R. Doug Wicker's Blog, page 179

The Christmas Lights of Eastridge — Part 1

Today I present a reblog of a post I made back in 2012 of El Paso’s premier neighborhood for Christmas lighting:

There is a neighborhood in El Paso that is locally famousfor going all-out each year in decorating for the Christmas Season. It’s called the Eastridgearea, and the residents there have been performing this mystical lighting feast from well before I moved to El Paso over thirty years ago. Over the course of this week’s three regularly scheduled blogs, we will be highlighting the phot...

Christmas Lights Week — How to Photograph Them

It’s the Christmas season. All this week, Monday through Friday, I’ll be reblogging previous Christmas lights posts beginning today with how to photograph Christmas light decorations and the importance of white balance. Next week we’ll return to the Sydney-to-Seattle cruise tour.

Taking pictures of Christmas lights requires special care and preparation. Regular readers of my blog know that I don’t usually advocate taking the camera out of JPEG and shooting in your camera’s Raw format (especial...

Fun Photo Friday — Vanuatu

Sunset Leaving Port Vila

Next week we’ll be taking a brief break from this voyage to present a series on Christmas lights, including how to photograph them. But for now here is today’s Fun Photo Friday of various Vanuatu sights:

Filed under: Uncategorized Tagged: Efate, Espiritu Santo, Fun Photo Friday, Luganville, MS Oosterdam, photography, Port Vila, R. Doug Wicker, transpacific cruise, travel, travel photography, Vanuatu

Touring Espiritu Santos

Mavutor River

You can find beaches everywhere in the South Pacific. But you can’t find scenes such as this on every island:

Matevulu Blue Hole

Espiritu Santo is a huge island with many rivers. It also has many areas known as “blue holes.” And blue they most assuredly are.

Matevulu Blue Hole

Our road trip through the Espiritu Santo countryside also took us to coconut orchards,

Coconut orchard

Through grassy ranches,

Ranch land

Over crystalline rivers,

Mavutor River

And even by picturesque cemeteries,

Ceme...

Vanuatu — Port Vila and Luganville

Rainy Day in Port Vila

The MS Oosterdam continued to make her way along the Vanuatu archipelago after we departed Mystery Island. Our next stop was Port Vila on the island of Efate. Port Vila is the capital of Republic of Vanuatu, and it was not named after Bob. Unfortunately we were greeted with overcast skies and light rains throughout our brief stay there. Ursula and I made it downtown, but I didn’t really want to take the camera out in those conditions. So, the pictures you see here of Por...

A Reminder of the Significance of Today’s Date

The Hawaiian Islands Campaign — December 7, 1941

Seventy-three years ago today the Greatest Generation confronted their own version of 9/11. That was the day the Japanese attacked in two waves Pearl Harbor, Hickam Field, Ford Naval Air Station, Bellows Field, and Wheeler Field. Alas that generation rose to the occasion far better than did we. While there were missteps along the way during the aftermath of that attack — such as the abhorrent treatment of Americans of Japanese descent — almost t...

Fun Photo Friday — Inyeug is still a Mystery

Lonely Windsock

Here’s my favorite shots of our stop on Mystery Island, Vanuatu:

Filed under: Fun Photo Friday, Photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel Tagged: Fun Photo Friday, Inyeug, MS Oosterdam, Mystery Island, photography, R. Doug Wicker, transpacific cruise, travel, travel photography

Touring Mystery Island on Foot

Mystery Island Marketplace

As I mentioned Monday, Mystery Island (Inyeug) is uninhabited until the tourists arrive by either ship or plane. Once the tourists do arrive, they are greeted by great beaches, diverse flora and fauna (including hanging from the trees some of the biggest spiders I’ve ever seen), and a marketplace at which to shop.

Massive Spiderweb

And a Massive Spider to go with it

The small World War II airfield relic is a sod strip approximately 2,001 feet/610 meters long. And, yes,...

Gilligan would be Right at Home — Stopping by Mystery Island

Welcome to Mystery (Inyeug) Island

Mystery Island (Inyeug) is usually uninhabited . . . until a ship arrives or a plane lands. Until then the inhabitants live next door.

Mystery Island Panoramic

The southernmost inhabited Vanuatu island is Aneityum. What you see in the picture above isn’t it. That’s Inyeug, also known as Mystery Island. They’re easy to tell apart because Aneityum looks like this:

Aneityum

and Inyeug looks like this:

Mystery Island

Mystery Island is small enough to circumnavigateon f...

Fun Photo Friday — Leafing through Lifou

MS Oosterdam

Today we say goodbye to Lifou before heading to our next port-of-call Vanuatu. Specifically, next week we’re going to take a look at Mystery Island. Until then, here is today’s Fun Photo Friday gallery of Lifou favorites:

Filed under: Fun Photo Friday, Photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel Tagged: Fun Photo Friday, Lifou, New Caledonia, photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, travel photography