Change of Scenery

For the Christmas Holidays.

Took a trip up north to visit some family for a couple weeks. Had super travel weather - 40s and 50s in mid December! Sure would like to have that weather coming back, but its unlikely.

Snapped a few photos, including a nice morning sunrise after a snow storm

And of course, I always take a few fun photos of the lights on the Christmas tree.

I think this one looks a little like a 'Lightman' with a head, body, arms and legs.

Welcome to the Christmas Matrix? Sure hope I get tagged as nice, and not naughty!

Time to head home. Left the day before a snow storm, and much colder temps. The day started off nice, some clouds. Had been a light snow dusting overnight so road seemed just a tad slick, I went slower at first. It was SUPPOSED to be raining in the Black Hills area. But instead it was snowing. Quite a bit. I drove probably 100 miles on snowy/icy roads at 30-40 mph. It was wearing on me. But then it suddenly cleared up, roads were dry, no snow. And warmer. So I was able to finish up the trip with a nice sunset. Did get home a bit late due to the slow travel.

A 3 shot of the morning, mid day snow and evening. Made it home safe. And with me was another special item I actually bought months ago, but just got over Christmas - ANOTHER bike! A real actual high end road bike. It's used, well used, but in pretty nice shape. I'm developing plans for some upgrades to this bike, of course! I'll have some posts on that in the future. 

See you next year!

From Many, One

Many parts, and much time and too much money = One custom bike!

A couple months ago I posted about my project bike. I finally got most of the parts I wanted. Ended up with a long chrome non-suspension fork, as the springer types weren't long enough due to this bikes long headtube. And a smaller, mag style 20 inch front wheel. Which doesn't match the back, unfortunately. Big chrome handlebars, better derailleur, better brakes (important because now it has ONLY rear brakes). Lots of miscellaneous little parts and details. This photo shows the original bike and the parts for the big conversion.

It took quite a while, some of the parts like the fork I changed as I went. Took longer to get it all together, and the brakes were one of the last things to finish as I changed levers, so I couldn't ride it outside. But I did get it all working, and have ridden it inside on the trainer. So it's pretty much ready to go, as is...

What do you think? It's probably 90% finished. Still need to add the computer, tool bag, some chrome fenders, headlight and a few other small details. I already think I'd like to put on a wire spoke front wheel, with a disc brake, which I can mount to the new fork. I just need to find a wheel with the mechanical disc brake. I like the look of the 20 inch front wheel. But a 24 inch is also a very possible setup. The banana seat is a little harder and less comfortable than I expected, but for this bike style is important! All my bikes have nicknames, but I still haven't come up with one for this one yet.

Overall, I think it looks pretty unique. Looking forward to some nicer weather so I can get some real road testing done soon!

Up In Smoke

Maybe Cheech and Chong were in the area. More on that in a bit.

Got out for my hike. Weather had been cool, but got nicer today. But it hasn't rained, and the wind was blowing directly from the direction of the fires. So expected some smoke.

Got started, wasn't bad at all. But could see some very thick smoke obscuring horizon to the west. Situation the same as last week - dull muted greens and yellows, with many leaves already gone.

Did find a few colors here and there. This orange-ish tree was about the best I could find all day.

A nice little sort of lean-to shelter of tree branches built by someone over time.

Another three shot pano of a pond. Just like last week.

A pair of deer. Saw two different small groups of deer today. No mooses, elks or other critters unfortunately. Sometimes you see them, sometimes you don't.

As the day went on, the wind changed more to the wrong direction. Though it was harder to see when you're down in the trees, when you come out on a high spot wow was it getting smoky!

Sky a mix of some clouds and a lot of fire smoke. The farther away you could see, the more yellowish and lost in the smoke everything became. And it was really smelling like a campfire.

The sun turned orange/red depending on how much smoke there was. By late afternoon, it was almost orange light. Felt like maybe I was walking on Mars! Perhaps the sky was colorful to make up for the lack of color on the ground? Headed home and washed the smoke out!

Ablaze

Because of the fall colors!

Or not.

