John Guilford's Photo Gallery: Travels

Pictures taken on Trips and Travels

All rights reserved. These images are not to be used or copied without my prior written permission.

Unless otherwise noted, through 2011 all pictures taken by me with a Nikon D70 camera.
Depending on the focal length, the lens is most likely either the Nikkor 18-70mm AF-S or the Sigma 70-300mm DG APO.
Starting in 2012, I switched to the Nikon D7000 with either the Nikon 18-105VR lens or the Nikon 70-300 VR lens.

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Waimea Rainbow
Date: 21-Feb-2012 Time: 3:08:07 PM Exp: 1/250s @ f/8 ISO: 250 Lens: 18mm		Waimea Canyon, on the Hawaiian island of Kauai, is sometimes known as the Grand Canyon of the Pacific. It is about 10 miles long and up to 3,000 feet deep. After we got rained on near the top of the canyon, the sun broke through, resulting in this rainbow.

Butchart Sunken Garden at Night
Butchart Gardens near Victoria on Vancouver Island, BC contains wonderful gardens. My favorite is the Sunken Garden that was built about a hundred years ago on the site of an old quarry where they had mined limestone for a cement factory. In 1953 miles of underground wiring was added to provide night time illumination. I especially enjoy this garden at night. This is a time exposure from the north rim of the Sunken Garden. Several places in the garden you can see "ghosts" of people who moved during the time exposure. The stack in the background is all that remains of the original cement plant.		Date: 06-Aug-2011 Time: 10:39:55 PM Exp: 2.1s @ f/4.0 ISO: 400 Lens: 18.00mm Meter: Manual

Ross Fountain at Butchart Gardens
Date: 06-Aug-2011 Time: 10:26:48 PM Exp: 1.3s @ f/4.5 ISO: 400 Lens: 70.00mm Meter: Manual		In Butchart Gardens, near Victoria BC, is the Ross Fountain, installed in 1964 to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Gardens. The fountains are illuminated and constantly changing. At night it puts on an especially colorful show.

Mt. Orville and John Hopkins Glacier
Glacier Bay National Park in southeast Alaska is a stunning place. The scale can be so vast it can be hard to grasp the scale of things. This is Mt. Orville (10,272 ft), first climbed in 1995, towering over the John Hopkins glacier. From this distance, it is hard to appreciate the size of things. The John Hopkins glacier is a mile wide here, extending 250 feet above water (the size of a 25 story building) to 200 feet underwater. The glacier itself is 12 miles long and is flowing about 10 feet a day on average. It is one of the few tidewater glaciers currently advancing (most are receding). The glacier is actively calving as can be seen from all the floating ice in John Hopkins inlet. This picture was taken from a cruise ship about 5 miles away from the glacier's face.		Date: 20-Jul-2011 Time: 9:44:14 AM Exp: 1/320s @ f/9.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 70.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority

Water Tower Shadows
Date: 13-Nov-2010 Time: 3:32:13 PM Exp: 1/30s @ f/9.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 38.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority		While hiking in Tamalpais State Park north of San Francisco, I came upon this water tower. I loved the way the shadows of the steps played against the actual steps themselves. It makes the picture more of an abstract image.

Golden Gate Bridge Tower
One of the things I like about photography is lets me look at the world in different ways. I like to view things differently looking for a picture. While walking across the Golden Gate Bridge, I looked up from the base of the tower, and this is what I saw. I love the way the orange of the bridge contrasts with the blue sky.		Date: 14-Nov-2010 Time: 1:04:53 PM Exp: 1/100s @ f/10.0 Lens: 18.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority

Golden Gate Bridge After Sunset
Date: 14-Nov-2010 Time: 5:26:29 PM - 5:48:21 PM Exp: 25s, 8s, 4s, 2s, 1, 1/2s @ f/8.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 62.00mm Meter: Manual		The Golden Gate Bridge north of San Fransisco is said to be one of the most photographed bridges in the world. Photographing the bridge after sunset is challenging, however, as the lights (especially from the traffic) are much brighter than the bridge. This HDR (High Dynamic Range) picture was made from six separate images with exposure times varying from 1/2 second to 25 seconds. These images were then combined to form the image you see here.

