Colosseum

This wonderful place is also called Flavian Amphitheatre.  Rome has so many historical locations and sites, its impossible to see them all in a single visit.  I really enjoyed our stop at the Colosseum, but I wish we could have stayed longer and without the other thousand tourist.  They claim it could hold between 50,000 to 80,000 spectators, but I have my doubts.  I’ve been in massive modern stadiums that only hold 40,000.  I don’t see any way this place could hold as many people as they claim.  Anyway….its a great location and worth checking out.

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Lombard Street

I’ve loved my past trips to San Francisco.  What a great city!  The last time I was there, I went to Lombard Street on two difference occasions.  This specific time, it was late at night.  I was basically the only person there.  The other time was during daylight and it was packed with cars and tourist.  I liked having it to myself the best.

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Matt Ryan

I’m so far behind in my photo editing.  Last night I edited some photos from the Steelers vs. Falcons on October 7th.  I was looking through them for a good Matt Ryan photo for a friend of mine.  In my opinion, this isn’t the typical “good” sports photo, but I liked it.  So here he is….. As you can tell from his dirty uniform, the Steelers got to him a bunch on this day.

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City Nights

I’m starting to work through my Chernobyl photos.  It’s going to take me a very long time, but I like what I’m seeing so far.  But I need to mix it up and not give you too many Ukraine photos in a row. 

Tonight, I have a Big Apple sunset photo for you.  MJ was extremely good that night waiting for me to get the perfect photo.

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Hospital Nursery

Here is another photo from inside the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone.  I took this photo inside the hospital nursery located in the city of Pripyat.  There are a few rooms inside the hospital like this.  I have no idea how many babies were born there per year, but based on the nursery, it had to be a few hundred… I think.  This room is an iconic Chernobyl spot…..

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Pripyat Cultural Center

I took this photo inside the cultural center, which is in the City Center of the abandoned city of Pripyat Ukraine.  This town was founded in February 1970 as the ninth nuclear city in the Soviet Union.  It was built to serve and support the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant.  Of course, after the nuclear disaster, the city and the entire surrounding area was evacuated. 

In this room, you can see a former boxing ring that was set up.  Note how the sun rays are highlighted in this photo…. That’s not from photo software editing magic….  Simon flew a drone around the room, which kicked up all this dust helping to create this affect (Great idea of Robert’s) 

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Chernobyl Cooling Tower

I’ve just started to look at and edit a few photos from our trip to Ukraine to visit Chernobyl and the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone.  It’ll probably take me years at the pace I work and the current back log of photos I have to edit.  Regardless, here is a photo I took inside the cooling tower, which is near nuclear reactor #4, #5 and #6.  I loved this mural someone painted on the wall.

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Olympiyskiy

I’ve been absent from the digital world for the last 10 days, while Blair and I traveled to the Ukraine.  We spent some time in Kiev (beginning and end of the trip), Chernobyl, and a few small villages.  We spent most of our time within the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, so you can imagine the number of future posts I’ll have from Chernobyl.  I took this photo from our hotel window at the beginning of the trip in Kiev.  This is their Olympic Stadium, used primarily as a football (soccer) venue.    

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Weird

This beauty is from our Motown Urbex trip earlier this year.  This was the second time I’d been to this site.  I don’t remember this orange chair in the past, but it made for a nice focal point in this photo. I love the graffiti on the back wall as well.

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Bonaire Historic Site

We had a wonderful time exploring the entire island.  On the southern end of the island, there are two historic sites with around 8 to 12 of these tiny huts.  One set is painted white and the other is yellow.  These are former huts for the slaves that were used in the Salt Flats way back in history.  Unfortunately, even this beautiful country has a negative mark on their history due to the use of slaves.  I can’t imagine how terrible the working and living conditions were for these poor souls. 

This specific location is also one of the numerous designated scuba diving sites around the island, all marked with a stone painted yellow and the dive site name on it.  As you can see, this dive site is called “white slave”. 