This fall has been weird. Its stayed VERY warm and dry. Maybe that's why the fall colors are very disappointing. At least to me. Went out hiking at one of my favorite spots to capture some color. But most of it escaped!

Lots of trees are still green. But its a kind of a dull, fading green. That seems to be turning gray. The trees that are yellow are mostly a very dull yellow. Hardly any bright fall colors anywhere. Just lots of muted colors and green-ish leaves. And other spots where all the leaves are down already. Color me unimpressed! But, lets try to salvage something anyway.

Probably one of my more picturesque shots of the day. A three shot pano of a beaver pond. Not my first choice for areas, but one of the more colorful areas I could find. Looks pretty good. Also, one of the few areas with any standing water. Many of the little marshy ponds here are totally dried up cracked mud.

Lots of rock features here. Lots of people climb those rocks. I just admire them. Picture was just ordinary, but I added an oil paint effect to make it a little different. I think it helped.

Last shot for this post. Just a collection of clouds cruising along the sky. Temps were upper 70s. Pretty nice for late September. On the right of the photo, the haziness is from smoke. There are some forest fires burning farther west and south of here, and smoke was just on the edge of where I was.

Planning to hike next week in my other favorite spot. Check for colors (not expecting much) and hoping there isn't much smoke. Guess we'll know in a week...

Ow!!!!

Well, that was unpleasant.

Last Saturday, after some cool and rainy weather, we got a couple hour break of warm and sun in the afternoon. Decided to take the MTB out for a quick ride.

Should have stayed home.

I headed for the greenway. The concrete bike path through town. Usually always a good ride. But not today...

From the earlier rain, some things were still a bit damp. I ride a short distance on a unpaved road from where I live to the Greenway. The first thing I hit on the Greenway is a short downhill into a sweeping right turn. Traveling under 15 mph (cause that's the max shown on my computer). Banked around the turn as I've done hundreds of times. But this time something different happened.

The rear wheel suddenly slid out under me like I hit a sheet of ice. And I was sliding on the concrete on my right side. It was over in seconds. No broken bones or anything like that. But my right hand took a hit, with several bleeding scrapes. My right leg got it worse. One small scrape, one slightly larger that was bleeding a fair amount, a bigger raw area near knee, but it wasn't bleeding. And a sizable scrape halfway down leg probably an inch or two wide and 5-6 inches long.

Ow!!!

Post-crash analysis tells me that even though the greenway itself was dry, my drive on the damp dirt road got the tires to hold some dirt/sand. Once at the greenway, all was ok. But the edges of the tires were still gritty. Once I banked in to the curve, the gritty sidewall was the contact area. And physics took over and down I went.

Bike took a little abuse too. Similar to me. Scraped off the edge of the handlebar grip, and the rear derailleur. Almost shredded the shift cable. With a little filing and some paint, had it back to good shape. Later discovered I needed to straighten the derailleur hanger, think it got bent a bit as well.

So, bike is healed up. And me, I'm working on it. Getting there, but it takes a bit longer. Got lots of midly touchy scabs on leg though! I have pictures, but I think I'll leave them off this particular post.

Today took my first ride - on the same bike. Did the ride I was going to do a week ago. All went fine. No crashes. Going a bit easier as the leg can feel a bit sore at times. But back on the horse!

Mystery Revealed!

Not that much of a mystery, really.

Picked up a basic 7 speed cruiser bike for a closeout price a few months back. Performance Bicycle Americano with an aluminum frame and 26 inch wheels.

Decent but basic. The components are all pretty cheap, but after some tweaking by me, they work ok. Here's the bike in its nearly stock condition -

My plans for it are quite extensive. I'm planning to make a sort of custom bike, inspired partly by chopper bikes, low rider bikes and the old Schwinn Sting-Ray style bike.

Almost all the parts will change. I bought it mostly for the full size frame, to use as my starting point. Been figuring parts for it, getting ready to start ordering. And do more figuring. As I haven't entirely decided some things. Like the size of the front wheel (probably smaller, but how much?) and the fork (springer or straight chrome or suspension?) and so on.

