Icy Straight Point

 Alaska Cruise Trip Day 3 – Icy Straight Point

We docked at Icy Straight Point in Hoonah, AK.  It was drizzling while we were there; the only time it rained on our trip.  We took the Sky Glider gondola to the summit, but since it was so early in the season there wasn't much to do up there.  I read some comments on one site that said the trip to the summit was a 45-minute bus ride before the gondolas were built.  We came back down and took a different gondola into town.  The greenery was amazing due to over 200 inches of precipitation per year.

Trading Sun-tanning for Blankets

 Alaska Cruise Trip Day 2 – At Sea (still)

It was bright and sunny on the cruise, but the temperature hung right around 50ºF/10ºC most of the time. I personally love cool weather—just cool enough for a light jacket or hoodie. The ship's pool area provided throw blankets in addition to towels. As you can see in today's image, most people were using ship-provided blankets and/or wearing jackets. There are a few people hanging out in the hot tub, too. 

Melting Pot

 

Alaska Cruise Trip Day 2 – At Sea

One of the things I enjoy about a cruise is the eclectic mix of people aboard. I'm suddenly thrust into the middle of a huge melting pot of people from around the world, each with their own languages, customs, and style of dress. 

The breakfast cafeteria was a madhouse with stations serving traditional breakfasts from several countries. People zipped and zagged from station to station with full plates, and I tried my best not to run into anyone.

More than once, I saw a large group, possibly from China or Japan, sitting together. They would gather finger food on several plates and then serve themselves family-style. One day, we were sitting at a table waiting for the changeover to lunch service.  The kitchen staff were busy loading up the stations with food and had plastic wrap on the outside to keep people from taking food early.  When that same large group came through and saw that there was a huge bowl of lychees at one of the stations, they went crazy.  They ripped through the plastic wrap and started grabbing lychees like it was a gold rush.  It took a while for the kitchen staff to get things back under control again.  The entertaining show was hilarious.

There were a variety of activities for the time we spent at sea. None of them interested us much, but it was fun to walk around, check things out, and take pictures.

All Aboard!

Alaska Cruise Trip Day 1 – Vancouver (still)

After we landed, we took an Uber to the embarkation building.  Three ships were boarding at once!  The line was pretty long, considering approximately 7,300 people were trying to board at the same time.  Surprisingly, the line moved fast.  If only the lines at the DMV would move that fast!

Minnehaha Dormant

The 5th and final part in a series of blogs for anyone who has ever been to Minnehaha Falls and/or followed Minnehaha Creek down to its junction with the Mississippi River.

Today is a close-up of the limestone shelf where the water would normally be flowing.  Two boys lounging in the lower right give some perspective to the size of that shelf.  I think the moss and sprinkles of fall color are pretty.

I've started reading a newly-published book about the falls and the surrounding area, complete with a number of historic pictures.  It used to be much wider and had many names during the 1800s, including "Little Falls."

Goodnight, sleepy, sleepy falls.  See you in the spring!  

Minnehaha Dry

Part 4 in a series of blogs for anyone who has ever been to Minnehaha Falls and/or followed Minnehaha Creek down to its junction with the Mississippi River.

Minnesota had the driest September on record, which is certainly reflected in the current image on the left.  The one on the right shows an average spring waterfall.

Techie corner

This isn't quite an apples-to-apples comparison between the two images, from a photography standpoint.  The current image was taken with the wide-angle lens on my phone.  (I take a lot of images on my phone these days.  They still aren't as good as a DSLR, but they've come a long way!)  The wider angle leads to perspective distortion.   

The one on the right was taken with my DSLR, with a much narrower field of view.

Below is an image with a red box showing approximately where the image on the right fits into the image on the left.

Muddy Minnehaha

Part 3 in a series of blogs for anyone who has ever been to Minnehaha Falls and/or followed Minnehaha Creek down to its junction with the Mississippi River.

We were almost at the falls in this photo.  Just standing brown water here.  I'm surprised that there weren't a billion mosquitos around.

Minnehaha Rocks

Part 2 in a series of blogs for anyone who has ever been to Minnehaha Falls and/or followed Minnehaha Creek down to its junction with the Mississippi River.

We're heading upstream, if you can call it that, toward the falls.  Even though the creek isn't flowing, I think the boulders are pretty in their own right. 

One thing I didn't realize is that at some point, concrete step-downs were installed in the creek.  You can see one fairly clearly toward the top of the picture.

Minnehaha Puddles

This series of blogs is for anyone who has ever been to Minnehaha Falls and/or followed Minnehaha Creek down to its junction with the Mississippi River.

October 1st, a friend and I went down to see (or not see) the dried-up Minnehaha Falls.  The newscasts say it's been over a decade since this happened last.  

Today's image is below the falls and down the creek a bit, looking toward the route to the Mississippi.

