Last stop - Yosemite

 The photos don't really do it justice but Yosemite seems to comprise huge bits of rock sticking out of the ground. And (below) viewing places on the edge of precipices.

 I had flown into San Francisco to meet up with an old friend Kate - now Catherine - and her husband Bill. Now retired they were keen for me to see something of the surrounding area - so we drove to Yosemite.

 An old friend from my tramping club days had a major ambition to climb El Capitan - that's it behind me on the left. Speaking personally - no thanks.

 And yes - bears here too. The rubbish bins are designed to keep the bears out.

 In places there was just rock, no soil. The trees did well to grow at all

 It was quite a bleached out landscape

Yosemite was spectacular - but, perhaps sadly or superficially, I was almost as excited by the shower in the motel. I just loved the glass wall. Forgot to get a photo of the tiling inside but it was equally gorgeous.

 All very 50's and a little out of place in a cheapish motel - but I'd love to replicate one day.
Bridgeport Inn if you are ever over that way.

After that we drove back to SF (actually I drove a lot of it - a little scary on the wrong side of the road) and I went to the airport, flew home to New Zealand,  had dinner and went to bed.

THE END

Ace time in Portland

 Portland was great from the start - which was a $2.40 light rail trip into town on one of the above. Then it was a 5 minute stroll to my hotel. Ace! People in the train were different - they seemed to be nicer to each other, more courteous and considerate. It was about midnight when I walked to the hotel but the streets just had a nice 'vibe'.

 So I had the weekend to explore. Downtown was interesting - pedestrians ruled. It took me a while to get used to cars waiting while I crossed the road.  The footpaths were wide and there didn't appear to be too much traffic for a downtown area.

 I think Portland is particularly famous for its foodcarts. As it was the weekend not many were open but it sure is an economical way to eat and there is a good selection of cuisines.

 In the Seattle hostel Someone showed me the magic button on Google that gives directions. I think I may have worn that button out now - but it is awesome. I worked out how to get places using the buses, light rail and the streetcars (the red thing below).

 And sometimes I walked.  The scene below was a Sunday morning of what was going to be avery hot day. Still in the central city area but on the outskirts and obviously it is also residential. The pool was created by sloping paving - nothing fancy but great for kids.

 But the 'piece de resistance' was my hotel - aptly named the Ace Hotel. It has a kind of industrial chic and is very COOL. The area above was the mezzanine and they are so cool they had the lyrics to Leonard Cohen's Suzanne on the wall. The couches were covered in heavy canvas.

 I was in the budget room and had a shared bathroom. They had crates for towel storage and the loveliest of toiletries in the shower - Malin and Goetz since you will be wondering what to get me for Christmas.

 My room was a triple - it was all they had left when I made the booking. At least I got to choose which bed. The top sheet was just folded up under the blanket and I had to make my own bed - shock horror! Having your own basin is handy and for the first time in my life (true) I ate and drank something from the mini bar because it was so good.

Ah - it was a fine weekend in Portland

Moving to Montana

 On the flight from Seattle I could see all these lovely 'crop circles'. We flew to Missoula and then drove a further 80 miles to our home for the next week...

 We arrived on a Sunday afternoon and had a few hours to ourselves (the last for the week)- so I went for a wander.
Photographers Formulary is owned by Bud and Lynn. Bud also has a side business in boulders.

 This is our building which housed 3 big darkrooms as well as our dining area and lecture area.
It was a warm and sunny week but we felt little of it as we were indoors mostly working day and night.

 This must have been toning time because it can be done under normal daylight.

Our group - which included Jane (technical assistant) and Tim Rudman and his wife Ingrid.
Workshops usually have 10 people but we ended up with only 7 as a couple cancelled due to problems from Hurricane Irene. It was to our benefit mostly as we got more time for input from Tim.
At the end of the week we displayed our best images for all the staff to view.

 There was a lot of talk about bears. Firstly they said there weren't any about then slowly came the stories of various incidents. On our last day I bought a copy of the Missoula paper - the front page story about a bear right in town.

So - what are Lith prints? One starts with  a black and white negative and develops it in a slightly different developer, sometimes 2 developers. The images are often anything but black and white - taking on various hues according to a multitude of variables. We also toned some - gold toner lead to a blue-ish effect and selenium came out more brown. Best was often a combination of both with dark browns and light blues. Often the images seemed more 3D due to the splits of colours.

 Sometimes the prints had a lovely creamy look, other times it was a less pleasing salmon - but that could then be changed in the toning process.

 The images above - top left is selenium toned, bottam left is gold toned and the one on the right is a combination.

 This image worked well with the process - the background and foreground seeming quite separate. The two below were a result of some random playing on the  last night when we thought one of the solutions had become contaminated - I really like them both. They seem very antique.

I hadn't been too sure what I would learn from the workshop or how useful it would be but actually I learnt lots and it will be very useful for a lot of my images that have been hard to print more conventionally. Now I just hoave to figure out how to get some of the developer - it is too toxic to ship - but I do have recipes for various possibilities.

Other stuff in Seattle

Walking into the Seattle Art Museum one is immediately confronted by these flying cars - cool.

 The work above is made from aluminium, brass and razor wire!

and this one is from military dog tags.

I ventured out of central city to Fremont. Had to walk over the bridge form the bus stop but the bridge was up!

 Fremont's attractions include its rocket...

 its Lenin statue...

the Troll under the big bridge...

 and the sculpture "Waiting for the Interurban" which gets dressed/decorated in various guises