I was glad I chose to spend several nights in this mountain town and jump around to a few different ryokans to stay in. All of them were very similar in that I had a very tiny little room. That’s okay. I don’t need much. But there was barely room for my bags and my body. I slept on the ground, on a futon, that was prepared for me while I was having dinner. It was so cozy to get back into my little room when it was freezing outside and curl up inside my cocoon.

Exploring Shirakawa-go

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2019-02-14 20:45:36
• CameraILCE-7RM2
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/1250
• Aperture4
• ISO160
• Focal Length35.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias

This balloon company has given me many opportunities for a free balloon ride, but I still haven’t taken them up on it. Why not? I don’t know! I’m kinda busy, but not THAT busy. And I’ve always wanted to do one… well, I’ll let this act as a reminder to officially get this on my to-do list!

Over Lake Hayes

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2016-10-21 01:59:29
• CameraILCE-7RM2
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/320
• Aperture5.6
• ISO400
• Focal Length89.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramAperture-priority AE
• Exposure Bias

I’ve done the walk through the wetlands in Glenorchy about half a dozen times. Each one is different, but my favorites are when the waters are still on windless mornings. You get these sorts of perfect reflections. I know, a “walk through the wetlands” sounds a bit swampy and dull… but not around here!

Another Walk in Glenorchy

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2016-10-20 02:24:24
• CameraILCE-7RM2
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/2500
• Aperture3.5
• ISO200
• Focal Length24.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramAperture-priority AE
• Exposure Bias-1.3

I had one extra day at the end of the Japanese tour, and I decided to visit a new place I had never visited before: Kobe. It was another awesome Japanese town, although I didn’t get to spend a lot of time there. You can see another town there in the distance across the way. That’s actually Sakai, which is near Osaka, and I was there a few weeks early to watch a blacksmith craft swords and knives using the old traditions.

Kobe, Japan

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2017-11-12 10:16:01
• CameraILCE-7RM2
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1
• Aperture6.3
• ISO100
• Focal Length122.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias

Here’s the Pantheon in Rome. It’s hard to believe this building is 2,000 years old! I edited this single RAW photo using Aurora HDR 2019. This is an old photo, from probably over eight years ago. I still have SO MANY unprocessed photos, and it’s fun to go back to them now and process them using new tools.

The Pantheon

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2016-01-19 19:20:31
• CameraILCE-7RM2
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/60
• Aperture4
• ISO1600
• Focal Length11.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramAperture-priority AE
• Exposure Bias-0.7

We were all pretty tired by the time we made it to the last stop in our 10-country tour of Europe a few years ago. But there’s something about being a new city that gives me a little boost of energy! So I tried to use every possible calorie left in my body to see as much as I could… this is the view from one of the bridges as you approach the Red Square.

Afternoon Walk in Moscow

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2017-06-03 11:56:44
• CameraILCE-7RM2
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/1250
• Aperture4.5
• ISO100
• Focal Length44.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias

Now here’s a word you may not know: nunatak. I sure didn’t know it until a few years ago, even though I briefly had a double-major in geophysics. I was at a retreat at Aro-Ha in Glenorchy and one of my fellow retreaters was a geologist. Each day, we would go on long hikes, and he told me about this word. Even though that looks like a perfect pyramid, almost volcanic in shape, it’s actually formed when two glaciers come together and carve out that particular shape. It’s one of many forms of a nunatak and the only Greenlandic word I know.

The Nunatak

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2016-10-20 02:24:37
• CameraILCE-7RM2
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/2500
• Aperture3.5
• ISO200
• Focal Length24.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramAperture-priority AE
• Exposure Bias-1.3

As far as religious buildings go, I tend to enjoy taking photos in mosques rather than churches or cathedrals. This is not a blanket rule, of course, because a few cathedrals can be rather stunning. They all get a little boring after a while, though… kind of predictable. But as you can see here, inside the Blue Mosque, the level of design and color blows away most of the rather dreary cathedrals in the world.

The Blue Mosque in Istanbul

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2016-10-02 16:05:55
• CameraILCE-7RM2
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1
• Aperture8
• ISO100
• Focal Length12.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramAperture-priority AE
• Exposure Bias

Before I went to Austria, all I knew about it was that the country birthed Arnold Schwarzenegger, so I had high expectations. But, it turned out to be pretty much like every other central European country. That’s not a bad thing, it’s just right there in the middle of the bell curve. And if there’s one thing that bell curve does well, it’s museums. as you can see in this photo. The actual exhibits were mind-numbingly dull, but that’s more a function of my taste than that of the curator’s.

Austria

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2017-05-28 12:01:55
• CameraILCE-7RM2
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time6
• Aperture16
• ISO100
• Focal Length12.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramAperture-priority AE
• Exposure Bias