HIGHLIGHTS

4yrs ago today I drove from Bordeaux France to Madrid Spain. Along the way we made a couple stops, most pominently in Burgos Spain.

Enjoy the second day of pictures and keep on looking forward to 80 more… some not so plentiful as this (but some more)

We drove a lot that day but in the end we made it to Madrid from Barcelona.
But the highlight was just before sunset we spend the evening checking out BURGOS, Spain.
Lots of people and lots of stone.

ON THE WAY OUT (of france)

OK so this will happen often but I don’t remember the name of this first town, but I remember it was before we made it out of france.

Two of my favorite pictures because they have some good emotion.

THE DRIVE

(BELOW-ABOVE) Some scenes while driving, this includes the very first picture when if you look you’ll see the blurrieness of the trees on the bottom as we whizzed by. Some of the pictures made me wish I had a much cleaner winshield. But I had to take the truck with that HUGE tube going over the bridge.

Toll roads were the story of the day… a drive from paris to madrid on the fast roads can be a spendy experience and we aren’t just talking gas.

Who doesn’t like a funny sign. (Right) Sometimes I did stop for the pictures and here was one such rest stop with some of the scenes (below)

BURGOS – Spain

So usually if you want to visit an older city and you’re interested in the city center it’s much more of a trip. Because if you’re driving you usually need to park a pretty far way from the town or expect to pay some pretty hefty rates if you can find a place in town. The great thing about this is that you get to see a lot of fun sites on your walk into town, like crossing over the river and seeing the family enjoying their day.

You kind of aim for the main big attraction… and sometimes that’s the big tall building with big spires.
But when I got there i took some of my best shots of the building as they did their thing, tourists and locals alike.

The thing that struck me most about this town was the big long walk way that was pretty highly trafficked. The older generation sure took advantage of this promenade that followed the river for a while and certainly made it easy for me to find my way without a map to the more visual treats of the city. The benches were numerous and popular. I remember saying to myself where are all the children or at least the younger generation… well there were a few but white and greay were certainly a popular hair colors.

Just a scene while walking by on the promenade.

Of course I went to the big cathedral first but then I got lost in the back streets and the random plazas.

Here I captured a romantic moment (above) and then the next a bike came rushing by (below), I knew europe was quite the biking country but then i realized a lot of them roads aren’t the smoothest in the world.

(above) he’s practicing for the big times.

This biker was a little more intent on his food.

And this biker his friends

Some great random street scenes. Very typical of this type of city center. In the center picture you’ll see something unusual for this location(Brick)

Since the building was under construction I selected carefully my angles and limited the pictures… but then I thought why not get the construction in at least one of these.
A couple more of the scenes from here are located at the top of the post.

And a couple more plazas (above) and the plaza watchers out in their finest (below)

THE END

one last shot before sunset, as we drove from Burgos to Madrird, the rest of the way in the dark.
Probably just a stop on the side of the road because i couldn’t get get it while driving.

FULL GALLERY - and in chronological order

Envisioning Europe - May1
(By Scott Jarvie)

THE PROJECT

Today starts day 1 of an 82 day project. Each day we’ll post the pictures that were taken 4yrs previous.

This means 4yrs ago today these pictures were taken.
The hope is you’ll better be able to envision what these areas of Europe look like.
Join in on this trip and listen to some of the things written about the places, people and things.

The pictures were taken by Scott Jarvie – See his photoblog here
Tis I that will be writing this set of posts.

REMASTERED

The release is an exciting opportunity to go back through the pictures 4yrs later with lots more selecting and editing skills.
Going through the pictures with a faster computer and a better eye to bring back what I saw even with simple entry level lenses.

The purpose of these posts are to help you envision europe, and to enjoy beautiful pictures.
I’m not a photojournalist, I make no apologies for editing the pictures, I want them to insire an appreciation for the location to portray my vision for that area.

Thus these pictures are remastered. Which is probably the most exciting part of the project.

LAYOUT

Some posts will be long… because I took a lot of good pictures that day.
Some posts will be short… because I didn’t take a lot of pictures that day.

We show some of them BIG and other Small.
We’ll link you to the original gallery online as well.

I’ll aim for the following

• Favorites up front.
• Pictures by theme.
• Chronological order.

Don’t forget to view the full post to see ALL of the pictures

BEEN THERE?

Well then chime in and write a few words about the picture or your experiences.

