Urban

Jaywalking, construction, hot dog vendors. Three things that Toronto has in common with NY.

Toronto dogs are better though.

I miss real cities

Toronto reminds me of New York, which reminds me of Toronto.

Get to travel again....

With my favourite.

*edit picture removed*

This one is from our last trip together to NY. I'm going to try and get some of my favs up.

Where sheep go to heaven

Getting to the last of the Ireland pics. These last several were taken towards the end of my Ireland trip. I decided to climb yet another hill to see some ancient burial grounds. What the short hike really turned out to be however was some kind of sheep heaven. Despite not seeing a soul around, these sheep seemed totally comfortable around me as I walked by. Most in fact glared at me. So I took a picture.

180 degrees

Climbing my last hill/mountain I was lucky to have the cloud cover break for moments at a time. The following two are examples of those lucky moments when the sun streaks through and warms the surrounding hillside. The first is looking out towards the setting sun, the second is the hillside that caught some sun. You can see how dark the sky would have been otherwise.

bogs

I think I mentioned earlier that Ireland had a lot of bogs due to the climate and rapid deforestation. The pics below were from a National Park. Not just any park mind you, a bog park. The yellowish orange ground you see is in fact what a bog looks like. It's METERS deep and is mostly moss, decaying plant matter and detritus.

lonely trees

There aren't a lot of trees in Ireland. There used to be though, but they were all chopped down for their wood and for land. The result is that Ireland has one of the largest bogs in the world, and there are a lot of lonely trees.

roads

For the most part, Ireland had some very nice roads. If the freeways in Los Angeles were used as a comparison, it was much like driving on a fine silk, whereas, LA roads would be very close to that nasty pair of socks you keep forgetting to throw away. Holes, stains, lint balls. You get the idea. Here are some I travelled during my stay.

Patterns

Everything was so blue up in Calgary and BC, that I tried to find things with interesting patterns or colours.

Peaks

Just a sample of more peaks from my Calgary/BC trip.

I like this one because it makes the hill look like a miniature model.

thank you!

20080119_coast_020, originally uploaded by akim_hobo.

Beach

Gonna hit the beach this weekend.
Why?
Because it's been a long time, and my nostrils are clogged with pollution.

The city

We made it to San Francisco :)

secret spot

Ok, well not so secret, but it was found partly by memory, and perhaps a little bit of luck. If you drive up the coast there is a water fall that spills into a small cove. The view is nice.

backlog

Due to my laziness I've accumulated a backlog of photos, so I'll be posting in twos or threes now.

These are from the same trip up the coast.

My favourite kind of trip

20080119_coast_07, originally uploaded by akim_hobo.

My girlfriend. My camera. Good times. Can't wait until our next one.

white on green

Ireland 2007, originally uploaded by akim_hobo.

Ok so it looks more like puke green, but I think that has something to do with the late afternoon sun that was streaking through the valley at the time. I though it would be a nice break from all the white on blue I've been posting lately. Oddly enough, this was also taken out of a moving car. Maybe I should start a blog just on that.

Tilted

20080218_lakelouise_kicking_164, originally uploaded by akim_hobo.

Sure it's tilted, off center, blurry. That's what you get when you take a picture out of a rapidly moving car. The sky was so perfect and the trees so generously holding onto their dustings of snow that I had to give it a try.

This was on our way back to Calgary from Kicking Horse.

Kicking Horse

20080217_lakelouise_kicking_081, originally uploaded by akim_hobo.

I have to say, out of all the different ski resorts I've been to. Kicking Horse in BC has got to have one of the most consistently beautiful views. I had to ski like a little girl for most of the day to avoid landing on my camera gear, but it was worth the captures.

By "little girl" I of course mean, "awesome little girl"

Barely touched

Ireland 2007, originally uploaded by akim_hobo.

You would think that this is an example of a highly retouched photo, but it's not. Not to say I didn't tweak things here and there, but in large the sky really was this crazy beautiful that day. I forgot exactly where, but I remember I was in a valley and the light was gorgeous.