Sometimes I get fascinated by simple things. For example, this photo, while on a cruise on the cold waters of San Francisco harbor, is nothing at all. But I was fascinated by the twinking of the sun on the waters, and tried a couple of photos, before I got the one I was looking for. View the image full size by clicking on it to see it properly.
Take a look at this picture. It's prime purpose is to display the lenght of the main arch of the Golden Gate Bridge, or more accurately the width between the 2 pillars of the Bridge, and boy, is it long. Seen from this angle, the central section seems to span the entire width of the photograph, and looks real long.
I somehow cannot get over the color of the water, it looks incredibly blue.
I really like these sort of photos. The sun shimmers off the slightly undulating waters in the Bay Harbor, just off San Francisco. This is daytime, not near sunrise or sunset, although it looks like sunset.
You can just stand and watch this shimmer for a long time, relieving tension and other wordly thoughts.
This is the San Francisco harbour in December. As you can see, there are a large number of people having fun in the bay, sailing away to glory.
It looked so calm and peaceful, with sailboats everywhere.
This is actually the photo of a National Park. Confused? Don't be. This is a photo of Alcatrza, called 'The Rock', a small island located in the middle of San Francisco Bay. It is pretty famous also by the name of a movie with the same name, starring Sean Connery and Nicholas Cage.
The island has a chequered history, finally culimnating in being a federal prison till 1963, when it was freed and made a national park. It is a popular tourist destination, reachable by a ferry ride from Fisherman's Wharf.
It was a natural prison, since it was not easily accessible, had freezing waters that deterred most people trying to escape. Some of the most famous prisoners over there were Al Capone and George 'Machine Gun' Kelly.
This is the inside of a cable car in San Francisco. If you take a closer look, then you will find that there has been effort taken to make the look feel old, heritage like.
There is a lot of wood used in the making of the cable car, and it shows. As you can also see, it is fairly crowded, with a mixture of tourists and denizens of the city.
I like this photo a lot. It shows a sloping view of the San Francisco towards Fisherman's Wharf, from the perspective of somebody on the cable car leaving Fisherman's Wharf and climbing a hilly road.
You also get a long distance view of the harbour, and of Alcatraz, The Rock. It is the island, right in the middle of the Harbour.
If you look at this photograph in full view by clicking on it, you will see some idea of the ups and highs of the streets of the San Francisco. San Francisco is a strange place, going up and down. If you look closely at the wheels of the cars, you will see that all the wheels are turned inwards. Due to the sloping nature of the roads, all parked cars have to have their wheels turned inwards so that even if they start to move down for some reason, they will turn into the curb.
This is a good view of San Francisco. For somebody who is coming to San Francisco for the first time, and having heard of how earthquake-prone the city is, it seems a bit difficult to believe that all these high-rise buildings exist.
However, this view looks good, and I liked it enough that I took a few photos, and this seemed to be the one that captured things most properly. I really love the colour of the sky, and getting such a colour without any manipulation was really good.
This is one end of the San Francisco cable car system, Union Square. Here, this wooden structure is a part of a heritage system. The cable car comes to the tracks on the round wooden platform, and then the wooden round platform is turned so that the cable car points back the way it came. Interesting to watch, especially for tourists.
I simply love the cable car system run in San Francisco. This is a heritage line, the world's last manually-operated cable car system (refer Wikipedia). The line mostly runs from Union Square to Fisherman's wharf, and if you have not taken a ride in this before, you should certainly do so. They are not very fast, but are an excellent tourist attraction. Riding in them, you get a very good idea of the steep slopes of San Francisco's roads, and it is a different sort of pleasure riding on the steps of an open tram that is just going uphill or downhill on a steep road (if you refer the second photo).
These are 2 views of Lombard Street. This is the actual name of the road, although it is more known by the name of 'Crooked Street', and it is not hard to figure out why. On this street, the slope is so high that they really had to make the street a winding street so as to reduce the slope for both vehicles and pedestrians. Over time, this has become a tourist attraction, and a must see when you come to San Francisco.
I really like this photo. Taken in the Bay Area, right next to the Golden Gate Bridge, this is a photo of a sunset over the water. I really like images like this one, the sunlight shimmering over the water gives a very good feel.
This is a view of the Golden Gate Bridge from a road that leads up a hill next to the Bridge. This is an equisite view, and gives a view of the middle span with utter clarity. It seems to cover the entire Bay ocean flowing under it, and gives an idea of the grandeur of man's creations.
We are actually going on a road that winds up a hill, and this place is actually part of a national park. There are a large number at normal times on this road, and almost all of them are here for this view.
Part of the fun while traveling on US highways is the vast open distances, and nowhere is this more apparent than in the freeways criss-crossing the US. This is an excellent example of one of them, near the US San Francisco area, where the highway seems to be travelling to the horizon.
This is an otherwise simple photo. Just a rock in the waters off San Francisco, but when you look at this closely, you can see the waves crashing off the big rock, and the small out-cropping. Felt kind of nice to see this, see how the rock stood there and withstood the impact of all the waves.
This is another photograph of surfing in the Bay Area. As you can see, this seems like a very beautiful location, and there are a large number of people enjoying the surf. Waves are good, and these people are really enjoying it. All of them are in black, and the reason being that these are all wet suits, given that this is December, and the water is cold.
This is a photo taken at a small town near San Francisco. You could ask as to why everybody looks to be in black, this is because they are all wearing wet suits. It is after all December, and fairly cold. But it was fun to watch people having fun, and imaging how cold the water would be.
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