...City

While Rome is the Eternal City one might call Berlin the eternal building site. Or The Unfinished City. Construction cranes are as prominently featured in Berlin's skyline as sights. And it can happen that, if you haven't visited a place in a longer while ("easy" in pandemic times), you'll find old, familiar buildings gone, while new buildings seem to pop up out of nowhere everywhere. I've taken this image last week after a visit to the Futurium (a "House of the Future", opened in 2019 – I'll post images from there soon); in the foreground you can see the river Spree, and the glass building on the left is Berlin's Central Station, the Hauptbahnhof (HBF). Noteworthy: The HBF's upper platforms aren't fully roofed, because the Deutsche Bahn (DB; the German Railway Company) wanted to open the HBF in time for the 2006 World Football Championship by all means, and it would have taken until 2008 to finish the roof. The irony: All the construction parts needed to finish the roof were already manufactured. To this date these parts are stored on the premises of Berlin's East Station. Will the roof ever be finished? Who knows... The construction site you see in front of the HBF has nothing to do with the HBF's roof. It is that of the new S 21 suburban railway line, which is scheduled for completion in 2022. Allegedly...

At first, I wanted to process this as a monochrome, because the scene is rather busy. But I liked all these colours. So I thought "embrace the chaos, embrace the construction site and all those cranes", and do it in colour ;) The final image is an HDR made from three images (in HDR Efex), with further processing / sliding steps in Color Efex.

Happy Sliders Sunday, Everyone, stay safe and healthy, and take care!

Die Unvollendete

Rom ist ja bekanntlich die Ewige Stadt. Und Berlin könnte man getrost als die Ewige Baustelle bezeichnen. Oder auch als Die Unvollendete. Baukräne gehören zur Berliner Skyline wie seine Sehenswürdigkeiten. Gerade in Pandemiezeiten, wenn man manche Orte schon lange nicht mehr besucht hat, kann es dann auch passieren, dass alte, vertraute Gebäude plötzlich verschwunden sind, während allerorten Neues entsteht. Dieses Foto des Hauptbahnhofs mit einem Seitenarm der Spree im Vordergrund habe ich vergangene Woche nach einem Besuch des Futuriums (2019 eröffnet, Fotos von dort zeige ich demnächst) gemacht. Die Baustelle am Europaplatz, die Ihr hier seht, bedeutet allerdings nicht, dass die Deutsche Bahn nun doch das Dach für die oberen Bahnsteige des Hauptbahnhofs verlängern würde. Die dafür nötigen Bauteile, längst fertiggestellt, lagern weiterhin (hoffentlich gut verstaut) am Berliner Ostbahnhof. Diese Baustelle gehört zur neuen S-Bahnlinie S21, für die ein unterirdischer Bahnsteig gebaut wird. Geplante Fertigstellung: 2022. Warten wir's ab.

Ich wollte das Foto erst als SW / getöntes Monochrom bearbeiten, weil hier ja ganz schön viel los ist. SW sah mir aber zu trüb aus, weshalb ich bei Farbe geblieben bin. Das Foto habe ich in HDR Efex aus einer 3er-Belichtungsreihe erstellt und für Sliders Sunday in Color Efex noch den einen oder anderen Filter (ich weiß wirklich nicht mehr, welche Filter genau) angewendet.

Habt einen guten Wochenstart und passt weiterhin gut auf Euch auf!

This picture was taken from the deck of the MS Fram on the 16.1.2020 at 23:09. The ship anchored at the eveming in front of the Lemair Channel which we were scheduled to cross the following day. I will post several pictures of that amazing day during the next few weeks.

Tofu is active in the morning and relaxes in the afternoon. The photo was taken on Sunday but as Tofu doesn't have to work he sticks to this schedule during the week too. What changes are the places where he descides to spend his afternoon siesta. On Sunday he chose the rocking chair in the living room.

A different take on this encounter.

On our last night in the Grand Teton National Park, I had scheduled for us to be at Schwbacher’s Landing at sunset. This was the first location we visited prior to making our way up to Yellowstone NP a few days before. We shot this location at sunrise (I still haven’t posted any of those images) but I really wanted to see what kind of light I would get at this time of day.