But for now I'm just riding it around, enjoying it as is. Before things get crazy!

Taking A Bath

Just got back from a summer vacation trip. Visit family, do some chores, ride bike, take a few photos, etc.

Weather was all over the place. From beastly hot and humid to stormy to almost cool. Typical northern plains summer weather.

Took my old (like 30 yrs old) mountain bike to do some riding with my brother. My trip could be divided up into 4 major legs. And on every leg of the trip, I got rained on quite extensively. As my bike was in the bed of my pickup, it got to take a bath. Four times! I covered the seat once, and took it off once. Because I just knew it was going to get soaked. Again. And it did!

Clouds, rain, rain, clouds. But, the clouds were pretty cool looking!

A change of pace. A shot of fire! Helping dad burn piles of old tree limbs and yard debris. Something he occupies a lot of his summer time with.

Here's OB (Old Blue - my brother's old Trek MTB) and ROB (Really Old Blue - my 30 yr old Supergo MTB. The one that got plenty of free washes this trip) back at Urtle Tate for some trail riding. Discovered that there are several new recently finished trails, along with some others still being put in. Very nice!

And on my way back home, more clouds, more rain! Pretty good trip overall though, had a good visit.

Shine AND Sparkle

Welcome to July 4th. Happy Birthday America! Time for fireworks!

As mentioned in the previous post, I was planning to go to a car show. Which I did! I almost didn't find it. Was nowhere to be found in the park, but it was in the fairgrounds area I noticed as I was about to leave. Warm day, but with some clouds on the horizon.

There was an assortment of all kinds of cars. Classics, hot rods, modern, trucks, old cars. Mostly all American, but what's this?

A couple Italians at the show! A Ferrari and a Lamborghini. Must be nice to have that kind of disposable income.

Since it's July 4th, and this is the USA, the rest of these are all American! As in American Motors!

Detail shot of a very nice 1970 AMX. Some Red, White and Blue in the circle. I have a full shot of this car from a older Superday post on here.

Another 1970 AMC, this one the Red White and Blue version of the Rebel Machine. Also featured on a previous blog post.

A sort of - an old Willys wagon, that would later become Jeep. This one was in pretty decent shape, was Red and White. It appeared to have a pretty recent but not very good paint job. Kinda runny. I fixed that and then made it black and white - my DHCBWOCHO for this show!

But, enough of the 'shine', time for the 'sparkle'!

Had a pretty strong thunderstorm and rain in the early evening. But then it cleared out and dried up, and the fireworks were on!

A pretty evenly matched set of bursts. Nicely balanced.

A couple little starbursts, surrounded by some big sparkles.

A bit busier with multiple bursts here.

Last shot, with multiple fireworks. I like the blue kind of foggy streaks in the center.

Took all the car shots with the new K-01 camera, fireworks were half the new camera, half the old camera. We're definitely into summer now!

Not So Super Day

Went to Superday this year. The annual kids day at the park. With many food vendors, assorted kids rides and activities, exhibits, and in my opinion WAY to many vendors selling products/services. Seems like its becoming more and more a business day in the park.

The not so super part is the new Mayor of the city made some changes. The worst was eliminating the car show. Which has always been a huge part of the day. And gives the adults something to do. They eliminated a few other events they've done in the past. I guess that's called progress?

I went and wandered around. Wanted to take some car photos with my new camera! Instead I took some random photos around the park. Which was ok too. Lets get to that shall we?

I took my 'new' K-01 camera, along with a 21 mm wide angle and a 10-17mm fisheye zoom.

Closeups of a nice white flower in a flower bed.

A small bubbling fountain outside the Botanic Gardens building

A weed shot with a very narrow depth of field. These kind of shots are a little trickier to get with this mirrorless camera, looking at focus on the back screen. And the breeze blowing the weeds around sure doesn't help.

The only shot with the fisheye zoom. Angled so theres really no fisheye distortion. Just a nice day on the lake.

While the lack of car show made Superday considerably less super for me, there is a bit of good news! On July 4th, along with fireworks that night, there will be a car show that day. So maybe I can make up for it soon!

