A Word A Week Photo Challenge — Cloud

Posted on January 7, 2013 by | 46 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

On A Word In Your Ear , Skinnywench’s photo challenge this week is Cloud. Since I have so many photos of clouds—it’s hard to avoid clouds, just as it is hard to avoid water, in kayaking photos—I thought I would join in.

But, although I have many photos of clouds, the clouds of two special days stand out particularly in my memory. On those days, a dramatic, constantly changing cloudscape dominated the scene. We stared upward, mesmerized.

Here’s the first of those days.

At Pier 40Dark clouds over Coney IslandReturning to Manhattan
Spectacular skies...
... in the Upper BayCrepuscular raysSinister cloud over ManhattanEngulfed in the rain cloudRain easingClouds at sunset

The story of the day is here, more photos are here, and larger versions of some of the photos are here. And the second of the two spectacularly Cloudy days is here.

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Posted in Kayaking, Nature, New York City, Photography

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Resolved

Posted on January 5, 2013 by | 49 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

This week’s Photo Challenge is Resolved.

Cape Cod Bay, July 2011. We are Resolved!

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Resolved to reach the water, no matter how long it may take

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and to set out over the turquoise sea

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to “fresh woods, and pastures new.”

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And that makes a fine resolution for this New Year as well!

(The story of that day on Cape Cod Bay is here; more photos are here.)

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Posted in Kayaking, Photography

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Travel Theme: Multiples

Posted on January 4, 2013 by | 42 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

Ailsa’s travel-themed photo challenge this week is Multiples.

I seem to recall that it was Couples just a few short weeks ago. And now it’s Multiples already? To be sure, it’s quite natural—

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Posted in Nature, Photography

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Three More Paddling Photo Winners

Posted on January 3, 2013 by | 54 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

The popular paddling site Paddling.net runs a Photo of the Week contest. Over the past couple of years, I’ve submitted a few of my photos. The first three photos that were successful were here. Now here are three more winners.

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Sailing my kayak with Balogh Batwing sail and BOSS outriggers on Long Island Sound. Sail is double-reefed in a 25-kt wind. Photo was taken by camera mounted at the top of the mast.

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Paddling down the Hudson River (NY) along the West Side of Manhattan at sunset

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Landed at sunset on the North Shore of Long Island, NY, during a kayak circumnavigation of Long Island in the summer of 2012

(see here, here, and here on the Paddling.net site)

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Last Manhattan Circumnavigation of 2012

Posted on January 2, 2013 by | 33 comments

By Johna Till Johnson
Photos by Vladimir Brezina

At the time, it didn’t seem like a big deal: On a sunny weekend in late October, we decided to circumnavigate Manhattan.

We didn’t anticipate, though, that, thanks to Hurricane Sandy, it would be our last circumnavigation of the year, indeed our last major trip in New York waters. And so this trip has a special resonance in our memories.

A Manhattan circumnavigation is usually a pretty predictable trip, though always a treat. It’s not particularly long by our standards, but packed with variety. The scenery ranges from the urban…

Midtown Manhattan from the East River

In the East River: the Empire State Building, with Vlad in the foreground (photo by Johna)

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to the bucolic…

Fall colors in the Harlem River

Fall colors in the Harlem River

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Ferries in the East River

Riding the chop and keeping an eye on the ferries down by the Battery

and the paddling conditions vary nearly as much: The water down by the Battery is often exciting (enhanced by ferry and other shipping traffic)…

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Up the Harlem River

Heading up the Harlem River

but  the  long glide up the Harlem River is usually tranquil.

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All in all, we looked forward to a lovely, if unexceptional trip.

Unexceptional except for being our last long trip of the year.  The following weekend, we toured the Gowanus Canal—a scenic, but short, excursion.

And the Monday after that, Sandy arrived.

Our Manhattan paddling home at Pier 40 was shut down, and the pier itself remains closed (though we’re hopeful it will reopen soon). In addition, there continue to be some restrictions on paddling in New York Harbor. So we haven’t been out (in New York waterways, at least) since.