I was actually shooting the scene of the mountain range about 30 yards down to the right when I decided I had enough of that spot and that we should head back a little to get a few more compositions from back closer to the trailhead. As we were shooting, a single moose came out of the pine trees and walked all the way to the marsh in front of us (about 20 yards away!) and those amazing sunset rays were peaking over the range.

Snow + Sunrays + Moose = Jackpot! We saw in total five moose on our few days in the park and it really made our trip. This was our first time seeing them in the wild. The others were all males with big antlers over near the Gros Ventre area. That is a story for another day.

Mike D.

Northern class 150 unit 150104 (partnered with 150138) departs Blackpool South with the 3.16pm to Colne (2N78).

With a scheduled 4 minute turnaround at this terminus, there's barely time for the driver to walk from one end of the train to the other before setting off again. On this day the turnaround was even tighter seeing as arrival from Colne was 2 minutes late.

Blackpool South, with its single platform and evidence of former glories en route, is very much the Cinderella line into this popular northern seaside town. In fact a significant part of the remaining platform has been abandoned to nature, as seen in this shot. By contrast Blackpool North is vibrant, recently electrified, and boasts fast direct services to London Euston. No surprise It also handles the vast majority of passenger arrivals and departures.

I arrived into this station on a sunny Sunday afternoon and walked the two miles or so along the bracing, enjoyable and ever vibrant promenade before waltzing back inland to North Station for the rather faster ride back to Preston.

A bit of a record shot so I'm not expecting a ten from Len. Sure I spotted Madge though.....

3.17pm, 10th October 2021

★彡.sᴛᴀʀʟɪɢʜᴛ .ᴀʀᴄʜɪᴛᴇᴄᴛᴜʀᴇ.ᴅᴇsɪɢɴᴇʀ.彡★

★ Home Cozy ★

• Landcaping •

★ Schedule for November ★ Open ★

✧ Contact in the world ✧ Emy Starlight

★ LandMark : Office Starlight

“Once again there was the desert, and that only.”

― Stephen King, The Gunslinger

Outside the Dreaming Door Temple at Burn2. Running until Sunday, October 16th

Visit the Hedonist Club Campsite and Demolition Derby: Camp Friendship

Check out the Schedule of Events

Species: Fringilla montifringilla.

Similar in size and shape to the chaffinch, the male brambling has a black head in summer, and an orange breast with white belly. In flight it shows a long white rump. Gregarious in winter, it may form flocks of many thousands and often joins with chaffinches. Numbers can vary between winters depending on food supplies. It is a Schedule 1 species. Info:RSPB.

Many thanks to people who view or comment on my photos

The weather was non too welcoming for our return trip to the standing stones. Salisbury Plain is infamous for the freezing winds that whip across it in winter time and that was the case on this day.

On top of this, storm clouds were gathering, but I struck it lucky after a long, cold wait when the sun broke through for a few seconds and lit up the stones so beautifully.

Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument in Wiltshire, England. It consists of a ring of standing stones, with each standing stone weighing around 25 tons. The stones are set within earthworks in the middle of the most dense complex of Neolithic and Bronze Age monuments in England, including several hundred burial mounds.

© All rights reserved.

This Grade II*-listed stone packhorse bridge over the River Welland at Deeping St James in south Lincolnshire dates from 1651. It is a Scheduled Ancient Monument.

Deeping St James is based around a now lost 12th-century Benedictine Priory, destroyed during the Dissolution of the Monasteries. The stones from the priory were used to build various 17th-century buildings in the area. The village is one mile east of Market Deeping which is also on the River Welland. This rises near Sibbertoft in Northamptonshire. The Welland is one of the main rivers that helps to drain the Fens. It joins the sea near Fosdike in The Wash.

Hello my beautiful people!! how are u? I hope you are well, I missed you <3

Well, this description will be somewhat different, since I write for you and some of my sponsors.

First of all, a thousand apologies for being sooo inactive, my flickr was suspended due to the new rules and I had to wait almost a week for the problem to be solved.

Second, I've had to delete almost all of my photos from old to some new (in this case, the ones I felt didn't meet the “safe” standard).

