Author Archives: Rob

Guemes Ferry Needs Some Paint

During the pandemic, I got to take photos of a lot of ferries. One of the ferries I checked out was the Guemes Island ferry in Anacortes. After I had finished my visit up in Anacortes, I had my lunch with me and was looking for a spot to eat it. I figured I would go to the parking lot by the ferry and see if it was in use. It certainly was and seemed to be operating more regularly than I expected. I did get a few photos and videos of it coming and going. The ferry looked a little scruffier than I recall from previous visits. I wonder whether it is due to be dry docked soon for a repaint!

Sunset Overflight Contrails

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I was out and about one evening when I saw an airliner flying high overhead pulling contrails behind it. The sun was getting low in the sky with the result that the light on the plane and its residual moisture was illuminated with some really nice warm color. It is definitely true that light is everything I photography. This would have been nothing without this light.

IFS Cloud Cable Car/Emirates Air Line

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I walked along the south bank of the Thames from Woolwich as far as North Greenwich. Once I got to the area around the O2 arena, I wanted to get back across to the Excel center and the easiest route was to take the gondola across the river. This was the Emirates Air Line. It still had a bunch of branding for this but apparently the name was changed in June of 2022. I was able to use my Oyster to pay for it although it didn’t seem as cheap as other forms of travel that TfL provides! I could see the system from long before the time I got to Greenwich since it is obvious as you look upriver.

There was virtually no one using the crossing when I was there. I just wandered into the terminal after having spent some time down on the riverbank watching the gondolas passing overhead. I stepped straight into my own car and was never troubled by the possibility of sharing space. This made it easy for me to bounce around taking photos of whatever caught my eye.

The crossing only takes a few minutes. You do get a good view of things as you go. The O2 is a lot easier to see from the air than from the ground so that is great. Coming across the river, I was able to look down on the various construction projects underway on the north bank of the Thames. The Excel center is the largest thing to see as you head north but there are lots of surrounding structures around the docks as you descend into the other terminal. The view of LCY is good to and, if only a departing flight had been coming out, I would have got an interesting shot.

I have no idea how useful the crossing is. It certainly wasn’t busy when I used it, but I was not there at what would be considered peak time. Even so, it still seemed to be a bit of an oddity in a city where public transportation gets heavy usage. Emirates has obviously discontinued sponsorship, but that decision might have come during the pandemic when airlines were hardly flush with cash. Who knows. It was still quite fun to use, though.

D558-II Skyrocket On Campus

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The NASA high speed research program was underway in parallel with the USAF’s X Plane program. While NASA was less focused on record setting, they did have one blast of glory when they were the first to hit Mach 2. The aircraft that they used was the D558-II Skyrocket. Three of the airframes were built and they all still survive. Originally designed to have a jet engine for take off and landing and a rocket for high speed flight, the later aircraft did not have the jet and were air dropped for their missions.

One of the early airframes is now on display in the City of Lancaster on the campus of Antelope Valley college. Since I was staying nearby, I decided to swing by on the Sunday morning to see the plane. The campus was nearly deserted and it felt like I was doing something I shouldn’t but there was no problem walking around the campus. The plane is mounted on a pole in a dynamic pose towards the sky as seems appropriate. I had chosen a good time because the light on the plane was pretty good.

The Skyrocket is a sleek airframe as you would expect for something that first broke Mach 2. Being painted white also helps it look slightly futuristic. I spent a bit of time wandering around and trying different angles on the subject to make it look as cool as possible. I had just about finished when my buddy Chris showed up so I spent more time trying to get in the way of his shots!

A Coot For Dinner

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A few times recently I have been down at Juanita Bay Park when the eagles have been hunting. While everyone thinks of bald eagles eating fish, they are also happy to eat birds if available. We have had large flocks of coots on the lake and they are a plentiful food source. They stay close together on the surface but, when the eagles fly close, the flocks will get startled and start fluttering around as they try to evade the predators.

The eagles are not bothered about the flock. They just want to isolate one of the birds which they can then take out. They will swoop around until they can take out one bird which they then land on top of and sit on it while it drowns. Once it has stopped moving, they take off and carry it back to the pole in the bay where they can eat at their leisure.

Before you eat a coot, you need to pluck it. The eagles make quick work of this and, with a breeze blowing, the air is quickly filled with feathers as they clean up their kill. Once that is done, time to tuck in to dinner. A coot is quickly eaten and then they fly off to a log to wash up before retiring to a tree to rest and digest. If there is anything left of the carcass, you can guarantee that the crows will be paying close attention and will close in to take care of matters.

https://youtu.be/xy8UeqNzxRQ

Updated AAC Apaches

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The British Army bought a bunch of Apaches which were locally assembled by Westland and were fitted with Rolls Royce Turbomeca engines to bolster the local content. Since that acquisition, the Apache has gone through a bunch of upgrades and the current AH-64E Apache Guardian is the latest and greatest. The British Army decided to acquire these and, this time, there is none of the local content to worry about. Their airframes have been rotated back to Boeing and AH-64E airframes get delivered. Some might have originally been British but others are not.

Middle Wallop is not the busy airfield it once was but there is still some Army flying underway and that includes operation of these new Apaches. While I was visiting, there were some airframes flying around the local countryside and also doing some pattern work. They pattern is a bit distant from the museum area but I was still able to catch some shots of them. Hopefully I will see them in more detail at some point but this was my first encounter with the updated fleet.

Car Transporters Are So Elegant

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Having grown up by the sea, I always like looking at passing ships. However, there are some that are just a little bit harder to like. Car transporters are that type of ship. While on the Isle of Wight, I saw this one passing by. I was going to take a shot of it because when don’t I take a photo but this is a prime example of just how lacking in grace this type of ship is.

F-35A Demo At Seafair

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The F-35’s appearance at Seafair has resulted in a few posts of departures and arrivals at Boeing Field on this blog. However, I don’t think I have actually shared any shots of the display itself. I quite enjoyed the demo routine that the USAF had last year. Unfortunately, the display axis for Seafair is a long way from the shore so the shots were a bit distant. I also didn’t know the routine and was caught out when flares were dispensed and so didn’t get shots of those that I am happy with. However, there were a few times when the jet came in close to the shore and I got some closer views. I do want to see the display at a more conventional location at some point.

Pipes And Valves

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In a previous post I talked about the visit to the Georgetown Steam Plant. I mentioned in that post that there are all sorts of interesting details around the plant with the old technology of vale’s and pipes – technology that probably is still pretty relevant today. This post is a sequence of shots that I got while wandering around the plant that show some of the more interesting detail elements.

Experimental Grand Caravan That Was Lost

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I was down at Renton and drove around the back of the ramp. There was a Cessna Grand Caravan parked up and I was tempted to get a shot. They have made that area a lot harder to see recently and I didn’t bother. However, I was up on the other side of the field at the overlook when it taxied out for departure. I heard the call sign was experimental which caught my interest and I grabbed some shots as it took off.

A few days later I heard of a plane crash up near Snohomish. I had seen this plane flying patterns up there when I was looking earlier in the day and, when I saw pictures on the news sites of the crash, I could see the registration was the same plane. I understand they were trialing something new – perhaps a baggage pod – but I have no idea what happened. It looked as if the wing had separated in flight since it was a long way away. The test pilot was one of the Kenmore Air staff. He died along with one other person on board. A very sad story.