Bill's Blog

St. Augustine, FL
November 28, 2018

The Santa Maria Restaurant opened in the '40's on St. Augustine's waterfront, next to the popular downtown. In 2015 it was sold and closed down. An ongoing battle between the new owners and the city left the once popular landmark desolate and abandoned. The hurricanes and storms have not been kind, causing more damage with each passing year. The big sign on the roof is gone and the walkway to the building is collapsing.

This is an ongoing series, now going back over four years. Visit my Out of Business gallery to see all the images.    

      November 27, 2018

Signs x 2

November 27-29, 2018

St. Augustine Seawall at Sunrise

November 28, 2018

From Wikopedia:

Tulum (Spanish pronunciation: [tuˈlum], Yucatec: Tulu'um) is the site of a pre-Columbian Mayan walled city which served as a major port for Coba, in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo.The ruins are situated on 12-meter (39 ft) tall cliffs along the east coast of the Yucatán Peninsula on the Caribbean Sea in the state of Quintana Roo, Mexico. Tulum was one of the last cities built and inhabited by the Maya; it was at its height between the 13th and 15th centuries and managed to survive about 70 years after the Spanish began occupying Mexico. Old World diseases brought by the Spanish settlers appear to have resulted in very high fatalities, disrupting the society and eventually causing the city to be abandoned. One of the best-preserved coastal Maya sites.

From our visit:

Lily, our guide.

The Castle

The building was deliberately built crooked. Something to do with the alignment with the sun.

Tulum was a great Mayan seaport, built on a cliff beside the ocean.

It looks all nice and manicured. The ruins are surrounded by jungle on three side and ocean on the fourth. It is only accessible by walking down a road through the jungle.

I pushed the contrast and saturation to bring out the carvings. See the face at the bottom?

Seaport

The Mayans are gone, but there are still local residents...

Coati

October 30, 2018

More of an ongoing series:

Out of Business:

No more Country Cookin

November 9, 2018

Hurricane Michael hit the Panhandle of Florida on October 10 as a Category 4 storm, winds two miles an hour less than a Category 5. The storm caused huge amounts of damage; everyone saw pictures of the devastation. A month later, on November 8, I drove from I10 down to just north of Wewahitchka in Gulf County, one of the hardest hit areas of the storm. The drive took me through Calhoun County including through the towns of Greensboro and Blountstown.

The talking heads did not do justice to the damage the storm caused. What the news reports do not give you is a sense of the size of the area that the storm hit and the breadth of the damage it caused. Mile after mile, as far as you can see, trees are snapped off like twigs and man-made structures damaged or destroyed.  I have been around for a day or two (no jokes), have seen a lot of storm damage of one kind or another, but nothing prepared me for what I saw on that drive.

There was a lot of work going on, clearing and cleaning up. But even a month after the storm, the damage is astounding.

Here's the thing: everyone donates right after a catastrophic storm, but there is still a huge need in the area for money to rebuild, for food for those who lost homes and jobs, for the basic necessities we take for granted like soap and toilet paper. If you want to help folks, there are lots of agencies still taking donations: reach out to them. We are.   

A few pictures from the drive. We didn't stop to take pictures and do closeups, folks there have enough on their plates without people stopping to take pictures. These were all taken from inside a moving vehicle with my little DX0. 'Most are not the quality I like but they give a sense of what hit the area.   

November 8, 2018

Tampa Harbor

Goodbye, Tampa

Cruising away

Last of Tampa Bay

Sun on the ocean

Sailing into Night

Coming into Key West

Docking

Wilson and a friend at Fantasy Fest- Key West

Departing Key West- sunset

Sunset #2

Flags and Time

Mexican Para-sails

Sunrise #1

Sunrise #2

October 27- November 1, 2018

2018- Hither and Yon slide show.  

The images in this blog are thumbnails... cut down images to fit in a blog. As such, they lose a lot. You can see them in my Galleries as full size images. Click here to go to my 2018 Gallery. From there you can visit my other galleries, going all the way back to 2004. 

A week later, still on Highway 19

Skyway Restaurant: forgotten in time. No building or even the remains of a building around this sign.

Harvest Winds Ministries. No services here for a goodly while.

September 28, 2018

Headed home from north Florida and stopped for a driving break at the Waccasassa River bridge. For all intents and purposes in the proverbial Middle of Nowhere.

(09/23: see Editors Note at end of post)

Trivia: In 1956 John D. McDonald wrote a book centering around the same Waccasassa River bridge

Old white building beside the river. 'Seen it's better days. Strangely, the flag is relatively recent and in good shape.

This once pointed the way to a new development.

And then there is the caboose.

September, 20, 2018

---------------------------------------

Editor's Note, 9/23:

Upon further research, it turns out caboose 0795 is owned by the Levy County Historical Society, when they bought it from a private owner in 2016 and moved it to it's current location. In 2016 they had plans to restore it but very little has been done. There is a proposal before the County Board to move it to the Pat- Mac Wayside Park, just down the road at 5230 SE HWY 19/98 in Gulf Hammock.