And third and last, I will be making posts a little less constant because my university scheduled me in the afternoon and I hardly have much time between jobs, projects and exams, because I have to redo my schedules and get used to it. However, after so many obstacles I am still encouraged and always committed to continue making my posts, always giving my best. I hope you can understand and that, despite this, you continue to trust me to be a blogger ♥️ Without further ado, I hope you all have a nice and excellent day, thanks for stopping to read.

After this short but long commercial break , today, I bring you one of several new photos that I hope you like and give it many likes, comment what you think, follow me (i follow back :x) and share with your friends, it would help me a lot to continue growing and improving to be a better blogger every day <3

I love you very much, keep taking care of yourselves and meet your daily goals my loves!!

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❥ If you have time and you want to know more, please visit my blog, click in "about" and the link is there <3

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❥ .:: Hanatsumi ::. Naamah

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HEAD: Lelutka - Ceylon Head 3.1

BODY: Ebody Reborn

LASHES: y e m a. Group gift

What3Words

///scheduler.detonation.webs

York Minster, formally the Cathedral and Metropolitical Church of Saint Peter in York, is an Anglican cathedral in the city of York, North Yorkshire, England. The minster is the seat of the archbishop of York, the second-highest office of the Church of England, and is the mother church for the diocese of York and the province of York. It is administered by its dean and chapter. The minster is a Grade I listed building and a scheduled monument.

The first record of a church on the site dates to 627; the title "minster" also dates to the Anglo-Saxon period, originally denoting a missionary teaching church and now an honorific. The minster undercroft contains re-used fabric of c. 1160, but the bulk of the building was constructed between 1220 and 1472. It consists of Early English Gothic north and south transepts, a Decorated Gothic nave and chapter house, and a Perpendicular Gothic eastern arm and central tower.

The minster retains most of its medieval stained glass, a significant survival among European churches. The east window, which depicts the Last Judgment, is the largest expanse of medieval stained glass in the world. The north transept contains the Five Sisters window, which consists of five lancets, each over 53 feet (16.3 m) high, filled with grisaille glass.

Text Ref: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/York_Minster

I carefully planned this shoot, arriving early to Four Mile Creek so there would be a mist on the water and the fall foliage although past peak would still be an attractive backdrop for the Herons. Somehow the Herons got mixed up on the dates and times and were a no show. Standing on a muddy path alongside the creek under a canopy of trees holding my longest lens my options were limited. I really did not see any good shots, but I started viewing the trees above me through the lens very slowly and carefully similar to a sniper looking through his scope. I left with over 30 images that I probably would never have seen if the Herons had been there as scheduled.

Precision Scheduled Railroading in effect, NS Train 224 with the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad Heritage Locomotive on the point passes over Dry Creek on the NS Kansas City District-BNSF Brookfield Sub.

This train's Moberly crew was over 9 hours old at this point, and at 13,024 with 3 distinct blocks of traffic to get rid of between Voltz and Kansas City, they'll be close to their hog time before they make the first cut.

The Lackawanna's Phoebe Snow and N&W's Herman H. Pevler are both rolling in their graves.

Locomotives: NS 1074, NS 9212, NS 9555, NS 8086, NS 9036

4-22-19

Missouri City, MO

Mt Manaslu 8th Highest Mountain in the world......

8163 metres above sea level...

One of the most beautiful mountain in the world...

16 days trekking schedule...

🇫🇷Sur la côte ouest de Thira (Santorin) , on trouve 3 ports :

* Vieux Port de Santorin .... ou accède les navettes maritimes des grands bateaux de crisoisière et pour la plaisance

* Athinios Ferry Port et Port of Santorini pour les ferry (1 pour les passagers) les bateaux d'excursion comme celui où nous trouvons,l'autre pour les marchandises.

Notre excursion est prévue avant le coucher du soleil. Une autre excursion plus tardive dans la matinée est possible pour assister au coucher de soleil .

🇬🇧 There are 3 ports on the west coast of Thira (Santorini):

* The old port of Santorini .... where the shuttles of the big cruise ships and yachts arrive.

* Athinios Ferry Port and Santorini Port for ferries (1 for passengers) and excursion boats like the one we are on, the other for goods.