Colorado Wine Country
While visiting Winter Park, Colorado, we were having a glass of wine on the deck. I noticed the refracted and inverted image of the surrounding hills in my wine glass. It was only later I noticed a third image in the stem of the glass.		Date: 25-Jul-2010 Time: 5:45:53 PM Exp: 1/100s @ f/7.1 ISO: 200 Lens: 70.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority

Sea Lion Arch, Ecola State Park, Oregon
Date: 21-Jul-2009 Time: 5:40:24 PM Exp: 1/320s @ f/10.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 270.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority		Sea Lion Arch rock as seen from Indian Beach at Ecola State Park near Seaside, Oregon. As is often the case on the Oregon coast, the day was foggy and not the best for photography. We had driven down to Indian beach and saw Sea Lion Arch at the far end of the beach. I hiked down to get as close as I could without getting wet. You can see some of the myriad of birds who live on and around the rocks. The ones on the arch are hard to see at this resolution; the ones at the top left are clearer. Due to the fog the picture was virtually monochromatic, and I decided it would make a better black and white image.

Cape Meares Lighthouse, Oregon
Cape Meares Lighthouse near Tillamook, Oregon is a lighthouse built in 1890, and deactivated in 1963. It is listed in the National Register of Historic Places. A nearby hillside offers a rather unique vantage point to see inside the lens assembly. This tight crop of the first order Fresnel lens almost has an abstract feel to it.		Date: 20-Jul-2009 Time: 5:11:39 PM Exp: 1/60s @ f/13.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 70.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority

Evening Beach, Seaside, Oregon
Date: 20-Jul-2009 Time: 10:03:57 PM Exp: 15.0s @ f/14.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 40.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority		Seaside, Oregon has a wide beach with soft, white sand. In the evenings small bands of people would gather around small campfires along the beach. I was surprised to see how many fires dotted the sands over a wide area. We saw this during our whole stay at Seaside, even on a cool evening with a light mist falling. I took this photo after dark but before all the light faded from the sky. This gave what I think is a dramatic look to the clouds. The fifteen second exposure blurred the cloud edges enhancing the effect. The railing in the foreground separates the beach proper from the promenade that runs the length of the beach.

Butchart Pansies
While visiting Butchart Gardens, north of Victoria, BC, on a rare, sunny April day, we came across these pansies. There's no great story here - just an explosion of color. These flowers where on a hillside above the walking path, so I was able to get below them for a shot from a different perspective than normal.		Date: 14-Apr-2009 Time: 1:38:30 PM Exp: 1/80s @ f/16.0 ISO: 400 Lens: 50.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority

Acapulco Sunset
Date: 19-Feb-2009 Time: 6:42:19 PM Exp: 1/200s @ f/10.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 300.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority		This picture is pretty self explanatory. It is the sun setting into the Pacific Ocean on a beach in Acapulco, Mexico. It was shot from the grounds of the Grand Mayan resort. During our entire stay in Acapulco we enjoyed incredibly pleasant weather with clear skies. Often the lack of clouds means a boring sunset. Here, it gave a great view of the sun's orb sinking into the watery horizon. My 300mm lens allowed me to make the sun look large compared to the trees in front.