The building and caboose are on the Gulf Hammock Wild Hog Canoe Race property, end point of an annual canoe race on the Waccasassa River that has been going on for more than 40 years.

Now you know.

Various and assorted images, in no particular order, from Apalachicola, in Florida's panhandle...

Ghost sign

159-161

Remodeled window

Need your intergalaxy transport repaired? Apalachicola is the place for you.

Bench For Sale

Two images of, apparently, unused doors. Hope there isn't a fire.

Grand old hotel we stayed at.

Waiting for sunset

Former County Jail, now a storage area.

Small for these violent days. Back in the day, the second floor was cells and the first floor living quarters.

Look real carefully at the bottom of the marker. The jail was built in 1949.

Built entirely of bicycle wheels. Didn't see any alligators.

Sunrise exercise

A sidewalk brick. No office in the surrounding area.

Taranto's is for sale

A door less traveled

The tap room at The Owl

Outstanding cuisine

August 25-27, 2018

Day 1:

Day 2:

August 23 & 25, 2018

Many years ago, when I was but a young boy, traveling was not as easy as it is today. Families had big lumbering cars called station-wagons. Windows were cranked, keys were turned, mirrors were manually adjusted and car air conditioning was an awesome new thing most of us didn't have.

Most difficult of all, if you needed to communicate with someone, you searched the road until you saw a blue sign. You approached it and sometimes even had to wait in line, hoping you had change.  People could be looked up and then numbers pushed. The connection was usually scratchy and, if you talked more than three minutes, you needed more coin.

We all know what happened to these old devices: they joined VCR's, photographic film, Blockbuster, maps, and manual transmissions, lost as detritus in time.

Fortunately, a few of these old relics still exist, mostly hidden in out-of-the-way places as reminders that The Good Old Days required effort. Here, from Apalachicola, FL, is a historical relic:

Apalachicola, FL
August, 2018

August 16-17, 2018

On a pier someplace in south Florida...

Boat cleat worn white

Web minus spider

Tallahassee evening Storm Clouds from beginning to end...

Beginning...

Middle...

End.

 July, 2018

My new "little" camera is a French- made DxO One, replacing my venerable little Canon. Pardon me while I wander into camera geekdom: the DxO One is a miniaturized pro- quality camera that shoots RAW, JPG and "Super RAW." It weighs 3.8 ounces, is just under three inches tall and, according to the manufacturer, the lens is made "with six aspherical elements, offering an exceptionally high level of precision while also optimizing acutance."

What makes the DxO unique is that it has a built-in Lightning connector that plugs into an iPhone. The iPhone becomes the viewfinder, focus tool, setting adjuster and flash for the DxO. Click on one of the links in this blurb for more about the camera.

The very best thing about the DxO is its size and portability: Chase Jarvis said it, "The best camera is the one you have with you."

As with all new toys, there is a learning curve. In this case it is fairly steep because the DxO is radically different than any other camera I have used.

The learning curve:

Augusta, GA:

City skyline

Storm over the city

After the storm

Great Hilton Curio property in Augusta

Veranda during the storm

Atlanta airport:

Under construction

Morning Dew

Rain through a hotel window

Home:

A friend

Upper Tampa Bay Park.
4th of July.
Temperature right at 90 degrees and at least 1000 percent humidity. Nice day for a stroll in the park.

June-July, 2018

Various and Assorted;

(all these, and more, are full-size at my 2018 Gallery)

Starting with the Bahamas and The Infamous Birthday Cruise...

Moving air around is important!

Very green

Drtiver and assistant

Always important to have a good pilot.

Looking down at night

Miami

Stormy First Night 1

Stormy First Night 2

Dancing for Dinner

Preparing appetizers

Miami Early Morn

Moving on...

Awaiting mail. Tallahassee.

Tallahassee Gate

Construction

Somewhere on the West Coast of Florida. Old steam Train Locomotive wheel makes up the background.

CLOWN!! Daytona Beach

Daytona Beach in the Round

Pier in the round

Better Days behind the Wynfield, Orlando.

These last two were taken with my new DXO One camera (camera guys, look it up). Definitely a learning curve.

Rainbow at home

Augusta, GA skyline

January - June, 2018

Cruise- looking back to where we were

Cruise Sunset

Cruise- last day sunset

Sunrise through our front door

St. George Island- working toward sunset

St. George Island- end of sunset

St George Island- ocean side sunset

St. George Island- sunset through the brush

St. George Island- getting close to sunset

St. George Island- same shot, later towards sunset

St. George Island- lensball sunset

Daytona Beach- bird and sunrise

Daytona Beach- birds in flight sunrise

Daytona Beach- watching the sunrise

Daytona Beach- palms at sunrise

Daytona Beach- sunrise from a balcony

Daytona Beach- homeless awaking for another day at the beach

January - May, 2018