Our excursion is scheduled before sunset. Another excursion later in the morning is possible to watch the sunset

.

🇬🇷 Υπάρχουν 3 λιμάνια στη δυτική ακτή της Θήρας (Σαντορίνη):

* Παλιό Λιμάνι της Σαντορίνης .... όπου έχουν πρόσβαση τα λεωφορεία των μεγάλων κρουαζιερόπλοιων και των σκαφών αναψυχής.

* Αθηναϊκό Φέρι Λιμάνι και Λιμάνι της Σαντορίνης για τα πλοία (το ένα για επιβάτες) και τα εκδρομικά σκάφη όπως αυτό στο οποίο βρισκόμαστε, το άλλο για τα εμπορεύματα.

Η εκδρομή μας είναι προγραμματισμένη πριν από τη δύση του ηλίου. Μια άλλη εκδρομή αργότερα το πρωί είναι δυνατή για να παρακολουθήσουμε το ηλιοβασίλεμα.

🇩🇪 An der Westküste von Thira (Santorin) gibt es drei Häfen:

* Alter Hafen von Santorini .... wo die großen Kreuzfahrtschiffe und die Freizeitschifffahrt anlegen.

* Der Fährhafen von Athinios und der Hafen von Santorini für Fähren (eine für Passagiere), Ausflugsschiffe wie das, auf dem wir uns befinden, und der andere für Güter.

Unsere Fahrt ist vor Sonnenuntergang geplant. Ein weiterer Ausflug am späten Vormittag ist möglich, um den Sonnenuntergang zu erleben.

🇪🇸 Hay tres puertos en la costa oeste de Thira (Santorini):

El Puerto Viejo de Santorini es por donde acceden las lanzaderas de los grandes cruceros y yates.

* El puerto de Athinios y el puerto de Santorini, para transbordadores (1 para pasajeros) y barcos de excursión, como el nuestro, y otro para mercancías.

Nuestra excursión está programada antes de la puesta de sol. También es posible realizar otra excursión más tarde por la mañana para ver la puesta de sol.

🇮🇹 Nella costa ovest di Thira (Santorini) si trovano 3 porti:

- Il Puerto Vecchio di Santorini, da cui partono le navette per i grandi crociere e yacht.

* El Puerto de Athinios y el Puerto de Santorini, uno para transbordadores (1 para pasajeros) y el otro para barcos de excursión, como el nostro, y para mercancías.

Nuestra excursión es por la tarde, antes de la puesta de sol. Es posible otra excursión por la tarde para ver la puesta de sol.

Amtrak's California Zephyr train No. 6 has crested 7440 ft. Soldier Summit the morning of Jan. 17, 1987. The tiny brick D&RGW train order depot, at the time used by maintenance of way, was demolished by April the same year.

Railfanning during COVID just plain sucked, it was a pain in the ass for everyone. The worst part it seemed for everyone was food and overnight stay for a simple trip. The many trips we did to the CMQ during this time were nothing short of 20-26 hours. The train schedules of number 1 and 2 required you to be trackside along Moosehead Lake at dawn. Usually, an 11:30 PM departure from the house meant the day would end around midnight the next day. We had lots of fun and laughs, and we made the best of it. After following number 1 west to Jackman, then back east with number 2 we enjoyed the final days of Blueberry Barns leading the way. Here number 2 with 9020-9011 and 9017 pass us at the closed for the season, Squaw Village resort in Greenville, ME after "swimming" through hip deep snow getting from the parking lot to the edge of back lot. It was all worth it in the end, making for good stories....let's hope it never again. Greenville, Maine February 17, 2021.

For my video; youtu.be/Zd7IUeNHgCk?si=huEZz1b7WPjaeKDy,

Port Moody, Port Moody, British Columbia, Canada.

At the end of Burrard Inlet’s Port Moody Arm, the Shoreline Trail includes two sections of boardwalk, four bridges, and a raised gravel pathway around Pigeon Cove, and a paved multi-use pathway. This area is one of Port Moody’s most widely used trails, hosting over 230,000 visits a year. In addition to being an important recreational area for the community, this is a critical ecosystem area for fish, birds, and other wildlife.