Share it all

• Stories
• Links
• wikipedia info/links
• your own pictures

This is about learning about places and cultures get involved and share.
Perhaps we can even highlight your experience in some posts.
Envisioning… (By You)

STOP 1 – AIRPORT (Not Pictured)

I did take some pictures but I guess they didn’t make the Cut

STOP 2 – Blois, France (Pictured above)

Blois Wikipedia Entry -

Where is it? Google Maps

Seems every town in europe has some sort of storied past that would be intriguing to go into for each one.

We weren’t planning on stopping here, but we were driving down to Madrid from Paris and it was about lunch time so this is what was near.

Parking is always a chore, so we found a place and had to walk a ways to find something to eat, so why not do some more exploring on the way.

No we didn’t eat here but this is a pretty typical scene

There is so many more people on the streets than in most places in the United States (obvious exceptions to big cities like NYC)
My feeling is when a city designed hundreds and hundreds of years before the exsistence of the car makes it so parking is horrid, streets would get congested anyway.
It also makes so that most things are close by, people adapt to their evironment and then economies adapt to that as well.

People riding by.

Good ol’ window shopping and fun little book stores

Here’s a perfect little scene showing the goings on.

Funny that I end up showing off all the every day stuff… when all the tourists were over taking pictures of the more famous buildings and hanging out in the park.

I walked through the park… but I also took pictures of people doing random stuff.
I shot this one from the hip, all he would have seen was me carrying my camera loosly by my side.
Glad he took an interest in my nice camera and looked down at it.

Other random scenes of Blois.

STOP 3 – Side of the Road

Gold star if you know the name of this castle.

We were in a hurry to get down to Bordeaux to stay for the night. So we just stopped on the road (I think N 152)
It would have been just outside of Blois (or inside)

I would love to know the story about this little community. (Past, Present and Future)

I had an 18-200mm lens back in those days which made it handy to zoom in or out as much as I wanted.

STOP 4 – Bordeaux City Center

Wikipedia Entry on Bordeaux

Google maps – Bordeaux

There are a couple things I most remember about this place… the parrallel parking was killer that day… here I am first day in france. I’m using a car twice as big as most other cars and I not only have to fit in a tiny spot (the only we could find, just a few feet bigger than my car, but I had to do it fast because cars couldn’t just go around me, there was only one lane each way. Oh yeah and it was one of the busier roads in the city.

But here I am alive today, no car damage after 3 months of driving 12,000+ miles in 10+ countries

(Above) Oh the joys of Lightroom (Vers. 3) this was a nikon D200 and at night at ISO 1000 this thing is a grainy mess. But I just love the emotion so I had to save it! And it worked.

We got a tour by the family we were staying with. They took us to the cool bridge and I even had my tripod for some night shots.

STOP 5 – Dinner at our hosts

Thought a couple shots of a french kitchen might be interesting. I believe they caught these themselves that day or the day before.

FULL GALLERY (48 Images) – And in Chronological order

Taken by: Jeremy Hall

2004 with a canon 10D

An old cathedral building in Exeter, England on a stormy day.
There is a website for this cathedral. : To find out more about the cathedral go here

“Founded in 1050, the Cathedral has always been dedicated to Peter – one of Jesus’ earliest followers and a key leader in the first Christian community.” -Jonathan Meyrick

Here is a post about how the photographer (Jeremy Hall) edited the picture.

In the post Jeremy describes how he edited the picture… but also has some words to say about the building as well

“This particular photo is one that I took a few years ago on a wonderful trip to the United Kingdom.
I was astounded at the intricacy and beauty of this building, but also by the dramatic clouds looming over it.”

This bird lives at the Krishna temple found in Salem, Utah

Picture taken by: Scott Jarvie

And yes the bird did talk a little… not as much as the other parrot in the cage next to him.

I think seeing the 3 parrots, numerous llamas and peacocks tells us a little something about their care and concern for animal life.
It goes along with their vegetarian lifestyle.

To learn more about Krishnaism check out the wikipedia listing… and feel free to share other links about the religion.
I’m sure we’ll be visiting the topic often in the future along with many other religions and locations around the world.

For mp3 version of this episode click here

Katherine Loveless, the photographer

Ian and Katherine talk about a lake she camped near in Oregon

Katherine talks about why this picture of the crossed logs is a favorite

Katherine talks about the beach and the dead seal and the contrast of dark to light

Katherine talks about the people on the water and looking back on old photos; Scott agrees that there can be diamonds in the rough

Katherine talks about camping on the roadside and waking up to Idahoan beauty

Ian makes an honest attempt at describing this picture, and the photographers are impressed

Scott describes what he sees in this picture…and even thought the sky is purple, but settled on red

Ian describes the blue sky and the two rocks that parallel the seagulls overhead

Katherine talks about “Seagull’s Playground” and she know exactly how many there are