Cormorants Lined Up for Inspection

Leave a Reply

It’s been too long since we last had a cormorant on the blog. Time to rectify that. These are not action shots. Instead, as we walked along the shoreline on Bainbridge Island, there was a wooden beam out in the water. The cormorants were lined up waiting for me. I think they knew I didn’t have a long lens with me, otherwise they would probably have flown off. Instead, they were hanging out in the sun drying themselves. My choice was to shoot from along the beam or side on. I went with both!

Armee de l’Air A400M

Leave a Reply

The A400M Atlas is now in service with a number of air forces. My encounters with them, though, have only involved the development airframes displayed by Airbus. That changed in Sacramento when The Patrouille de France arrived as part of their North American tour. They brought an A400M as he support plane. I was rather disappointed that it arrived late in the evening, after I had gone home and disappeared early the following morning to recover some delayed jets.

It was back for the day of the display though. It started up at a remote location but then proceeded to give a short flying display. It then taxied back to the crowd line where it shut down and was opened up for visitors. The people were lined up to get inside it for ages. The plane still looked pretty clean so I guess it had not been in service too long. I was glad to get a close up look around the outside as well as to see the crowds inside and the flying display itself. Not a dramatic performance like the test crews have put on but still good to see.

Fort Ward

Leave a Reply

Our Bainbridge trip included a bonus element. I had been advised how busy the ferries could be on nice summer weekends so we headed out early anticipating some long lines to get on the boat. We got to the terminal about an hour ahead of when we were planning to sail, bought our ticket, drove straight on to a boat and it sailed a minute later! This was a pleasant surprise. However, it did mean we were on the island a lot earlier than our planned first stop was open. We needed to kill some time.

Nancy did a quick search and came across a place called Fort Ward. We put that in the GPS and headed off. Fort Ward is an area of the coastline that used to be part of the protection of the approaches to Bremerton naval shipyards. It was given up by the military a long time ago and now sections of it are rather nice housing and more of it are a state park. In the early morning, walking along the shore through the park was a very pleasant way to spend some time.

Veterans’ Alaska 737 – Finally!

Leave a Reply

Alaska Airlines has a number of jets in special colors. My efforts to finally get the merger jet were covered in this post. One of the other jets that I never managed to catch in California was their Tribute to Service aircraft that is honoring veterans. My friend Roger caught it a number of times but I was always in the wrong place.

Alaska is, despite the name, headquartered in Seattle so their jets are regularly rotating through SeaTac. Shortly after arriving here, I saw that this jet was coming in and, since I was nearby, I decided to see if it could finally catch it. Sure enough, I got it. I would also like to point out the sun and blue skies in this shot for those of you that think I have moved to somewhere where it only rains. It’s true that it does rain but not as much as you think so far!

Bloedel Reserve

1 Reply

I’m always on the lookout for the place I might move to when I decide to lay off the whole sordid business of working for a living. We took a trip to Bainbridge Island which, if you asked Nancy, was a chance to check out some of our new area or, if you asked me, was a house hunting trip. The place I was looking at was called Bloedel Reserve. They may tell you that it is an estate that is now open to visitors but clearly they are keeping it ready for me. A nice little house with some delightful gardens.

The house is not necessarily my style but I’m sure I could find a way to make it work. The grounds do look like they might need a reasonable amount of effort. I suppose I could buy a little mower to ride around on but that does sound a bit like hard work. I suppose I could get some help. I wonder whether Nancy would like a little John Deere?

A C-146 But Only in the Distance

Leave a Reply

This shot won’t win any prizes. I only show it for relative rarity value (although one of my friends has caught a lot of these near his home). The US Special Forces have their own choices of equipment and the Dornier 328 turboprop has been something they have found a use for under the designation C-146. This one showed up on the downwind for Nellis during a break in Red Flag. It was rather far away from me but I wasn’t going to miss taking a shot of it given that it is the first I have seen. I didn’t even change the camera settings so it has frozen props. I think the artistic failings are the least of the problems when shooting something this far away!

Seattle Skyline Zoomify

Leave a Reply

On our boat ride back from Bainbridge Island, we were getting back to Seattle in the early evening. The light was not at its best but it was certainly becoming nice. While the boat was moving, if you were quick it was possible to shoot a series for a pano so that is what I did. The resulting pano is rather large. Therefore, the above image is a small excerpt but to zoom in and pan around, you can go to the Zoomify version of the shot below.

When United Thought That Ted Was a Winner

Leave a Reply

Occasionally I post about disappearing airlines. Normally they are airlines that went away because they ran out of cash. This one is a different story. The arrival of low cost airlines caused a lot of the majors to think that they could fight the newcomers by setting up their own lost cost operation. United came up with Ted. I guess this was like half a United! They moved a bunch of their Airbus A319s and A320s from United to Ted and set them up on services which, I guess, did not have the premium passengers and so was focused on the economy traveler.

Ted lasted for a while. I don’t know whether it was ever a profitable business or not. When you viewed it in the context of the overall United business, it might have been good for a while. However, whatever the underpinnings of the business were, eventually United came to the conclusion that Ted was not a good idea. I don’t know whether the cost base was too high to sustain it or whether it was just undercutting revenue from United but they gave up on the idea. The jets got repainted and became part of the United fleet again.

At Last a Voyager – But…

Leave a Reply

The Royal Air Force has replaced its tanker force since I left the UK. The VC-10s and TriStars have been retired and there is a public private partnership in place to deliver tanking support. This uses converted Airbus A330s. They are able to provide tanking and transport services (with some of the aircraft configured only for transport). In RAF service, these jets are named Voyager. Red Flag 17-1 was my first real opportunity to photograph a Voyager in action. (Annoyingly my sister has shot them before me and has been on a refueling mission with them!) While an A330 might not be the most exciting jet to see, I was really looking forward to photographing it.

As the mission was recovering, the light was great. Low sun providing a warm and soft illumination on the returning jets. Then, the Voyager called up. Just as it did so, the sun went in. The Voyager came down the approach, its gray fuselage in the shade of some clouds. It landed, taxied in and then the sun came right back out again. Arghh! Sure, I can bump up the white balance a bit to warm things up but the jet was in shade and there is not much I can do about that. I had to leave before it recovered on the following day so no luck then. They will be around for a while so I guess I will get any crack at this at some point.

Portland Station

Leave a Reply

I took a trip to Portland for work. Rather than drive, I took the train down. It wasn’t as quick but it was a far more relaxing way to travel. With wifi on the train and no need to pay attention to where we were going, I could get on with things or, occasionally I assure you, stare out of the window at the scenery. A lot of the journey was along the shoreline and it was very pretty. (They are building a more direct route to bypass some of this which will reduce the journey time but probably make it a lot less attractive.)

I arrived at Portland at the Amtrak station. It was a rather striking building. A lot of the older stations are more architecturally individual as they were built at a time when railways were competing for business. This one made me think of a European style. For some reason, it made me think of Germany. I can’t quite pin down why but there was something Germanic about the design.

I arrived in good weather but didn’t have time to get a shot. The following morning things were rather murky but, when I came back for my trip home, the skies had cleared and I grabbed a few shots. I rather like the message on the tower. Pretty clear what they are driving at!