The day ended with the transmission going out in my car. I guess 12,049 miles did it in. At least I wasn’t on the other side of the country when it happened…

The next day we stopped off in Columbus, Ohio around lunch time. It was a Saturday and the city was very quiet. After driving up and down some of the main streets trying to find a place to eat we saw a crowd of people standing in front of a place called Dirty Frank’s Hot Dog Palace. This was definitely the right place. A hot dog joint that was packed. What more could you want? I had a Hot Bollywood with spicy mango chutney (which was quite good). And the photo is of Trey’s Octodog.

Finally Saturday night we arrived home. The final reading on the odometer was 12,049 in total miles over 61 days covering 22 states ad one province. All in all a very successful journey. Stay posted for more to come though…

After the city museum checked out the Gateway Arch and then we went looking for somewhere to cool off. We didn’t really find anywhere but did make a stop at Forest Park where we saw the egret pictured below. So we headed back to Laurie’s and hit her pool for a while. Kids were happy!

We then went on a trolley ride around town before grabbing lunch (and a milkshake) at The Hop Diner and then starting our drive north.

I can’t say just how great it is to be back with my kids. Homeward bound!

Kansas City impressed me as a city on its way up. It seems like there is a lot of money being spent on redevelopment. I rode my bike around and checked out some of the various downtown areas including a ride over to the Jazz District at 18th & Vine. The first four building images below are from the Sprint Center. From there I rode over to the Crown Center and came across the fountains. This is one of those zero-level open-air type fountains. It was plenty hot (I wasn’t missing the West Coast’s lack of humidity) so I thought it would be a fun picture and feel good to ride my bike through. It took several tries with the self-timer before I got a shot I was happy with. Just as I was viewing the final photo I was approached by a security guard. “You are not allowed to ride bikes in the fountain… in fact there is no bike riding in this whole concourse.” “Really? I didn’t see any signs.” “No, that’s why I’m here. And what are you taking pictures of?” “Me riding my bike through the fountain.” “Oh.”

I don’t usually take photographs of other people’s art. So, while I’ve seen many great murals (and Kansas City has more than its fair share of really nice ones) they generally are not my subject matter. The Michael Jackson mural however was just so well done that I thought I’d share it. What you can’t see from this image is that his sun glasses are made of mirrors and a semi-reflective metallic tin-foil-like material. It really set off the whole piece.

The spice photos are from the City Market. A scoop of spices was only $1.00 so I had to pick up a scoop or two from Katie & Maggie who were fun to talk with. I did some internet research on where to get some Bar-B-Q and was recommended to try LC’s Bar-B-Q located at 5800 Blue Parkway. The sandwich doesn’t look like much to write home about, but man was it good. The beef practically melts in your mouth and the sauce is to die for. When I finished I said some brief words to a gentleman a table over. It turned out to be LC himself and we got to talking. I got the impression that he could talk days about Bar-B-Q and cooking in general. He even popped into the DVD player an episode of Bar-B-Q with Bobby Flay that aired on the Food Network. He was A LOT of fun to talk with and his laugh was nothing short of infectious. What a great way to end my stay in KC.

Further along the way I pulled over to the No Name rest area outside of Glenwood Springs, Colorodo. As it turned out this rest area was also a jump off point to enter the local bike trail. I considered going for a ride, but instead decided to continue on in the car. In hindsight I will consider that to be one of my bigger mistakes of the trip. As I drove on in the car the views were spectacular with the rapids of the Colorado and the white water rafters taking on its challenge. I would definitely recommend (without actually doing it myself) that anyone traveling this stretch of road with a bike plan for the time to pull over and try this trail out. I wanted to just watch the scenery, but wasn’t able to as intently as I could have if I were biking while driving some 70 or so MPH.

The morning brought biking around Denver and taking in the city. There are 3 things that I found surprising about Denver. 1) It is flat. Denver was one of the flattest cities that I’ve biked in. 2) The mountains are barely visible and don’t play a significant role in the downtown cityscape. 3) That I didn’t see a single cowboy-ish looking person. So with my new found understanding of what Denver was I ended up doing a lot of abstract architectural photography. I was then heading back to my car when I saw the signage on the City Grille. It was only 11:00AM (10:55 actually as I had to wait for them to open) and I wasn’t that hungry, but some signs just cannot be ignored. I was not disappointed.

The weather was also starting to turn. What had been a perfectly clear day was giving way to a rather unsettled day. Clouds prevailed and distant storms threatened. Regardless as sunset approached I headed out to what is billed as the world’s most famous arch, Delicate Arch (which is supposed to be best photographed at sunset). The map indicated a 1 1/2 mile walk each way. It felt substantially longer but it was a very interesting walk none-the-less.  Delicate arch is on the edge of a large bowl formation that had a steep long pitch into the center of the “bowl”. I treaded carefully on the outer rim of the bowl while a 7 year old scooted along close to the steeper part. Then he dropped his water bottle which made a quick descent into the center. He almost followed. It would have been bad. Very bad. Just about when I had had enough of photographing the Delicate Arch the storm clouds were becoming more threatening and the lightning strikes appeared to be getting closer. I made a hasty return to my car seeing as how my tripod shared all too many similarities to a lightning rod and there were many large open high spaces that I had to transgress to get back to my car. I made it. Unstruck by lightning. Again, danger averted. I grabbed some quick shots of the Wolfe Ranch and faked a sunset to give it a little more zing.

On the way back from Delicate Arch one of the far off thunderstorms was kicking up over the Fiery Furnace. I had to stop and take a series of pictures capturing lightning strikes over the formation. My favorite of the batch is posted (though there were several cool ones), which also may be my favorite from the whole Arches collection. Again… it goes back to the uniqueness thing. No other image is exactly like this one and in fact there would be relatively few that are even similar.

The images of Marceau are of the one other person who was at the same location as I was to photograph the sunrise. He was from Zurich, Switzerland. And finally, Tom was a tour guide with another group. He was just so interesting looking that I had to ask if I could take his picture.

The first would be an “Intro to Photography” workshop that would cover the basics of making a better photograph, be it with a nice DSLR, a point and shoot camera, an IPhone, on Film, whatever you choose. The basics of taking a better photograph are basically the same no matter what camera you are shooting with. Higher-end cameras do offer additional versatility in setup, however composition (which typically supersedes everything else) is consistent with all formats.

The second possibility would be “Using a Single Off-Camera Light to Augment Your Creativity”. As the name would suggest it would be using off-camera remote flashes to create more dynamic looking lighting. The images below are just some examples of times I have used an off camera light during this trip to make a more compelling shot.

I would likely be doing these workshops in the Harrisburg area but would be open to traveling if the circumstances were right. I can be contacted through the comment box below or at tom(at)tomwenger.com if you have any interest in either of these workshops.