And So It Begins...

Starting a new mystery project.

What is it?

Gee, I wonder what it is? It's orange, I'm pretty sure.

More details to come in the future...

Total K-0!

K-01, actually.

Pentax K-01. My 'New' camera. New to me. It's actually used, I just bought it online from a guy (in Hawaii!) planning to upgrade.

I bought another Pentax because, well, that's what all my lenses are! And I can use them all on this camera.

I posted about getting rid of my K10D Pentax DSLR last year. Since then I haven't been able to use any of my lenses. That was a full on DSLR, 10 megapixel camera. It was good for it's time, but became outdated.

This new camera is 'different'. It uses regular DLSR lenses. But its the only Mirrorless design SLR that Pentax ever produced. Being mirrorless, it has no eyepiece, prism or mirror like DSLRs. You just look at the scene on the monitor on the back. It's supposed to make the camera smaller, and other brands that make mirrorless cameras ARE smaller. But they have different lenses for those cameras. Pentax kept their old DSLR mount for the camera so you could use the old lenses. Which is great. But the design makes the camera almost the same size as a regular DSLR.

It is a unique looking camera. Controversial. Much maligned. It was designed by Marc Newson, an Australian industrial designer. The camera itself is very well made. All metal body, with rubber grips. Very solid. But it looks like a brick. Handles like a brick. Its far from 'ergonomic'. Probably went a little to far to form over function. It's very usable as it is, but certainly could be better. There are workarounds, such as adding stick on grips to the front and back. Which I'm planning to do.

You wouldn't be wrong thinking it looks like its designed for kids by Fisher-Price. They even made it in some colors like bright yellow and bright blue.

But its actually a pretty decent camera. It came out in 2012, about 6 years ago. A very good Sony 16 megapixel sensor. Lots of capabilities and features. Current cameras with this size of sensor usually have 24 MP sensors. But that's some of what 6 years of progress get ya, for more $.

Here's the front of the camera. With my old hand strap attached I had on my DSLR.

The back. No articulated screen which would be nice. But I can live without it. 

The camera was in great shape. Other than a few small scratches the prior owner got on it during a hike, it looks almost like new. And, its only had a little over 1700 photos taken with it. Which is nothing for a 6 year old camera. Came with all the parts and accessories, all for just under $200!

My plan is to use this for a while. While waiting for Pentax to come out with a camera I really want. They have 3 DSLRs out right now, each has features I like and don't like. I'm holding out hope they'll come out with a camera in the future with ALL the features I want, and none of the features I don't. Probably won't happen. They'll probably go out of business before that happens, as they're more of a niche camera company all the time. Unfortunately.

Finishing up with a big and little shot -

Here's my physically smallest (21mm) and biggest (55-300mm) lenses mounted on the camera.

Shots USING the camera? Patience! Soon seeing them you will be, hmmm?

Head For The Hills

Just cause I'm going out for a hike. Nothing else.

Yet...

Anyway, after a seemingly endless cold and wet spring, we finally got some drier, warmer weather. It only comes in spurts. We get a couple nice days, followed by a week of cold and rain. Some spring this year.

Visited the nearby State Park again for a free visit 'kids' day. Free is always fine by this kid! There were a fair number of people about, but attendance seemed definitely lower than past years. But I never saw much promotion for it this year. Saw a Giant sponsored mountain bike trial ride trailer at the main trail head. And it looked pretty much deserted. Huh.

On to a few photos!

Big rock face. Looks Grumpy. But its actually called the Chameleon I believe.

A frozen shot of a small water feature along the stream. Looked kinda nice on the warm day. But the water is actually very cold. And a little too fast moving right there anyway. People were kayaking and canoeing a little ways farther along where it begins turning into the reservoir.

A neat little crown or halo of some yellow flowers along a trail. I was expecting more wildflowers since it had been so wet, but maybe it was a little early since it just warmed up. Bugs weren't a problem either. Always a plus.

That's all for this hike. Coming soon - some NEW (to me) camera tech! 

