I’ve been reading Nathaniel Philbrick’s excellent book, In the Heart of the Sea, about the whaling ship Essex (it sank in the Pacific Ocean in 1820 after tangling with a sperm whale and became Herman Melville’s inspiration for the novel Moby Dick). The surviving crewmembers, adrift in the ship’s boats, had to decide where their best chance of rescue lay […]
I collected this set of images during two separate visits to two different museums: Sacramento’s Crocker Art Museum (September 2019) and San Francisco’s deYoung Museum (August 2022). The artists and the media may be widely varied, but each one speaks to me in a profound way, and the more I consider them, the more connections I seem to discover. Al […]
Today I’m concluding the collection I started on Tuesday showing photos shot as I traveled to and from San Francisco on Amtrak and around the city on public transportation. They include images from my outing to the Lyon Street Steps. The first part of my trip was by cable car; I normally avoid riding the cable cars because they’re usually […]
I shot a lot of photos when I visited the Sacramento History Museum in September 2017, so I’m not too surprised that I found quite a few I’ve never shared before. These are all part of the 1920s Kitchen and Agriculture exhibit. A few of the images have appeared in the blog in black-and-white, but I also like the original […]
There’s plenty of comedy and drama — as well as history — in this episode of California’s Gold, originally aired in January 2000. California’s First Theater in Monterey is part of the Monterey State Historic Park, located along the bay and only blocks from the Old Fisherman’s Wharf. Because this is the original structure, which has undergone several restoration efforts […]
I confess I’m a more than a little bit amazed that I haven’t already featured this particular episode of California’s Gold. It originally aired on October 6, 2000, almost exactly 22 years ago. The California State Library not only holds treasures of the state’s history, it is, itself, a wonderful historic California treasure. Its original building, now known as the […]
I wound up with a window seat on our pre-Christmas flight from Sacramento to DFW, so I shot a few photos with my phone camera. They’re not the best quality, of course, but there’s always something fascinating about seeing the landscape from an airliner perspective. That viewpoint also highlighted the contrast between the rainy, overcast weather in California and the […]
It’s been many years since I spent time on the Sacramento end of the American River Parkway, but several times back in the 1970s I did ride what was at the time the entire length of the bike trail, 23 miles from Discovery Park to the Nimbus Fish Hatchery. These days the parkway and bike trail extend for 32 miles, […]