The boardwalks were originally constructed by City crews over thirty years ago as part of a larger trail system connecting Rocky Point Park to Old Orchard Park. These unique wooden structures are now aging and are frequently covered by water during king tides and storm surges.

Shoreline Trail Boardwalk Replacement Project.

The construction of the project has now been split into two phases with the first phase scheduled to begin in September of 2023 and the second phase in the summer of 2024.

www.portmoody.ca/en/city-services/shoreline-boardwalk-rep...

(The Chinese fishing nets at sundown story starts here.)

The last day of my trip though India was spent seeing the one thing I came on the trip to see, the Chinese fishing nets at sun down. To do so, my tour company out of the UK, scheduled a cruise through the harbour and bay of Kochi.

I waited on the dock and saw a large boat pull up and board many tourists. I was prepared to get on that boat, but my guide shook his head no. Then a smaller boat docked and he motioned that this was my boat. Let's say that the boat resembled the walls of this old house along the harbour.

It was a wooden boat with cracks like this and I could see light through many of the boards. I gingerly stepped on board and began a joyful "cruise." I loved having my own boat and the wonderfully polite and kind men who proudly showed me the area were an added bonus. I could focus on taking pictures and have the silence to do so. Moments like this are the times I cherish in remembering my travels.

I can be skeptical when I travel so I kept asking for reassurance that we would be close by the fishing nets at sundown. At times, the suspense over came me, but at the end of this series I will show you the finale of the cruise and my trip through Southern India.

thewholetapa

© 2012 tapa | all rights reserved

Swissair Flight 111 was a scheduled international passenger flight from John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City, United States, to Cointrin International Airport in Geneva, Switzerland. This flight was also a codeshare flight with Delta Air Lines. On 2 September 1998, the McDonnell Douglas MD-11 performing this flight, registration HB-IWF, crashed into the Atlantic Ocean southwest of Halifax International Airport at the entrance to St. Margarets Bay, Nova Scotia. The crash site was 8 kilometres (5 mi; 4 nmi) from shore, roughly equidistant from the tiny fishing and tourist communities of Peggy's Cove and Bayswater. All 229 passengers and crew on board the MD-11 were killed, making the crash the deadliest McDonnell Douglas MD-11 accident in aviation history.

Peoples of Peggy's Cove help the Rescue Teams on site with Fishing Boats

memories from our visit to the Orkneys. This beautiful little plane is the trusted transport of choice if you want to hop from Westray island to sister island Papa Westray. The flight lasts about SIXTY SECONDS and is listed in the Guinness book of records as the World's shortest scheduled flight. We even got a certificate for that :)) And as you can see, this little plane is the island's postman and lifeline as well.

One of the upsides of moving all of my classes online during the pandemic this past year has been the new flexibility in my schedule. During the normal season at the college, many of my weekends would have been taken up with competitions, festivals and workshops, all of which, sadly, aren't happening this year. Instead, my weekends were going to be wide open this Winter and I was very much looking forward to taking a few trips back up to Yosemite to get some more shooting in during my favorite season in the park.

Unfortunately, this is easily one of the worst rainy seasons we've ever had in California. In my neighborhood, it's rained exactly three times since last May. Yosemite hasn't fared much better with the snow fall far below normal for this time of year. I'm hoping things will begin to change this weekend with a few snow showers in the forecast.

Since I haven't been able to make a trip up there so far this Winter, I have instead been sorting through some of my photos from my last Winter trip in 2019. On this particular evening, the park had received nearly three feet of snow on the valley floor and I had just done a face plant in a drift shortly before this photo was taken. As I recall, it was day in February when most of the other photographers in the valley were fighting over spots to shoot a fiery Horsetail Fall. Instead of joining the scrum, I headed down to the river in search of some solitude and stumbled on this view just as the sky lit up.

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Having had lightly (or no) scheduled traffic in the recent past, I had never given D&RGW's La Veta Pass much thought; but after reading more on its storied past as a potential route south to Mexico for the Rio Grande, I have newfound respect for its historical significance. With the takeover of the Pass from San Luis Rio Grande by Colorado Pacific Rio Grande (CXRG), and what appear to be twice-a-week runs to a connection with UP at Walsenburg, it may become my new "go-to" during future family trips to Colorado.

