Day 370 – Leaving New York

My last day in New York and one of the last days of my trip began with a walk around Brooklyn.

From there, I went to Penn Station and started walking downtown to Chinatown.

It was another nice and sunny day so there were a lot of people enjoying the weather in the parks and squares.

The people are always what make New York to what it is for me and why I like taking photos around here that much.

Since my flight was only leaving in the evening, I had enough time to chill and enjoy he walk without having to rush.

I enjoy walking around Manhattan, the energy, the noise, the rush but also the pretty laid back vibe and nice people once you step into one of the parks where people unwind.

Chinatown was the last stop before I did head back to Brooklyn to pick up my bag and continue on to the airport.

On my way to JFK, I was treated to a nice sunset as a goodbye present from New York and the US.

Tomorrow morning, I will arrive in Bergen on my way to Edinburgh for the last part of my trip.

Day 369 – NYC Downtown Architecture

After posting a lot of people photos the past days I thought a small change would be good for today’s post.

I started the day with a visit to the WTC Memorial Gardens before meeting a friend for lunch in Jersey.

After lunch I headed back to Manhattan and initially planned to take the Staten Island Ferry but then decided to walk to and across the Brooklyn Bridge.

I really like the Brooklyn Bridge and always try to walk across and take photos whenever I’m in New York.

It also helps that the DUMBO area is very nice to spend time in so crossing the bridge is a nice way to get there.

The weather was great again and when I started walking across the bridge, the sun started to go down so it provided for some nice shadows and light.

The DUMBO area has seen quite a bit of improvement in the times I’ve been there and has now more cafes, restaurants and the parks have also been done up.

There was also a cool and free outdoor cinema screening of Monty Python’s The Quest for the Holy Grail.

Day 368 – Just NY People

One of my favorite places in Manhattan is the High Line, a great park and great use of the old elevated rail tracks, more cities should do this and use the old industrial remnants like this.

Before going to the High Line, I did some walking around and went for a short browse to B&H where I managed to try out the very impressive Sony a7s.

When I set out to go to the High Line, I knew I wanted to post a series of photos from the High Line today.

Well, after taking hundreds of photos, the selection came out slightly different and I ended up with more people photos again.

After walking along the High Line, I started to head back towards Central Park and take more photos along the way.

I managed to also walk past the Flatiron Building, which is a pretty cool building and one of the things I really wanted to see the first time I came to New York.

Despite me thinking about avoiding it, I walked through Times Square again but didn’t spend longer than needed this time round.

BY the time I made it to Central Park it started to get dark so not ideal for photography so I set out to walk back to Penn Station and take the subway from there.

It was another fun day in New York where I walked a lot and took way too many photos.

Day 367 – Different Sides of New York

You never know what you come across when you walk around in New York, even snow in August. In order to come across something new, I decided to go to Brighton Beach and Coney Island today.

I’ve been to New York a few times before and walked down most streets and avenues in Midtown and Downtown Manhattan, been to Brooklyn, Long Island and Staten Island, even to Jersey but never made it to Brighton Beach.

Most times I’ve been in New York it was winter and cold so this was a reason why I didn’t come to Brighton Beach before.

Still, it was time to check it out and being a very nice and sunny day it was perfect to come here.

Getting here, you first notice all the Russians around and how different it feels from the more urban areas of New York.

There area  lot of very interesting people and characters around so it’s worth taking your time to walk along the boardwalk to take it all in.

I had a great time there and it was good to finally be here and see a different side of New York. Towards the evening, I decided to head back to Manhattan.

While I don’t really like Times Square and the area around it, it makes for some interesting photos thanks to the many weird and strange people you can see around.

As usual in New York I took  a lot of photos and by the end of the evening I filled up my SD card and ran out of batteries for my GR.

I will have some more time in New York for more photos in the coming days.

Day 365 – More from Boston

Another nice and sunny day in Boston although it being Sunday there seemed to be less people around, especially around the downtown area.

I decided to go around Chinatown as it seemed to be a good place to see people outside and it’s always interesting. For some reason I also seem to feel more comfortable around there despite standing out more.

Without a set plan, I just walked everywhere where I found or thought I’ll find a photo opportunity.

Some photographers tend to find a good place and wait there for the right photo, I’m not patient enough and always feel that I miss out on other opportunities so prefer to just wander around and find the photo opportunities.

While walking around, I also joined some of the tourist trails to see some of the more important houses and sights.

Since I never know what I will see when walking around and don’t do any proper research of what’s on, I sometimes arrive at festivals but in this case I arrived at the very end when it finished.

The evening I spent walking around before going to the cheapest bar I could find and getting a few beers for a dollar each so this was good.

Tomorrow afternoon I’ll be heading to New York so this was my last evening in Boston.