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Strip Sack

It was an extremely hot day on the sideline yesterday during the Steelers vs. Falcons game.  I’d rather have that then the freezing weather that comes with games later in the season, but it was a little to hot for football, if you ask me.  The Steelers had a good game in all three phases of the game (offense, defense, and special teams) regardless of the heat. 

I took this photo of T.J. Watt’s strip-sack of Matt Ryan towards the end of the game, which ended with the Steelers recovering the fumble in the End Zone for a defensive touchdown. 

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Sneakers

This photo is from our Detroit Urbex trip last spring.  We visited a ton of sites while we were there.  This is from Bradley Elementary School.  This was one of those old style gyms that they also used as the cafeteria.  You know the type, where the tables and benches fold up into the walls to clear the space for gym class.

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Conner

How was your week?  Mine flew by very quickly and I can’t believe it’s Friday night already.  I took this photo last Sunday night at the Steelers vs. Ravens game.  I captured this photo pregame of James Conner, while he was getting himself ready to play.  He didn’t have a great game against the Ravens, but he has a promising future ahead.

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Como Octoberfest

For some people, October is a excuse to celebrate, drink beer and have fun….under the title of Octoberfest.  Honestly, I don’t know the history of Octoberfest and should probably look it up.  Maybe I’ll do that soon… or maybe not. 

I took this photo in the past at a local Octoberfest in the town of Canonsburg Pennsylvania.  Perry Como was born and lived in Canonsburg, so they have a statute of him in front of the City Hall.  He doesn’t normally have a hat, but apparently he got into the Octoberfest spirit for the festival.

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Smithfield Again

I’ve posted numerous photos of this bridge in the past and I can’t get enough of it.  This historic architectural wonder has been used since 1883.  I took this photo a few months ago and I doubt many people have this perspective.  I hope you like it. 

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Tye

It seems hard to believe we’re entering the 4th week of the NFL season already.  Other than a good win against the Patriots, it doesn’t look like it will be a good season for my Lions.  But that’s nothing new.  It also doesn’t look to good for the Steelers based on their start of the season.   On the other hand, the Titans have gotten off to a good start.  Today’s photo is of Tye Smith, who is a cornerback for them in his 3rd season.  He played college at Towson College and was selected in the 5th round by Seattle in 2015 (170th selection)

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Serenity

As weird as this sounds, I can’t remember where I took this photo.  It is either Rickets Glen State Park in central Pennsylvania or it is from Watkins Glen State Park in the State of New York.  I was taking water fall photos in both places the same weekend and I’ve lost track.  How sad is that???  My memory is getting really bad. 

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Vista

Wow, the weekend can’t come soon enough at this point.  Nothing dramatic has happened this week, I’m just ready for the weekend.  Therefore, I looked through some of my photos for a happy memory….. and I came across this beauty.  I can remember standing on the Carnival Vista just after sunrise taking this photo.  There were probably only 20 people up on the deck at the time and it felt like I had the entire ship to myself.  Great moment!!

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Splash!!

I must have taken a couple hundred photos at this exact spot capturing the waves as they crashed up on the rocks behind the sea lions trying to capture the perfect moment when the entire scene came together.  I doubt I captured the perfect image, but it turned out pretty good.  In case you’re wondering, this spot is at the southern tip of Cape Peninsula in Western Cape South Africa. 

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Don't Be Jelly

How was your day today?  I had a good day and am still trying to catch up at work after being gone last week, which is the price everyone pays for taking vacation.  So to remind myself about what a great vacation we had, I’m posting another photo from Bonaire.  On the last morning, Blair and I went to this abandoned hotel south of the airport to capture some urbex photos.  To our surprise many of the rooms had great graffiti murals in them, which added to the setting.  Of the many murals, I loved this one just because the building was right on the coast of the Caribbean Sea. 

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