The hogger on this CXRG train is taking it nice and slow near the station of Russell on the west side of the Pass, returning to Alamosa from Walsenburg. In a few miles, it'll be a mostly-flat, if not smooth, ride all the way into town. Now, about that power...

Visit this location at Club Samurai in Second Life

Levers in the soon to be closed Barnetby East Signal Box.

The box was built around 1916 by the Great Central Railway when the route between Wrawby and Brocklesby was quadrupled to cope with the growing freight traffic to and from Immingham and Grimsby Docks. With closure currently scheduled for the end of 2015 the box will likely just fall short of its centenary.

Title extract from the poem "Woak Hill" by W. Barnes, quoted in "Far From The Madding Crowd" by T. Hardy.

Hadleigh Castle Essex UK

Hadleigh Castle is a ruined fortification in the English county of Essex, overlooking the Thames Estuary from south of the town of Hadleigh. Built after 1215 during the reign of Henry III by Hubert de Burgh, the castle was surrounded by parkland and had an important economic and defensive role. The castle was significantly expanded and remodelled by Edward III, who turned it into a grander property, designed to defend against a potential French attack, as well as to provide the King with a convenient private residence close to London. Built on a geologically unstable hill of London clay, the castle has often been subject to subsidence; this, combined with the sale of its stonework in the 16th century, has led to it now being ruined. The remains are now preserved by English Heritage and protected under UK law as a Grade I listed building and scheduled monument.

Running 3 hours behind schedule, the sextuple combination of 44220, L277, 44223, RL304, 44209 and RL306 roar away from Gunnedah with loaded grain train 5446 from Narrabri to Carrington.

The train would stop down the track at Burilda and place the front three locomotives onto the rear for banking up Ardglen.

Wednesday 11th September 2024

The Sumpter Valley Railroad along the Elkhorn Scenic Byway in Baker County Orgon

The Sumpter Valley Railroad is open weekends and major holidays, Memorial Day Weekend through the last weekend in September. Round trips take just over two hours, including a layover in either McEwen or Sumpter. There are also many special events throughout the season, ranging from train robberies to photo specials.

The Railroad’s station is located in Oregon’s Sumpter Dredge State Park and visitors to the railroad can also tour this iconic gold dredge during their visit to Sumpter and the railroad

For more information including train schedules and upcoming special events visit

www.sumptervalleyrailroad.org or for more information about Sumpter, and other historic sites and attractions in Baker County visit the Baker County Tourism website at www.travelbakercounty.com .

BEE4BD to Edinburgh departing around 90 minutes behind schedule

Terminal 1 was closed down due to minimized Flight Traffic in MUC in November 2020. All Traffic is handled now via Terminal 2. Re-opening of Terminal 1 for Check-in Purposes scheduled for May 19.

Taken on March 1, 2021 with Sony ILCE-7M2 and the Sony FE 16-35mm F4 ZA OSS at F=8.0.

Charlie was the last. No more models scheduled to shoot, for the near future.

Lady did a mighty fine job, especially as it was her first time.

(insert sex joke)

But it's time to shift things, ever so slightly. I've got a few projects waiting for me in the next few weeks, gonna hopefully stretch my legs a bit, artistically speaking.

Excited, bit nervous. Don't really like change all that much. But there's something in my brain pan saying "do something different", and if there's one thing I've learned, all my years on earth, it's this:

ALWAYS LISTEN TO THE STRANGE VOICES IN YOUR HEAD.

Both sandhill crane eggs hatched and out popped two precocious, healthy orangey-gold chicks, endearingly known as "colts" almost immediately ready to follow their parents out of the nest on their diligent foraging for worms and insects to feed the colts.

Interesting to note that these photos were taken exactly one year to the day from my images of the 2019 hatchlings. These guys really keep to a tight schedule!

Two DMVW SD50Fs head east on BNSF's ex-Northern Pacific main line at Sterling, N.D. with a coal train for the Great River Energy plant at Spiritwood. A crewman told me these coal runs are now pretty infrequent. The Spiritwood plant is also scheduled to go to natural gas in the next few years (they get most of their fuel from natural gas now) putting an end to these trains.

