Tag Archives: Photography

Three Paddling Photo Winners

By Vladimir Brezina

The popular paddling site Paddling.net runs a Photo of the Week contest. Over the past several months, I’ve submitted a few of my photos. Two won—

Kayaking under the Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges, East River, New York City

Festive paddle in New York Harbor

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

and one was runner-up—

Kayak swim support, Lower Bay, New York Harbor

Looking through these and other photos that won, it seems that what’s required is not so much a technically great photo, but rather a photo of a compelling paddling scene—as it should be! All three of my successful photos show paddling situations that, to most Paddling.net readers, will be a bit out of the ordinary. As it happens, they are all urban photos, taken in New York Harbor. But if ever a seal hauls up on my kayak deck, or an eagle perches on the bow, I’ll be sure to submit that photo. And you should too!

Around the Reservoir: A Photoessay

By Vladimir Brezina

Yesterday I took a walk along the jogging track that encircles Manhattan’s Central Park Reservoir (more properly, I guess, the “Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir”).
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On the reservoir side of the jogging track, beyond the black cast-iron ornamental fence, is a steep embankment leading down into the water. In this micro-enviroment, just a few feet wide but 1.6 miles long, fall is in full swing…

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Ghosts, Goblins, Superheroes, and Pricesses Dance on the Upper East Side: A Photoessay

By Vladimir Brezina

Halloween. But I was stuck at home working. It was clear I wasn’t going to make it to the Halloween Parade in the Village this year.

But around 5 p.m., unusual sounds from the street below began to penetrate my concentration. I discerned excited voices, children’s squeals, and then—the beat of dance music!

When I emerged to take a look, I found that my block of 92nd Street, between Madison and Park Avenues, had been blocked off and the First Annual Carnegie Hill Halloween Block Party was in full swing!

It was mostly for children. Little ghosts, goblins, skeletons, witches, dragons, tigers, superheroes, knights in armor, princesses, pumpkins, bananas, cobwebbed barrels and even tubs of popcorn, some young enough to be held in arms by their parents who clearly were having just as much fun, cavorted in the street. A little later there was a tiny parade, and prizes were awarded for best costumes. Then, the main business of the evening: trick-or-treating from house to house. Many houses in that block have for days been festooned with their own cobwebs, giant black spiders, and grinning skeletons in anticipation.

Here are a few photos.

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Halloween Is in the Air on the Upper East Side: A Photoessay

By Vladimir Brezina

The Upper East Side of Manhattan takes Halloween very seriously. Halloween is still some days away, but decaying bodies, chained skeletons, and giant black spiders have festooned the area for weeks. The block of 92nd Street between Madison and Park Avenues is particularly worth seeing… here are some photos from that block and a couple of adjacent ones.

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A Blaze of Fall Color by Kayak: A Photoessay

By Vladimir Brezina

In New York City, the leaves are only just starting to turn. But farther north along the Hudson the fall colors must be well advanced.

For a number of years I used to go by train with my folding kayak to see the fall colors in the stretch of the Hudson just south of Albany, near Catskill and the town of Hudson.  In Ramshorn Creek, a little winding creek off the Hudson just south of Catskill, I saw, about this time in October one year, the best fall colors ever—a vivid profusion of yellows, oranges, reds, purples, reflected in the green-brown waters of the creek against a crystalline fall blue sky.

It doesn’t look like I’ll have time to go up there this year. So here are some photos from that memorable trip. Even though photos can’t do the real experience of such colors justice, they do give some idea…

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On the Beach: A Photoessay

By Vladimir Brezina

That first glimpse of the sea instantly shows what the day will be like. The sea sets the mood.

That day at the beach may be just an ordinary Sunday at the seaside
or it may be stormy
or dreamy…

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Later Flowers for the Bees, and Butterflies: A Photoessay

By Vladimir Brezina

… to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease …

John Keats, To Autumn

This past weekend was beautiful: dry, calm, sunny and warm—Indian Summer weather. In New York City’s Central Park, still mostly a fall-denying green, a fresh crop of flowers was out. And the park’s bees and butterflies, like the city’s human inhabitants, were out in force.

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Dawn and Sunrise in New York Harbor

By Vladimir Brezina

Yesterday I got up early to go kayaking with NYC Swim‘s Ederle Swim.  It was dark and cold. Why do these swims always begin so early? (Don’t tell me: time and tide wait for no man…)

But there was an unexpected bonus:  a prime view of a spectacular dawn and sunrise over New York Harbor, from the motorboat that transported us from Manhattan to Sandy Hook, NJ, for the start of the swim. A few photos:

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Kayak Trip: Manhattan—Sandy Hook

By Vladimir Brezina

On Sunday, Johna and I went kayaking. As usual, we looked up the tidal currents and went where the currents would take us that day. That turned out to be Sandy Hook, NJ.

The trip from Manhattan to Sandy Hook and back is one of our favorite trips. We do it often. It’s a full day’s trip but, with favorable current both ways, not overly strenuous: about three hours there and four hours back, with plenty of time between for lunch. I will give details of how to plan the trip so as to use the currents to best advantage in a future post. But in the meantime, here are some photographic highlights of Sunday’s trip.

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Happy Fall!

By Vladimir Brezina

The September Equinox occurred today, September 23, 2011, at 09:04 UTC, or 5:04 a.m. in New York City. And with it, the first day of Fall!

Autumn in New York
Why does it seem so inviting?

It’s autumn in New York
It’s good to live it again.”

To celebrate and anticipate the joys of fall, here is a gallery of fall foliage photos that I took in NYC’s Central Park last year on one spectacularly beautiful day, October 28 (late in the year for peak foliage color, it might seem, but not so in NYC’s urban heat island).

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