Which made this “unexceptional” trip rather exceptional, after all.

So our recollection of this circumnavigation is tinged with a bit of melancholy and a sense of loss. As the graffiti has it:

Poetic graffiti in the East River

“Alas this bitter life filled with sweet dreams” — Poetic graffiti in the East River

But even an “ordinary” trip has moments of incandescent beauty, which will live on in our memories…

Yellow and blue nocturne

The George Washington Bridge: Yellow and blue nocturne

We hope to be back on the waters around Manhattan in 2013!

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The individual photos are here.

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Posted in Kayaking, New York City

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Out With the Old, In With the New

Posted on December 30, 2012 by | 50 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

Ailsa’s travel-themed photo challenge this week is New.

The leaves of the old year blaze forth in a last burst of color. But among the old, at first almost unnoticed, are already the buds

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that, as the last old leaf drops away, await the new year!

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(Magnolias, Central Park, New York City)

Happy 2013!

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Posted in Nature, Photography

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Christmas Lights

Posted on December 30, 2012 by | 48 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

We always get our Christmas tree only a day or two before Christmas, barely hours before the Christmas-tree vendors in the streets pack up for their migration back north. We do this not just because we procrastinate (we do), but because Johna follows an older tradition. According to Wikipedia,

Traditionally, Christmas trees were not brought in and decorated until Christmas Eve (24 December) or, in the traditions celebrating Christmas Eve rather than on the first of day of Christmas, 23 December, and then removed the day after Twelfth Night (5 January); to have a tree up before or after these dates was even considered bad luck.

So, even as our neighbors’ Christmas trees are already out in the street for removal, our tree is only now reaching the peak of its transient glory—

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Our 2012 in Pictures

Posted on December 28, 2012 by | 74 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

The last weekly Photo Challenge of 2012 is—My 2012 in Pictures!

It’s been impossible to select the best photos. There are just too many photos to look through—I’ve posted more than 2,000 on this blog in 2012—and it takes more resolution than I am capable of at the moment to cull them severely. It’s like killing your children…

So here are, by no means the best photos of 2012, but just 12—one for each month—that in future years may remind Johna and me of some of the memorable stories of 2012—

January: An aborted kayak trip turns into an unexpected adventure on the streets of Red Hook, Brooklyn
February: Brown pelicans perform a pas de deux near St. Petersburg, Florida
March: Early crocuses and insects in NYC’s Central Park
April: We visit the 9/11 Memorial, Manhattan
May: Johna’s open-water kayak training in Rhode Island (photo by John Ozard)
June: Manhattan Island Marathon Swim
July: We land on the North Shore of Long Island during our kayak circumnavigation of the island
August: Sunrise over the ocean in Key Biscayne, Florida
September: Great North River Tugboat Race & Competition in New York Harbor
October: Even rats drowned during Hurricane Sandy
November: Fall colors in NYC’s Central Park
December: Conch emerges from its shell on St. Petersburg Beach, Florida

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The stories and more photos are here:

We hope that 2013 will turn out to be equally memorable and picturesque!

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Posted in Photography

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Happy Solstice, Festive Holidays!

Posted on December 21, 2012 by | 47 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

This morning we passed the Solstice of December 21, 2012, otherwise known as 13.0.0.0.0, and we can be cautiously optimistic—I am, on the whole, an optimist—that the world as we know it will continue…

So it seems safe to wish everyone a Happy Winter (or Summer, as it may be) and Festive Holidays!

And safe to respond to Ailsa’s photo challenge, which this week, very appropriately, is Festive—

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Surprise

Posted on December 21, 2012 by | 44 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

This week’s Photo Challenge is Surprise.

Kayaking around New York Harbor, we see many surprising things. And one of the most surprising, hidden in a narrow Brooklyn creek, is the wreck of an entire, respectably-sized submarine. The Yellow Submarine of Brooklyn has a fascinating history—involving a crazy but surprisingly well-developed scheme to salvage valuables from a famous sunken ocean liner—that I’ve already written up here and here. So I’ll just post a few photos—

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