Welcome to my blog. I document my adventures in travel, style, and food. Hope you have a nice stay!
Saturday was an excursion day with the destination being Angel Island. We could see it pretty well from the Golden Gate Bridge, and it was time to take a closer look. Neither of us had been there before.
Our first full day in San Francisco started near Fisherman's Wharf and ended at the Golden Gate Bridge, with plenty of walking throughout.
Melody is going to an early November conference in San Francisco, so we decided to take some time beforehand to travel around the City by the Bay. We've been here several times before (and I lived in the Bay Area in the 80's) but the last time we didn't spend much time in SF but went up to Mendocino; the time before we went south to San Simeon (and Hearst Castle). This time we're going to all places that we can get to by train, ferry, bus, cable car, or foot.
Melody came upon some free arts tickets, so we took advantage of them. Last Tuesday we heard Till Fellner perform at Meany Hall, and last night we saw Double Indemnity at ACT Theatre. It sounded like a great deal, and we enjoyed ourselves on both nights.
Looking at the lenses I have right now, there's what seems to be a plethora around 50mm. In fact, all the lenses I'm using right now either are 50mm or are close to it. While it would be nice to say there's a master plan behind that, it's really part by design, part coincidence.
A few months ago I rented a Panasonic 7-14mm ultra-wide zoom, and had a great time using it. Since I'm using a micro 4/3 camera, it's the equivalent of 14-28mm on a full-frame camera. Unfortunately, it's very pricey and holds its value well, so the number of times I would use it doesn't justify the expense. However, I noticed that there are some very inexpensive ultra-wide adapters, and thought it would be worth the $10 to experiment with one.
I took the opportunity to rent the Panasonic 7-14mm f/4 ultra-wide zoom the other day. I thought it would be interesting to experiment with such a lens, but didn't anticipate having as much fun as I did.
The past couple weeks have been ones of travel for me, with an emphasis on driving. A couple weeks ago I went through Downey, Phoenix, and Las Vegas, and last Sunday night we got back from a weekend in Spokane. Got to see lots of family, which is always the best part.
One of the reasons I ended up with my Panasonic G2 is the ability to buy adapters for almost any other lens available. Because the camera has no mirror, there's plenty of room for the adapter to place the adapted lens at the correct distance from the sensor (the Nikon F adapter is a hair over an inch long). I don't have a lot of legacy glass, but have had a good time trying them out. It's also a relatively inexpensive way to play with different kinds of lenses, narrowing down where to invest in the future.
This post covers our return to Seattle, as well as some final thoughts.
This narrative covers the second half of our time in London, England.
The last stop on our trip is London, England. Since we'll be there for almost a week, I'll split the narrative of our stay there into two parts.
We traveled back into England to go to York.
We ventured into Scotland and went to Edinburgh to spend a few nights.
We rolled into Keswick as we marked the halfway point of our trip.
The past couple days were spent in North Wales, specifically Conwy and Caernarfon, where we visited the medieval castles.
Stratford-upon-Avon is best known as the hometown of William Shakespeare, and you can see references to him all over. We also made it to Warwick Castle, which has its origins in the Anglo-Saxon era.
The Cotswolds is a group of villages set in rolling hills (wolds). Bath and Stratford-upon-Avon are also considered Cotswolds, but for this part of the trip we centered around Moreton-in-Marsh and Chipping Campden.
This post covers the city of Bath, which is just as well known for its natural springs as for its Roman-era history. It also covers Stonehenge and the village of Lacock (our bus tour started in Bath).
This narrative covers our time in Bristol, where I played sightseer while Melody was at the Plone conference.
