A Joshua Tree

Sorry for the sporadic posting of photographs, I have been in Chicago since last Tuesday and still have 4 days to go. Unfortunately I haven't managed to get out much to take many photos either because of the work I'm doing here. Today the plan is to head to Downtown Chicago and go up the Hancock Tower, lets hope.

The photo today is of the whole reason that Joshua Tree National Park got it's name, The Joshua Tree. 

Desert Water

Desert Water was taken in Joshua Tree National Park. This was a normally dry creek, close to Keys Ranch that had still not dried out from a snow storm a couple of weeks before. This area was really pretty in the morning sunshine, although it was a little chilly and even colder when the wind picked up a bit later on in the morning.

The Jerry Can

This is a photograph I took at Keys Ranch in Joshua Tree National Park. It's a wonderfully preserved area and only accessible via a guided tour. Time has truly stood still at Key Ranch. The photograph is over a Willys Jeep parked and left to rust away in Keys Ranch. Also spread around the area is a lot of other old cars, trucks and parts of old vehicles. A ranch house and a workshop is also there left as the owners left them. As far as the name of the photograph, I gave that name after leaving the color of the cans in the trailer. As a kid growing up my dad had a couple of jerry cans he kept in the garage with fuel for the lawn mower. These can were old Army surplus that dated back to WWII. The reason for their name, they were named after the people that designed them initially, the Germans (Jerry being the name the Germans were called during WWII). In fact the Jerry can has an interesting history that can be read here.

My Weekend

Saturday was a fun day that kicked off at just before 7am at a Visitors Centers in the town of Joshua Tree. Once we had all met up and signed in we headed into Joshua Tree National Park for a long, full day of photography with an instructor. We got to go to some weird and wonderful places that are generally not accessible to the public. Then towards the end of the day we took a hike with all our gear to a place called Ryan Ranch. It was built in the 1890's by the Ryan family and today is just ruins of it's former self due to vandalism and natural deterioration. One of the more interesting things we saw at Ryan Ranch was 3 graves that are placed nearby with the year 1897 painted on the rocks above them.

One of the people in the class with me was Elsa, our accountant at work, this is her photographed above. It had been a long day and the tiredness from the hiking through the desert and an early start was beginning to show for all of us. Unfortunately for Elsa, she sat still long enough that I got to photograph her.

Top Secret Mission

This is the last Mission Inn photograph I will post for a while. It was taken from one of the roof top walkways and gardens at The Mission Inn here in Riverside. It amazes me the secret places that The Mission Inn hides and yet you go inside and these places are there for you to see and walk around. Definitely worth a visit. I was originally going to post this as a color photograph, but I thought the black & white one looked better. If you want to see the color version click here.

On a different note Friday I leave for a photography workshop in Joshua Tree National Park. I am so looking forward to that. Then Tuesday next week it's Chicago here I come for 10 days. I have a weekend in Chicago this time, so hopefully I'll find some more places to photograph and share with you.

Riverside, Pre Sunrise

This is Downtown Riverside prior to sunrise, well it may be after sunrise but the clouds took care of us knowing one way or another. I thought today I would show you why I love HDR (High Dynamic Range) photographs. The photograph above was made up of 3 photographs taken of the same scene at three different exposures. The three then got blended together to show what was in the highlights and the shadows of each one and bring out a greater tonal range. If I hadn't have used the HDR technique the photograph I would have ended up with is shown below. I'm sure you will agree when I say "I prefer the one above"?

These were taken from about 3/4's of the way up Mount Rubidoux last Saturday.

Building Blocks

Today's photograph is another one that I took at The Mission Inn Hotel here in Riverside. This is on a balcony looking down on the courtyard at the entrance to the Wedding Chapel. I still have trouble believing just how beautiful The Mission Inn is and how much is packed into this amazing building. It reminds me of a project we once did in junior school. We each had to build a castle out of household waste items such as cereal boxes and drink bottles. Then we connected them all the individual ones together and made a giant castle. That's how I can imagine The Mission Inn being built, as every turn seems to have some different architecture. 

The Peace Tower

One of the places that I have seen and heard of and never really wanted to visit, (mainly because it involved physical exercise) was Mount Rubidoux here in Riverside. Well all that changed on Saturday, when a couple of guys from our informal photography club and myself decided to hike up and take some sunrise photographs. Of course mother nature as per the previous few weekends did her bit and nearly rained us off, but we got a day of no rain and took the hike. We met at 5:30am and headed up. Now all I ever saw of Mount Rubidoux was the cross at the top and I didn't think it was that big, until I saw it. What really fascinated me though was the other monuments and buildings up there. We stopped and took some lack of sunrise shots overlooking the City of Riverside and then walked up towards the summit.

Then after a short walk I get my first glimpse of The Peace Tower and Friendship Bridge (photographed above). They were built in 1925 as a surprise for Frank Miller, co owner of Mount Rubidoux and founder of The Mission Inn Hotel in Riverside, while he was away on a trip to China and Japan. On the south side of the Friendship Bridge is a plaque commemorating an incident in the 1932 Olympics held in Los Angeles (Click here to view a photograph of it). A Japanese contestant turned his horse aside from its final jump because it had developed a limp indicating a severe injury. Had it jumped, the rider almost certainly would have won, but most likely the horse would have had to be destroyed. The plague was the idea of Frank Miller, who had earned the highest civilian award in Japan for his effort to foster friendly relations between the USA and Japan.

By the way as hikes go, it's not too bad, except the next day my calf muscles ACHE!!!!

The Chapel

This is another photograph I took at the Mission Inn on Tuesday evening. It's of the entrance to the St. Francis of Assisi Wedding Chapel. The Mission Inn is pretty amazing as you are pretty much free to explore it on your own, (although tours are offered.)  When we got up to the first floor the scene that greeted me was yesterdays photograph; then we wondered around a little more and walked into a large courtyard and the entrance to the chapel. If you ever have a chance to visit do so, you will be amazed at what's inside.

Night Time Inn

 I know I have posted photographs of the Mission Inn in Riverside before but, never anything from inside it. The main reason for that is I always thought inside it was just another boring hotel. Yes maybe a little older and prettier but just another hotel. Well last night that all changed for me when our Travel photography class took a field trip to the mission Inn. Unbeknown to me there is a chapel and an amazing courtyard. You can go up to the top and have a view of the City of Riverside. So over the next couple of days I will share some of the beauty of the Mission Inn with you.

Update on Wednesday, March 3, 2010 at 10:47AM by [Martin]

So I had a bit more time to see what I could do with the photograph I posted above and maybe improve it a little. Tell me what you think?