Category Archives: travel by the pint

Lunch under ground

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Following our visit to the Miao village that I wrote about in my last post, we boarded the bus and headed to an undisclosed location for lunch. After more winding roads, we eventually arrived at a very large rock shelter — no — cave, as it turns out. This would be where we would have a buffet lunch amidst a stage show, laser lights and a cast of hundreds of costumed staff. Lunch in China is often an adventure.

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So many dishes, so much to photograph.

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Yet another stage show. Incredible, as usual.

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“Pig-shaped pastries” and other dishes including Black Bone Chicken, Nanxi Goose Breast, Bamboo Soup, Jiangtuan Fish, Braised Beef, Stewed Tofu with Chopped Pork and Quick-Fried Pumpkin Sprouts. Good thing we’d be walking this off with a visit to the Stone Sea in the afternoon.

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Travel by the Pint redesign

Winter is typically a quieter season for me but my workload seems to be picking up this year — something you won’t catch me complaining about. I made things worse for myself by vowing to redesign my own websites this year before my travel schedule starts to pick up in the Spring. Progress is beginning to show, however, and last week we re-launched our Travel by the Pint site:

For those of you who haven’t visited Travel by the Pint before, it’s a video podcast that we created to feature some of the great brewpubs and microbreweries that we run across as we work on travel stories around the country — and eventually (we hope) the world. The episodes can be viewed within the website or you can subscribe for free through iTunes and other online media stores.

A redesign of my photography site is planned as well. At least you now know where to get a good beer while you wait…

Needles Highway

cathedral spires in the black hills

Today I am officially caught up with my post-processing. The image above is one of the last I shot during June’s trip to the Black Hills. Now I’ll turn my attention back to uploading to stock agencies and keywording my Alamy files. I don’t have long before the travel season picks up for me again so I’ll have to make the most of these last couple of weeks in the office.

Several trips are already lined up for the next few months and I might try and squeeze in some Fall color shooting for my stock files if the season looks good. I have some locations in mind but it will just depend on when the peak color hits and if I’m available. The Black Hills is one of those spots I’d like to return to. We’ll see what happens. I have my leaf spies out and they’ll tell me when things start to look good.

I also spent part of last week preparing my entry into the SATW Bill Muster Photo Showcase (here is a slide show of some previous winners). Time was tight this year and I didn’t get to put as much thought into my entry as I have in the past. Maybe that’s good, though. With competitions it’s easy to over-think things. Afterall, it all comes down to the judges opinions — not mine. It’d be great if it were based on my opinion, wouldn’t it? Heh. Results won’t be announced until October so I have some time to sweat it out. I’ll let you know.

South Dakotasaur

South Dakota dino

Well… it was a pretty grey trip to the Black Hills. It was either raining or about to rain for four straight days. I still hold to my previous statement that the area is beautiful even in bad weather but, when you’re selling stock to travel publishers, most people like to see sunshine. Oh well. I did get some shots that I like that I’ll post here soon but I’m starting off with the dino sculpture that I ran across on Saturday while driving the length of South Dakota — just as the skies were beginning to break.

Wouldn’t you know it. Blue skies for the drive home.