the main hall of the Cathedral of Learning, then poked around a little.  This amazing globe was in the Polish Room, along with the score from Manru, Ignace Jan Paderewski's only opera. 

3pm - Hungry!  Had lunch and drinks at The Porch, just across the lawn from all the Carnegie buildings.

4pm - Back in the Carnegie Library, this time to look around a little.  

The library gallery was showing a beautiful collection of portraits:  Meet Your Neighbors: Refugee Portraits and Stories, a collaborative project about Pittsburgh's refugee community photographed by Rich Waters.

5pm - Back at the hotel and working on my Iceland blog post...

6pm - Waiting for a table at Meat & Potatoes. (That's the chandelier in the lobby.)

7pm - Ooooh the pot roast was sooo good.

8pm - Walking past the Roberto Clemente Bridge (Sixth Street), close to sunset.  Good night, Pittsburgh!

I really enjoyed my photo-an-hour practice.  I loved having a visual diary of the day!  I suppose it was easier trying this in a new place that I was exploring (I would imagine that a day spent working at home wouldn't be quite as visually interesting to blog readers!) but then again, taking a peek into someone's daily life is always interesting to me... I love stories!

One thing I'd try next time?  Setting a timer.  I missed my mark a few times.  Other thoughts might be to shoot only film, or just in black and white.

Feel free to send me suggestions, and if you try this yourself, let me know how it goes!  I'd love a peek into one of your days too.

(Many thanks to my friends Vicki and Phil for suggestions on places to visit & eat!)

Iceland Album - Part 2

(Continued from Iceland Album - Part 1)  At breakfast the next morning we had a discussion about what we could realistically see & do in the four days we had left.  We decided to let go of visiting the Vatnajökull glacier (-jökull at the end of a word means glacier), planning instead on drives and hikes closer to Reykjavik.  It was a huge relief to have a plan and - best of all - Airbnbs reserved for the rest of the trip.  There’s something comforting about knowing you’ll have a place to call “home” at the end of the day.

With all of that finally settled, we decided to spend the day exploring Vik, starting with the sea.  I’ve never seen a black sand beach before.  It was surreal,  as though an entire landscape had already been staged as a black and white photograph, with the exception of the iridescent green-hued cliffs (and the purply-blue lupines).

From the beach, we drove across the street and up the hill to the the iconic Reyniskirja church.  Apparently there was hiking trail up the mountain that began at the far end of the parking lot.

The weather had turned sunny but it was still a little chilly when we set out.  We climbed and climbed.  I’m always such a bad judge of distance… everything looked closer than it actually was. (Or maybe it was the other way around.)  I was the slowpoke of the bunch, stopping to photograph every few minutes, and Katherine, not big on walking, lagged behind with me.  She and I would treat ourselves to a few chocolate Smarties — my European fave! — as a reward for making it to the next resting point.  Ha!  (Hey, you gotta stay motivated, right?)

When we got to the top we explored a little, but turned around and headed back down. The actual mountain peak was farther along the trail, but we hadn’t brought water.  Or snacks.

Walking through the fields, I told the lupines how much I loved them.

After a picnic lunch back in town, we left Vik and headed west, stopping at Solheimajökull, one of the “tongues” of the Myrdalsjökull glacier.  Myrdalsjökull is sitting on top of Katla, a volcano that’s due to start some serious grumbling in the coming decades.  It was so interesting to stand there thinking that the whole landscape in front of us will wind up changing sooner rather than later.

It didn’t occur to me that the ice would be so dark and sooty, but, of course, Iceland is made of volcanoes, and so it makes sense. The parts of the ice that had cleaved revealed that perfectly magical glacial blue… its little inside secret.

Signs that read, “Don’t climb the glacier without a guide” were going unnoticed, and I’d read in a local paper that tourism has skyrocketed in Iceland with some consequences.  Every year there are deaths, close calls, and expensive search-and-rescues.  Trouble spots aren’t always roped off, or tourists seem to think they can ignore warning signs.  Just around the corner from Vik, photographers out to “get the shot” of the Reynisfjara basalt columns have, on occasion, been swept out to sea.  Iceland doesn’t mess around, so if you travel there, be mindful, Iceland’s wildness is what makes it so beautiful.

If you missed it, click here to read Part 1

Iceland Album - Part 1

When we asked Gracie, John’s oldest daughter -- she’s twelve -- where she might like to spend our weeklong vacation she said, “Someplace warm with a beach!”  As a joke I said, “How about Iceland? Ha ha.” We had a laugh, but the thought stuck with me.  A friend had just returned from a motorcycle trip around Iceland, and other people I’d mentioned it to had either been there as well or knew someone who had.  Everyone said it was a photographer’s paradise and a travel magazine I subscribe to showed up in my mailbox complete with a featured article about driving Iceland’s Ring Road.  We decided to go.  This was going to be the kids' first trip out of the country.  I kept my own travel wishes simple, hoping to accomplish three things: see daylight at midnight, hike up a mountain, and relax in some hot springs.

Flying into Keflavik at midnight...

Travel snafus abounded from the get-go.  Silly me, thinking that four of us could make it to Iceland flying stand-by on the only flight out a day.  Ha!  Or that we could arrive a day late and just “wing it” without having to fork over some serious change to get back on track.

We arrived in Keflavik at midnight, which seemed more like a predawn twilight.  It was windy, cold, and raining sort of sideways as we walked down the airplane steps onto the tarmac.  We had no hotel but managed to find one.  I was sooo happy to crawl into bed!  Even at 3am the sky was light.

At breakfast in the morning we came up with our plan: drive to Reykjavik to the visitor center, figure out where we wanted to go, and then head out. We walked around town a bit, found a great bakery, had a picnic lunch on a hill overlooking the harbor, and took a peek inside the Harpa Performing Arts Center before finally hitting the road.

Walking in Reykjavik

Harpa Performing Arts Center

I don’t know what made us think we’d get all the way to Hofn that day. Note to self: next time, believe the travel magazine when it says you’ll want to stop everywhere to take in the landscape... Is that a waterfall?!

From the road, Seljalandsfoss (-foss at the end of a word means waterfall) seemed almost small. Nope. It was immense.  (Those little dots are people!)  The cliffs were a fairy-tale green and the air shimmered with mist.  We got soaked hiking the path behind the falls but it was sooo worth it.

That night, we made it as far as Vik, Iceland’s southernmost village, and I’m glad we chose to stop. It was beautiful: black sand beach, terns flying along the cliffs, and more lupines than I'd ever seen.

We had a delicious dinner at Halldorskaffi and fell asleep in cozy beds right next door at the Puffin Hotel. Goodnight, Iceland!  More soon…