So heres the full story: The day prior to this, ZMQG4s lead ace (seen 3rd out) suffered an engine block failure and was shut down indefinitely. Rather than run the BN ace around, they parked it in nowhere southern Illinois. Now a day behind schedule, IG4SI was supposed to drop a CSX unit to rescue IG4SI, and clearly that didnt happen. So an extra board crew out of Dupo had to drive up to Bloomington, steal their local power, and bring the now 2 days late stack, into G4... running under IDUG4X-20.

Props to the based crew that chatted with us while they were parked south of Gardner later that evening.

Anyways, heres the rescued stack screaming through Odell in notch 8.

A trio of C4s lead an east-bound intermodal past the venerable searchlights that guard the CPKC diamonds in Savanna. Like most searchlights on Class 1s these days, these vintage lights are scheduled for replacement in the near future.

This whole row is scheduled for demolition to allow the Eden Project to be built. I'll believe it when I see it.

Meanwhile, Morecambe seems to be tying its future to this development.

Have a zoom around this picture for some interesting details.

CAERLAVEROCK CASTLE IS A MOATED TRIANGULAR CASTLE, FIRST BUILT IN THE 13TH CENTURY. IT IS LOCATED 11 KILOMETRES (6.8 MI) SOUTH OF DUMFRIES IN SOUTH-WEST SCOTLAND, ON THE EDGE OF THE CAERLAVEROCK NATIONAL NATURE RESERVE. CAERLAVEROCK WAS A STRONGHOLD OF THE MAXWELL FAMILY FROM THE 13TH CENTURY UNTIL THE 17TH CENTURY WHEN THE CASTLE WAS ABANDONED. IT WAS BESIEGED BY THE ENGLISH DURING THE WARS OF SCOTTISH INDEPENDENCE, AND UNDERWENT SEVERAL PARTIAL DEMOLITIONS AND RECONSTRUCTIONS OVER THE 14TH AND 15TH CENTURIES. IN THE 17TH CENTURY, THE MAXWELLS WERE CREATED EARLS OF NITSHDALE, AND BUILT A NEW LODGING WITHIN THE WALLS, DESCRIBED AS AMONG "THE MOST AMBITIOUS EARLY CLASSICAL DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE IN SCOTLAND". IN 1640 THE CASTLE WAS BESIEGED FOR THE LAST TIME AND WAS SUBSEQUENTLY ABANDONED. ALTHOUGH DEMOLISHED AND REBUILT SEVERAL TIMES, THE CASTLE RETAINS THE DISTINCTIVE TRIANGULAR PLAN FIRST LAID OUT IN THE 13TH CENTURY.

TODAY, THE CASTLE IS IN THE CARE OF HISTORIC SCOTLAND AND IS A POPULAR TOURIST ATTRACTION. IT IS PROTECTED AS A SCHEDULED MONUMENT, AND AS A CATEGORY A LISTED BUILDING.

A very old road sign at the junction of Beckenham High Street and Bromley Road in SE London giving distances to London and local destinations - a third side also gives the distance to the Swan public house at Wickham. This was the New Cross turnpike road of 1718. Turnpikes were toll roads set up to address the urgent need for better roads from the early 18th century. From 1767, mileposts were compulsory on all turnpikes, to inform travellers of direction and distances and to help coaches keep to schedule.

Another frame of the one and only time I pulled this off in 10 years living in The Last Frontier!

The Alaska State fair is always summer's last big hurrah in the Last Frontier. To help accommodate the 300,000 visitors over the two week period (equivalent to about half the state's total population) the ARR runs trains from Anchorage to Palmer up to three times a day on both weekends. This is a great way to travel and beat the traffic and the train drops you right at the gate as seen here.

These trains are the only regularly scheduled passenger trains on this normally freight only branch, and the only ones now that travel this far to MP A4.5. And on only one night each year they set of fireworks at 10 PM sharp. If the last train of the night arrives on time it is sitting at the station in a perfect position for just about the whole show. I had tried this shot the prior year only to be skunked by a train that arrived ten minutes late, but this time it all came together.