These things run in cycles and the water will come back eventually.  Here are some links to news and history:

• 2022 drought YouTube video
• 2012 U of M project and analysis
• 2009 Minnehaha Trickle article
• 1955 local area history
• Early 1900s history of the falls in general
• Newly released book about the seedier history of the falls

Injured

Today we found a gray squirrel struggling in the grass under one of our trees.  It was heartbreaking.  It couldn't move its hindquarters and we surmised that it fell out of the tree.  

I don't like to see any animal suffer, so we found a place that takes in injured wildlife.  They will be able to assess it and determine if its back legs are just stunned or if the poor little thing broke its spine when it fell.  Either way, it will be comfortable now.

Centenario

A few years ago, the church my husband and I grew up in, and eventually got married in, became a Spanish church.  But it is still affiliated with the Free Methodist Church of North America, so today they had a 100th Anniversary celebration.  The "little church on the corner" has been around for a century now.

Some of the "old church family" came back for the celebration and a tour of the interior.  I love what they've done with the sanctuary.  The pics really don't do it justice.  It's so light, bright and cheery!  I love the sheers on the windows.  They make the stained glass glow.  The seats are comfy and the A/V setup is nice.  One of the best improvements they've made is putting in a new furnace with central air.  

I'm glad they can bring the Good News of Jesus to our South Minneapolis Spanish speakers.

Just your Friendly Neighborhood Kitties

I see more and more homes in our neighborhood recycling their used/cracked/old pottery, china, dishware, and figurines in their flower beds and landscaping.  This particular home had oodles and oodles of cat figurines in their yard.  This is just a small sampling of the variety of kitties found there.  

I absolutely love the crazy kitty in the middle.  The one in the lower left, though.  That one is kind of creepy – especially those eyes!

Clearly

 Today is a complete Techie Corner day.  

I bought a couple new image editing programs.  I typically use Lightroom, Photoshop, and On1 Effects, but recently I got sucked into a Facebook ad for some new software by Topaz Labs.  I was skeptical at first, but they offered a free trial so I couldn't refuse.  

I was fiddling around today with their program called Gigapixel AI.  It's software to upsize photos, but it also does a fantastic job of revealing facial detail.  Today's image is part of one I blogged on a couple of weeks ago.  The one on the left is the best I could do with what I had.  The right is a couple of clicks in Gigapixel AI.  I could probably have smoothed out some of the facial features in image one if I had felt like it.  But the hair!  How did they manage to get it to look like hair again with individual strands?

I really like what it can do, now all they have to do is figure out how to translate that fine facial detail into fine detail for the rest of the image.

Hodge-podgery

 "Hey everybody, let's make a DIY park bench.  How hard can it be?"  

As seen in 2021.

Blarney

This evening I helped out my husband with a job cleaning up the trash that is left after the winter snow-plowing season snow mountain has started to melt.   You've probably seen these mountains of pestilence and waste in the parking lot of your local neighborhood box store.  

The mountain of doom melts slowly, so this will probably be a process over the next few weeks – A twisted archeological dig of sorts.

Tonight's inventory of the flotsam and jetsam of misery included: 

• work gloves
• vinyl disposable glove
• dirty diaper 
• security badge
• possibly part of a key fob
• booze bottle
• plastic Coke bottle with pee in it
• disposable masks - several
• switch cover from a device of some kind
• candy wrappers
• plastic bag
• broken watch/Fitbit band
• paper towels
• broken stakes
• bunny head; no, it was not a toy.
• a large crow lying on its back in the grass; no, it was not sunbathing.  Think - Weekend at Bernie's
• pieces of concrete
• and much, much more.

That brings me to my awesome find of the evening.  A real, live, honest-to-goodness Pirate Doubloon!!  If you look at today's image, you will see that it's even written right on the back.  That proves it's real!  I am so happy with my awesome find.  I'm rich!  It makes picking up all the rest of that nastiness worth it.  Well, except for the pee bottle.  Pee bottles are never worth it, not for all the pirate doubloons in the world.

 

Legerity

 Got wood?

Recovery

We had a splendid time with this lady last month.  

Techie Corner

No Flash, but No Trash either.

I also took several pictures at the time, most of them using flash.  But this one was caught in between flash cycles and was almost completely black.  I typically try to lighten these images before scrapping them to make sure they aren't salvageable.  

But I really like this one, now that I can see the image.  I like it even better than the image I blogged about last month.  The only problem – extreme graininess.  

New Photoshop plug-in to the rescue!  I recently purchased Topaz DeNoise AI and I figured this would be a great image to see what the plug-in could do.  I'm really pleased with the result! 

Drudgery

A lot of work upfront, but it will be so worth it once winter comes around.

Blizzardy

Around 2am this morning, it looked like a snow globe outside.

Erectly

The city has been doing a rehab project on the 10th Ave Bridge since 2019.  Supposedly they will be wrapping things up this spring.  From this perspective, it looks like an erector set.