Day 364 – Boston

It was a nice day in Boston and after having coffee and finding a place I could afford to stay, I went for a walk.

 

Boston is a very nice city and feels very European in a lot of ways, it also has some very expensive hotels and accommodation, even when compared with New York.

I have been to Boston before so as with other places I could just focus on taking photos in places I wanted to revisit or where I knew it would be interesting.

Not feeling like missing out on anything if I skip the sights is a nice thing and frees up my day to take more photos of people.

The weather being nice and the weekend there were a lot of people out in the parks and the downtown area.

The nice thing with Boston is that it’s relatively compact and most things to see are next to each other so you can easily walk everywhere.

It was a nice day in Boston and it’s good to be back here for a short stay before heading to New York.

Day 363 – A Day in DC

After taking the train in the morning, I arrived in Washington DC where I could spend the day. I booked the overnight train to Boston since it allowed me to save on a night in a hotel and would also get me there earlier.

After finding out that they removed all lockers in the station and now want to charge you $20 per item to leave your luggage, I just decided to carry my bag around. This meant I didn’t walk quite as far as I might have done otherwise.

First and last time I was in Washington DC it was under a blanket of snow and I had to climb over the piled up snow in order to cross the streets. This time it was raining and grey in the morning so I was kind of wishing for the snow back. It did stop and clear up by the afternoon though and made walking around nicer.

There were a lot more people out this time round and it was nice to walk around and take photos of people and the sights without being in a rush to see things.

At first I thought to go and see the museums but after a short walk around decided that it’s better to go out and take photos.

The downtown area of Washington DC is quite small so you can easily walk around and see everything in a day. This makes it great for a stopover on the way to a different place by train or plane.

The train to Boston was slightly delayed (almost as expected) but since I wasn’t in a rush and it would be an overnight train it didn’t really matter much. It showed me however that maybe I have been to harsh about the crappy UK trains and them being late all the time.

Day 362 – People in Philly

After sorting my train ticket for Boston, I headed to Old City Coffee to meet well known local street photographer Michael Penn for coffee at his local hangout.

It’s always great to meet other photographers and it was nice to finally meet Michael, I have been following his work for a while so it was nice to have a chat about photography and the Ricoh GR and GRD cameras we both use.

It was very nice to meet up and also see some of the books from his Philadelphia Project. So here a thanks to Michael for meeting up and for the books!

After meeting Michael, I set out do take some photos around Philadelphia and despite taking photos of different things, I ended up with a lot of people photos.

Philadelphia is fairly quiet when compared with New York but here are still a lot of people around and some interesting places to see and visit.

There are a lot of historical places and a lot of these are free to visit so it’s a good place to visit for a day when in New York.

The evening I had some cheap beers in Old City before having another chat about photography with the host on airbnb.

I will leave Philadelphia for Washington DC tomorrow morning before heading to Boston with the night train.

Day 361 – The Way to Philly

I woke up to a foggy landscape but it made for some interesting views. The train was as suspected still running late but managed to make up a bit of time and thanks to the more developed network here it was only 1h late now instead of 2h.

The fog soon lifted and the sun came out, the landscape here did look very different from what I have seen so far on my Amtrak journey across the US.

After arriving in Philadelphia, I went to leave my bag at the apartment I stayed at and had to get some laundry done. With laundry it’s like with cooking paste, no matter if you have only a few things or a whole closet full of stuff, it always takes the same time to get done.

By the time I was done with my laundry and some other things it was already late so I headed downtown to take some photos.

It was not the best day for photography and I ended up not being very happy with most of my photos. There were also not a lot of people ion the streets to take photos of and the architecture at night didn’t provide enough without a tripod.

During the course of the evening, I also managed to kill the screen on the NEX-3n completely, it was acting up before but it now just displays a black or distorted image. The camera still works fine but without an image it’s not easy to compose or focus using a manual lens.

This means I will have to fix the screen at some point but from now on the GR will be my only camera for the rest of my journey.

Day 360 – New Orleans to Philadelphia

It was another early start to catch the 7:00 train to Philadelphia, it was also another long journey since the train will only arrive in Philadelphia tomorrow around noon.

I settled into my seat and looked out the window to enjoy the sunrise and early morning light over the water and towns we passed.

Not long after you leave New Orleans you will be surrounded by water on either side of the train when it crosses a narrow bridge. This provides some nice views though.

On such a long journey it’s important to get out of the train and stretch your legs whenever possible and to get a change from sitting in the same place all day.

On this journey there are also some volunteers on board to provide you with information about the different place you are going to pass along the route, this is a nice thing and reason to get to the cafe car.

Towards the evening we passed a big Honda factory, followed by a military factory where they produce tanks or similar.

While it’s always a long day just being in a train, it’s usually very nice and relaxing. The train had again some delays so it should get to Philadelphia around 1-2h later than expected.