La Quebrada Cliff Diver
During an evening performance of Acapulco's world famous La Quebrada Cliff Divers, I shot this time lapse picture of a single dive. It is actually a combination of six individual shots taken in rapid succession. Here you can the diver starting off at the top of the right hand cliff, leaping off, and finally splashing into the Pacific Ocean. These professionals (the La Quebrada Cliff Divers were formed in 1934, though people were diving long before then) put on one show in the afternoon and several more in the evening. They dive into the ravine from a (relatively low) cliff on the left side of the photo. They swim across the narrow channel and climb the rock face on the right side of the photo. There, they progressively dive from higher heights until the finale of diving from the top of the 148 foot high cliff. The cliff isn't vertical. This makes it a bit easier to climb, but it also means the divers have to leap outward enough to clear the rocks on the way down (but not too far outward!). I've read that they need to time their jumps to coincide with the crests of waves to ensure enough water to land in, though when we were there I didn't see significant wave action. One can watch the show from a viewing platform or from the La Perla restaurant at the El Mirador Hotel, which is what we did, catching two shows over the coarse of dinner. I had my camera set up on a tripod. As the diver dove, I'd squeeze off a number of rapid shots. I later combined a series of shots taken during one dive into the image you see here.		Date: 16-Feb-2009 Time: 8:51:13 PM Exp: 1/40s @ f/2.0 ISO: 400 Lens: 50.00mm Meter: Manual

Dead Tree At Sunset
Date: 27-Jun-2008 Time: 7:05:10 PM Exp: 1/80s @ f/8.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 27.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority		Sedona, Arizona is red rock country with beautiful rock formations all around. While on vacation there, we climbed to the top of a small knoll near the airport in order to photograph the sunset. We got there an hour early. Waiting for the sun to set, I shot various pictures enjoying the fantastic quality of the low angle sun. This shot is a dead tree lit by the soon to set sun with more of Sedona's red rock formations visible in the background.

Sedona Redrock At Sunset
Another picture of the beautiful red rock in Sedona, Arizona. This shot was taken on the Broken Arrow trail during a Pink Jeep Tour. We were driven into the back country by a four wheel drive jeep. During one of the stops, I got this shot of the rock formations lit by the low angle sun.		Date: 26-Jun-2008 Time: 6:55:32 PM Exp: 1/125s @ f/7.1 ISO: 400 Lens: 31.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority

Grand Canyon North Rim
Date: 24-Jun-2008 Time: 7:29:25 PM Exp: 1/80s @ f/8.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 46.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority		While visiting the north rim of the Grand Canyon, we were eating dinner at the lodge on the rim as the sun was setting. Outside on the patio people were enjoying the lengthening shadows and warmer colors of the canyon rock. The lodge, located at Bright Angel Point, was built in 1927 and declared a National Historic Landmark in 1987.

Fireworks In The Magic Kingdom
While vacationing in Florida, we visited Disney's Magic Kingdom. In the evening, they had a fireworks display near the central castle. The cloud like background is actually the smoke from earlier fireworks blowing in the breeze blurred out by the time exposure. The fireworks show was pretty impressive and *almost* made up for the hassle of the crush of people, who, like us, stayed for the show and then all tried to leave at the same time.		Date: 10-Nov-2007 Time: 7:03:53 PM Exp: 5.0s @ f/16.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 48.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority

Hazardous Conditions
Date: 24-May-2007 Time: 4:36:25 PM Exp: 2.0s @ f/5.6 ISO: 640 Lens: 18.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority		While staying at Palm Beach Shore, FL, we found this structure on the southeast corner of the island. I really don't know what it is or what its function is, but I thought it might make a good picture. I hiked out onto the beach on several evenings trying to catch the dim light of the just-set sun. I wanted dim light so that I could use a longer exposure time to blur the waves, but not so long that they were indistinguishable. There was only a narrow sliver of time between too bright and too dark, but this was one of the results.

Palouse River Trail
Between the towns of Pullman WA and Moscow ID, in the Palouse area of eastern Washington lies the Bill Chipman Palouse trail. It used to be an old, abandoned railway line before being converted to a trail in 1998. On an early summer morning, this was the view down the trail.		Date: 30-Oct-2005 Time: 11:39:38 AM Exp: 1/320s @ f/11.0 ISO: 200 Lens: 70.00mm Meter: Aperture Priority