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Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Day Trip on the Road

This is a great time of year to drive on the North Carolina highways because there is so much in bloom. Many decades ago as a part of a state beautification campaign, the major highways were planted with a combination of flowers which return and are also replanted and maintained in some cases.
Bill and I went to Wilmington, NC for memorial day to visit the USS NC (memorial battleship). The whole way there and back I was able to practice snapping shots of the flowers. It's kind of hard when you're zipping by at a fast speed but I got the feel of the flowers.It is fun trying to shoot the flowers under the circumstance of speeding by (of course with Bill driving). I'll admit I occasionally try to take picture when I drive but mostly at stop lights. I've pretty much stopped doing it unless I'm a passenger because it's not really safe to combine driving with photography.
Usually when I'm taking roadside shots it's on the way to the mountains because the beach we usually go to takes us a different way. I was glad to have a chance this time of year to be heading to the part of the coast we take US 40 East on as there are so many fields of flowers.
In some cases it looks like the flowers go with a house or a farm but they will be on the highway side of the fence which is how I can tell they are part of what the state maintains.I also took some photographs on the USS NC memorial ship but the lighting wasn't great for the ones I took of the whole ship. Everything worked out great though for some shots on the ship of the guns pointing towards the sky with the signal flags in the picture.
Since Bill was in the Navy between 1968 and 1972 and served on a cruiser with some similarities to the retired ship, he was able to explain a lot about how it operated. I was amazed at how much he remembers, especially since he's older than I am, ha.
I was fascinated by the small plane on the ship. I wouldn't mind going up for a spin in that.I am not sure what bridge I was photographing as I leaned over the ship but it looked like a photo op to me. Of course everything is a photo - op for me. A seagull landing on a gun is a photo op for me. I'll admit that I'm a lot more comfortable around seagulls than I am around guns but these guns stopped firing a very long time ago.
I did find it interesting reading some of the information as well as seeing photographs of North Carolina servicemen who were stationed on the ship during World War II.A lot of the houses in historic part of Wilmington were decorated for memorial day although the lighting wasn't great for shooting them.This has been another of my long rambling all over the place posts, so I'll stop here.

13 comments:

Rambling Woods said...

Oh but rambling is always good with your Carver...I love the photo with the tractor or truck...There is something so very country about it and I love that feeling..
Michelle From Rambling Woods

Cezar and Léia said...

wow Carver! Fabulous series of beautiful pictures!
My favourite is the first shot, okay, you know how much I love flowers!
Glad to know about your nice day trip!
Léia

AscenderRisesAbove said...

I love taking those drive by photos; I took a bunch too this weekend. I get surprised sometimes by what I capture. Of course I have to shoot into; not sideways as my camera keeps trying to focus. I took some big boats with flags too so it was funny to see those here.
My blog is still down but I feel like I am half way through the process of getting it back so am more optimistic.

ellen b. said...

Oh what fabulous shots these are Carver. I love the beautification results! How wonderful to see those beautiful colors when tooling down the highway! Blessings on the rest of your week!

jmb said...

You had a truly wonderful day by the sounds of things Carver.

Lot of wonderful scenery plus educational as well. What's not to love about that?

MaR said...

Lovely post and shots, Carver, what a great day trip!!

Pretty Life Online said...

Perfect shots for wordles, thanks for sharing... Happy WW! Mine's up hope you can drop by.

escape said...

wow! all those green but i really like the house in the last photo. there are also american houses here in the philippines and i really like its architecture.

Leora said...

Love the drive-by flowers...the pink and red and white ones. And the house at the end reminds me of the homes where I grew up.

Dr.John said...

As usual I enjoyed the trip. I love your pictures

Jackie said...

That first shot looks like Texas Bluebonnets. Are you allowed to have those in NC? Some angry Texans might hunt you down! ;)

Texas is seldom pretty, so all we have is spring wildflower season to keep our spirits uplifted. :)

eastcoastlife said...

I wish I could see such a scenic road trip over here. It makes one cheerful seeing the lovely Spring blooms.

Avory said...

Haha, yeah, Daddy gave me the whole "insider's tour" too when we went to the battleship when I was 11 or 12. I was surprised by how much cooler it was than I expected. He knew what the flags meant, too. I was personally freaked out by the little plane. I didn't like the idea of taking off from a boat. He told me about how planes work too when we went to see the kind Grandaddy flew in at that exhibition a while back at the airport, but he mostly just knew about guns and stuff.