Palmer, Alaska

Saturday September 03, 2016

A sight we won't be seeing for quite a while and a photo I took during Edinburgh's Festival in August. This large island 'platform' is one of the proposed places where the trams will stop in 2014 when the project is now scheduled to be completed.

On tv and radio news programmes we hear every day of severe congestion on the outskirts of Edinburgh at places like Sherrifhall, Straiton, Hermiston Gait and on the Bigger Road, the A702, on the A7 Galashiels road, at Newbridge on the M8 to Glasgow and of course at the Forth Road Bridge. But do we ever hear of real congestion in the centre of Edinburgh - in Princes Street perhaps? Eh no.....this is mid-day during the week and does anyone really believe we need trams running along here to 'relieve congestion'? What congestion I ask!

I think the trams should be running on all the above routes to the edge of the city where our first class bus service can take passengers into town. Ah well, it'll be nice when it's finished I suppose!

Dennis Dart SLF, Plaxton Pointer SPD, number 191 (Y191 CFS) was new in 2001 and is now among the oldest buses running in normal service for Lothian. And there aren't too many now with registration plate and fleet number matching - a great tradition in Edinburgh between 1954 and 2001.

It's nice to have a nostalgic look again at Princes Street although note the naughty driver of that car behind the Dart - cars have been prohibited from this part of Princes Street for several years now. Must be a visitor!

The calmly flowing waters of a swollen Kickapoo Creek gently touch the concrete footings currently supporting the passage of this heavy, 131-car, southbound Union Pacific coal drag as its two, lead, AC six-axles ride their dynamic brakes, coasting downhill across a combination deck plate and lattice through truss bridge along the former C&NW "SI Line" outside Bartonville on a gloomy July morning. This train of loaded aluminum BethGons -- symbol CNAPW 14 -- are topped out with over 18,000 tons Wyoming's finest black diamonds; Filled at Peabody's North Antelope Mine in the state's rich Powder River Basin, these hoppers have only a few short miles left to travel before reaching their destination at NRG Energy's Powerton Generating Station near Pekin. The train will soon cross the Illinois River drawbridge and immediately make a right turn onto the IMRR and down into Crescent Yard for interchange where they'll tie down and the loads will wait for an Illinois & Midland crew to spot the cars at the plant for final dumping. Slated for decommission come the end of 2028 due to the country's relentless insistence on "cleaner" energy alternatives, Powerton is the sole remaining, actively burning coal-fired power plant to still remain standing in the greater Peoria area, outliving the facilities at Havana, Hennepin and Canton's Duck Creek (2019), and eventually the E.D. Edwards Station at Bartonville (2022). Once closed, it'll be another major hit in activity levels for a route that is already down in traffic. Twice weekly scheduled manifest service between Peoria and Clinton, IA, as needed coal, grain and ethanol unit traffic, and seasonal ballast trains are pretty much the bulk of what traverses this line.

For southbounds, this is the final, and most dramatic, crossing atop a snaky Kickapoo Creek which twists and turns beneath the rails of the Peoria Subdivision in six different locations within just about a short, two mile stretch of track. Just about a half mile back from this bridge, the train is still working through the CTC controlled interlocking at "Peoria JCT" where the Peoria Sub main to South Pekin splits from UP's "Low Line," which routes trains for Peoria area interchange into and out of their small Adams St. Yard just a short distance away on the city's southwest side. The single-tracked Peoria Subdivision, which runs south out of Nelson away from the busy Geneva Sub, uses a combination of CTC, TWC and ABS infrastructure to route what little traffic runs down this line and is also the only class 1 of four that has a "through route" through the city. A line that does not get much attention from photographers, an older "winged" EMD SD70ACe on the point of a well timed coal load just was enough for me to grab the camera and quickly pick it off at this very seldom shot location.

I sure could do without that walkway.

With its scheduled maintenance complete, Arcturus Outpost’s LL-928 Galaxy Explorer takes flight, to explore strange new worlds and seek out new life and new civilizations.

--- For this shot, I was trying to take the vibe from the box artwork with the ship zipping across a starry skied tan colored, planetoid surface and just give it a 2020’s sci-fi cinematic look and feel.

To learn more about Nova Team's other adventures visit their album: flic.kr/s/aHskpavQh5