Tag Archives: Manhattan

Weekly Photo Challenge: Near and Far, Take Two

Posted on September 9, 2012 by | 48 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

This week’s Photo Challenge is Near and Far.

I’ve already posted one response to this challenge—three of my annual photos of a round-Manhattan swimmer next to my kayak with the Empire State Building in the distance.

A similar photo-op occurs in our kayaking trips through New York Harbor. We often paddle from Manhattan down to the Lower Bay for the day. As we return in the evening, we pass through the Verrazano Narrows and turn the corner into the Upper Bay. And there suddenly, across the entire Upper Bay, we see the ramparts of Manhattan in the evening sun. They are imposing, but still far, far away…

Swimmers, too, get to see that sight sometimes…

For more on “Paddling to Manhattan Island”, see here; for more on swimming there, see here and here.

48 Comments

Posted in Kayaking, New York City, Photography

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

Manhattan Island Marathon Swim 2012: Follow the Red Herring!

Posted on June 26, 2012 by | 59 comments

By Vladimir Brezina
(Title suggestion by Johna Till Johnson)

Each summer, NYC Swim organizes a series of short and longer swims in New York City’s waterways. The premier event is the Manhattan Island Marathon Swim (MIMS), a 28.5-mile race around Manhattan. Along with the English Channel and Catalina Channel swims, it is one of the three swims in the Triple Crown of Open Water Swimming.

Each swimmer is accompanied by a kayaker (as well as a motor boat). Last year, I kayaked for the Lone Starlettes, four women from Texas swimming as a relay. And two of the Starlettes, Gretchen Sanders and Pamela LeBlanc, must have had a good time, because they wanted to return this year and repeat the experience as a two-person relay, The Texas Two-Step.

Continue reading →

59 Comments

Posted in Kayaking, New York City, Sports

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

The Kayak on the 17th Floor

Posted on June 4, 2012 by | 48 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

My last post showed my new 17.5-foot-long kayak completely filling our New York City apartment. And quite a few readers wondered how I was going to get it from the 17th floor down to the street and then to the water…

I suppose I could lower it down from the window on a rope, as some suggested. New York City has laws against most things, but lowering kayaks down the sides of tall buildings is probably not (yet) among them.

.

But there is a better way. Here’s how the kayak got to the 17th floor in the first place, and how it’s going to get down again.

Continue reading →

48 Comments

Posted in Kayaking, New York City

Tagged , , , , , ,

… And Once More to Long Island Sound

Posted on May 30, 2012 by | 22 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

On Sunday, the currents were right for a kayak trip through the East River out to Long Island Sound. Here is a slideshow of the highlights:

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

22 Comments

Posted in Kayaking, New York City

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Weekly Photo Challenge: Blue

Posted on May 14, 2012 by | 61 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

The Daily Post‘s Weekly Photo Challenge is usually posted on Fridays. It’s now mid-day Monday… Over the weekend, I, and many other people who have been trained to eagerly anticipate the challenge, were almost giving up. In fact, to fill the absence, on Saturday night Ailsa on her blog Where’s my backpack? proposed her own alternative challenge on the theme of “Reflections“, and has been getting a very lively response indeed. My two “Reflections” posts are here and here.

Still, better late than never! This week’s official Photo Challenge is finally here, and it is Blue.

… And immediately

Rather than words comes the thought of high windows:
The sun-comprehending glass,
And beyond it, the deep blue air, that shows
Nothing, and is nowhere, and is endless.

Philip Larkin, High Windows

That’s it: Blue means opening up, spaces without limits, endless possibilities…

Actually, some of the photos from my “Reflections” posts, here and here, would also have fit the theme very well…

61 Comments

Posted in Literature, New York City, Photography

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

Reflections

Posted on May 13, 2012 by | 34 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

WordPress has not yet posted a theme for this week’s Photo Challenge… So photo-bloggers addicted to a regular weekly Challenge have impatiently begun taking matters into their own hands. Over at her blog Where’s my backpack?, Ailsa has proposed a Photo Challenge of her own, which everyone is invited to join, with the theme of “Reflections“.

“Reflections” is a perfect theme for me. Kayaking, or just walking around after the rain as Ailsa did, inverted reflections in water are everywhere, often more intriguing and mysterious than the scenes reflected. I’ve already posted some of these water reflections here and here and here and here and here…

But “Reflections” also brings to mind our recent visit to the 9/11 Memorial in Lower Manhattan. The surfaces of the memorial, and the glass walls of the towers now rising all around, are full of reverberating reflections: of each other, of the clouds, of the visitors, of memories…

More photos are here.
And my second take on “Reflections” is here.

34 Comments

Posted in New York City, Photography

Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

In Memoriam

Posted on April 22, 2012 by | 30 comments

By Johna Till Johnson
Photos by Vladimir Brezina

The old World Trade Center…

It was the posters that finally made it real.

Everyone has a 9/11 story. Mine isn’t all that exceptional. I was in Midtown Manhattan that morning, preparing for a sales trip to New Jersey. I’d been awake since about 2 AM, working on a project for work.

… and the new World Trade Center

When the sirens first started, I didn’t think much of it. At least at first. But they kept going… and going… and going. Finally I looked out of the window and saw the column of smoke rising into the clear pale-blue air—and realized something serious was going on.

Then I turned on the TV and saw what everyone else did: the smoke, the helicopters, the collapse of the towers one by one.

Continue reading →

30 Comments

Posted in Architecture, Art, Culture, Life, New York City, Society

Tagged , , , , , , ,

Full Moon Rising over Hell Gate

Posted on April 6, 2012 by | 6 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

Last night, as a lavender dusk settled over Hell Gate

a pale shell of the full moon rose up among the high buildings

then shone white in the deepening blue sky

as the bright lights of the Second Avenue construction came on

6 Comments

Posted in New York City

Tagged , , , , ,

A Quiet Springtime Manhattan Circumnavigation

Posted on March 26, 2012 by | 25 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

Sunday, March 25, 2012

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

25 Comments

Posted in Kayaking, New York City

Tagged , , , ,

Weekly Photo Challenge: Through

Posted on March 23, 2012 by | 51 comments

By Vladimir Brezina

This week’s Photo Challenge is Through.

Crowds of photographers gather as the magic moment draws near. What are they waiting for?

It’s Manhattanhenge! On two days in the year, for a brief moment before it sinks below the horizon, the setting sun is perfectly aligned with the cross-streets of Manhattan’s rectangular street grid and sends its last golden rays straight through its canyons…

These photos are from the first occurrence of Manhattanhenge last year, on May 30, 2011. More photos are here and here.

This year’s magic days will be May 29 and July 12!

________________________________________________________

Some other nice interpretations of “Through” I’ve seen:

51 Comments

Posted in New York City, Photography

Tagged , , , , , , , , ,