A Photo a Week Challenge – Boats and Ships

Nancy Merrill Photography’s weekly challenge is all about craft that floats in water, boats, ships, tankers,etc.

Tower Bridge and HMS Belfast, London

Tall Ship, Sagres from Brazil. Halifax harbour

 

Maid of the Mist, Niagara Falls

Boston Science museum, model ships

 

Gondola details, Venice

A Photo A Week – Moving Waters

From Nancy Merrill Photography, a photo challenge about moving water. Rather than go for the usual waterfall type thing, I give you…

Roiling water in the Niagara River below the falls.

Raining evening in Manchester UK

 

Coins in a fountain

Heavy mist and a rainbow over the Montmorency Falls, Quebec

 

A Photo a Week : One

Nancy Merrill Photography asks us this week to show a photo with a single subject.. Here are a few I like from the archives.

On the old set of Coronation Street, Manchester.

Sculpture in the Imperial War Museum North, Manchester

Resident in the Trentham Monkey Forest, near Stoke-on-Trent, England, a sancturary for macaques. He looks a bit lonely.

A Word A Week – Raindrop

Sue at A Word in Your Ear pics out a random word each week for a photo challenge. This week’s is Raindrop.

November rain in Manchester

May rain in New York City

A Word a Week – Frame

Framing a photo is one of the tricks of making a photo more interesting. It can give the photo perspective and draw the eye into it. You’ll often see photos with bits of lacy branches around the sites or top. I do that often. There are other ways to frame a photo, though. Even just a wall or hedge along the bottom works, as does a view through a window.

While looking through my photos, instead of the classic framing with trees, etc. I came across some photos from a visit to the restored and historic Fortress of Louisbourg in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. Louisbourg was a French fort that passed hands back and forth with the English over a couple of centuries during various wars. The French finally ceded it to the English but it eventually fell into disrepair. In the mid 20th century, a project to restore it began and it’s a thriving concern now. They’re continuing to do work on it all the time. The fortress houses a small village and it’s set up much as it would have been in the 18th century. The people that work there all work in costume and can tell you about the historical aspects of the place and their “character”. We visited a few years ago and thoroughly enjoyed it. There are a lot of events that are put on through the summer, as well.

Here’s a few “framed” photos from that visit.

The main gate of the fortress

A view of the harbour

Soldier at the bastion

A Word A Week

More Louisbourg photos here.

 

A Word a Week Challenge – Play

From a visit to Montreal a few years back.

Play nice, boys!

More from A Word A Week.

A Word a Week – Mural

While some people think graffiti is defacing a surface, and it certainly can be if it’s just random and pointless, others thing of it as a work of art and it certainly can be that as well. Graffiti is a way of expressing, usually, discontent with political slogans and warnings, territorial markings. Murals on public surfaces could be classed as graffiti but it’s also beautiful public art, street art as a rule. Some public murals are even commissioned. Some people do it to brighten up the neighbourhood, some to reflect the neighbourhood. Here’s a few I’ve seen on my travels:

First, two from London

Seen on Tottenham Court Road, London

Seen in SoHo, London

Two from Quebec City

Petit Champlain, Quebec City

The Cooperative Mural, Quebec City

Chinatown, Toronto

The next two are no longer. In the first, the building has been torn down, and in the second, renovations along the wall have removed the panel and mural.

This building was on Oldham Road, Manchester, UK

This was on a panel in the wall around and beneath the Grand Parade square in Halifax, along Barrington Street next to City Hall.

See more over at A Word in Your Ear.

A Word A Week – Companion

This week’s Word a Week challenge is Companion. What would we do without companions? We are social beings that live together in cities and towns and villages. We talk together, we hang out together. We spend time together. We may not be with someone else all the time but it’s nice to know there’s someone out there to connect with. It doesn’t even have to be another human. Animals and pets can be wonderful companions. They don’t judge, they listen, (we’re not sure they understand but I think animals can pick up on your mood regardless of their comprehension of what we’re saying).  Even animals need company. Very few animals or birds are singular, loners. That “Lone Wolf” is usually the exception to the rule. Here, then are some photos showing companionship from my archives.

A Manchester Terrier about to be put through his paces

A pair of very stern looking eagles. Nova Scotia Wildlife Park.

In the UK, Dogs are allowed in pubs. You see this commonly in smaller towns and country pubs like this one in Coniston, The Lake District

In another country pub in England, though these companions don’t seem to be enjoying each other’s company.

Kids hang out in packs.

And lastly, my own companion for life. In the Latin Quarter in Copenhagen a few years ago

A Word A Week – Recline

Relaxing on a Tall Ship prow

Adam Lambert, Queen’s Killer Queen!
Bell Centre, Montreal

 A Word A Week challenge

A Word a Week – Create

Sue’s Word a Week challenge this week is “Create”. Here’s a couple of people in the process of creating crystal. The first is of one of the craftsmen from the Waterford Crystal factory in Waterford, Ireland. These artists memorize all the different patterns that they etch into the blown crystal and it takes years to work up to being a master craftsman.

A Waterford Crystal master craftsman

This man is blowing glass to make crystal. Nova Scotia Crystal (sadly, it’s closed now) employed glass blowers and craftspeople from Waterford.

Blowing glass by hand. Nova Scotia Crystal (now closed)

On a different note, my partner creates these wonderful cartoons for my birthday each year, usually focusing on one of our travels from the previous 12 months. This commemorates a misguided GPS that led us into a very tight situation.

Cornwall (St. Ives) 2011