Countdown

A year from now, in May 2019 the Union Pacific is marking the 150th Anniversary of the completion of the transcontinental railroad. The plan is to take the only restored and (hopefully) operational Big Boy locomotive to the event.

I last saw the train four years ago, when they brought it to the UP Steam Shop here in town from California. That was the last Depot Days I went to. With the deadline approaching, thought I'd go back and see how 4 years work has progressed.

Here's a quick link to that post: http://spiritboxstudio.blogspot.com/2014/05/caution-big-boy.html

The Depot Days are still the same as before - a lot of interesting trains, but my feelings haven't changed from four years ago. All the interesting old stuff is cordoned off, you can't go into any of the trains anymore, it's just too limited and restricted for me. But it's still interesting for a few photos.

The Big Boy is - in parts. Lots of parts. Apparently the tear down is done, most everything has been repaired or rebuilt. Custom made parts are done or in the process, and they are beginning to reassemble the train. Though it looks to me like they have a looooong way to go. Considering they have less than a year to get it all together, finished, tested and operational. But they're committed to having it ready for next May. Barring any unexpected major problems, they'll likely do whatever they need to get 4014 back on the rails.

Here's some of the main drive wheels waiting to get reinstalled. Serious Heavy Metal! The cab for the train was just to the left of these wheels, it still needed some work done on it. Behind the wheels you can see some of the 844 'Living Legend' locomotive. Another shot of that one coming up soon...

The front undercarriage of the engine. Lots of parts here look like they've been rebuilt, it's painted and probably just waiting for a few other things before it can be put back in place. You can see the front of the locomotive behind it

This wide shot shows the whole boiler of the train as it is today. There were people working on it as the open house was going on. Looks a little more like a missile than a train right now with all the other parts removed. More work to be done before it can get painted and start reinstalling everything, but I'm sure it'll start looking like a Big Boy before long.

But I didn't come just to see the progress on the Big Boy. I snapped a few more photos on the rather chilly day. But it was better than the day before when it rained all day.

Here's a head-on shot of the 844 'Living Legend'. The last steam locomotive built for the Union Pacific. And the only steam locomotive never officially retired. Originally pulling passenger cars, then freight cars, it was finally put on Special Service duty. Which it still does to this day making occasional special excursion trips. The other operational steam locomotive they have, the 3985 Challenger was nowhere to be seen. Must be stored elsewhere currently.

The signal lights atop a slightly weathered old passenger car outside what's left of the Roundhouse in the rail yard. Some of the old train cars are almost like new, other like this are fair but showing some weathering. Others are just rusted, parted out hulks.

I like this somewhat weather beaten sign on the door of the Roundhouse. Inside are a number of older steam and diesel engines currently. In various conditions. Everything shows its age, just like this worn sign on the worn door of a worn old building. But they just keep on.

Outside the Roundhouse were these two old cabooses. Pretty weathered and rusted, I went with a basic black & white look for these two tired old cars.

This is an old GM Electro-motive diesel engine. These were some of the first "streamlined" diesel engines that replaced all the steam locomotives. Before they were replaced by the newer diesel locomotives still in use today. There are a couple of these older diesels in the shop. I don't know if they are operational, but they sure look like they are. They look almost like new.

Probably my favorite shot of the day. This old engine spends its days looking out the Roundhouse windows, across the railroad tracks at the restored UP Depot. Longing for the days of being out on the rails, now just watching "the kids" go by every day with their loads...

That's it for my return to Depot Days. The Countdown is on! Will Big Boy 4014 make it? Guess we'll  know in about a year.

Blue Christmas

Took a trip to visit some family for the holiday. Unfortunately had some less than cheerful family things going on this year. But that is life.

Just a couple photos from the trip.

A colorful sunset with some HDR during the drive. It's almost a Van Gogh!

Took a bunch of Christmas tree light streak effect shots. It turned out ok. Most of the shots I got looked much like past ones I've done.

Weather was dry and unusually warm for trip up. Got super cold while I was there, and somewhat snowier for my return. But not stormy when I had to travel. Last year there was a blizzard on Christmas day, so overall the weather was WAY better!