Just wanted to give a shout out to my buddy John Mancini. This spring he invited me out one morning for some stand up surfing where I grabbed this image seen above. This image and a couple others ended up in one of the opening spreads in the fall issue of the StandUp Journal which just recently hit the newsstands. It’s great to see my buddy in the mag and to see the Keweenaw getting some recognition in the surfing/standup world.
Now if only I could find myself an actual copy of the magazine.
Mari paddling through a sea cave on the east side of Grand Island…
So, this post really doesn’t have anything to do with recent activities. But, earlier this summer Mari and I did make it over to Pictured Rocks for one last trip before our move out to Maine. I just came across a folder of images from the trip and thought they should be shared.
The Pictured Rocks area is a place that we found ourselves returning to each summer. Most of the time we would circumnavigate Grand Island because we were usually short on time and we didn’t have to set up a shuttle. This past summer however we had the opportunity to paddle the entire length of the Pictured Rocks shoreline and since Mari had never had the opportunity to experience this stretch we arranged to start our trip a few days before a symposium in Grand Marais. This enabled us to leave our car in Munising and have friends pick it up and bring it to the even site for us.
We spent 3 nights and 4 days paddling the ~45 miles to Grand Marais. During our trip we experienced thunder storms, thick fog, beautiful bluebird skies, strong winds and waves to 5-6 ft… sometimes all in the same day. This is something that everyone has been told, but a lot of people really don’t think about. The weather on Lake Superior really can – and does – change very quickly. On our second day of paddling we left Miner’s Beach in 80 degree, windless, blue sky conditions only to run into a small system where the temp dropped 15-20 degrees, the fog was so thick that we couldn’t see the 100 ft sandstone cliffs only a few hundred feet away, and 2-4 ft waves that were reflecting off the steep sandstone walls. If we were less prepared this could have been a very difficult situation. But we were good and after a short stop at Mosquito Beach we got back on the water and had nothing but blue skis, warm weather and calm water on our way to Chapel Beach.
Overall it was a great trip and I would definitely recommend putting the Pictured Rocks on your paddling bucket list.
Enjoy the rest of the pics… there’s a more complete gallery at the bottom. Some of the images are out of order because my slr and p&s aren’t sync’d up correctly.
Later… paddle safe!
Making the crossing from Trout Point on Grand Island over to Miner’s Castle…
And here comes the fog…
Approaching a large arch just north of Mosquito Beach…
Some of the amazing cliffs along the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore…
Mari paddling through one of the many small openings in the sandstone…
It seems like this is the first weekend that Mari and I have not traveled somewhere… but I’m pretty sure that’s because I had to work. Anyway, last weekend we got to meet up with our good friends Jill and Hans in Chester, VT. We drove down on Saturday morning to Chester. The rest of that day we hung out at their homestead, went to dinner, hung our around the fire and listened to Jill and Hans practice the guitar.
Sunday, we drove over to Franconia Notch. Little did we realize that Franconia is the weekend hiking destination for the majority of the people in the Northeast. On top of that it was Columbus Day Weekend so in hindsight we probably shouldn’t have been surprised when we showed up and the highway was lined with vehicles due to the lack of parking.
Eventually we found our own spot along the road and started our hike up Mt. Pemigewasset. Jill and Hans had Anika in tow so we didn’t choose anything too strenuous. The hike up was great and the view from the top was very much worth it. I really want to go back to this area sometime when there aren’t so many people.
Anyway, I just wanted to share some photos from the weekend. Here they are.
This past weekend Mari and I were again in Vermont. Mari was attending a conference and I was meeting up with Tripp for some play time outside. We drove over on Thursday night so Mari could attend some of the Friday events. Tripp couldn’t make it until Saturday, so on Friday I was on my own and decided to spend the day hiking the highest point in Vermont – Mt. Mansfield.
There are quite a few different routes to the top of Mt. Mansfield, there’s even a toll road that will take you 90% of the way up. I decided to hike the Laura Cowles Trail on the way up and then take the Sunset Ridge Trail on the way down. On the drive over the top of Mansfield was enshrouded in clouds and the Laura Cowles Trail follows a ravine up the side of the mountain offering a little more protection from the wind and from potential lightning. The only issue you might have is with water as quite a bit is routed down the center or the trail.
Fortunately, by the time I arrived at the base the sky was clearing and things were looking pretty good.
Here’s where the approach trail splits. I went to the right on the way up and came from the left on the way down. The approach from the parking lot is just a touch over a mile on easy, well maintained trail. The colors were just starting to come out and the weather ended up being just about perfect.
There was a lot of water on the Laura Cowles Trail. At times there were streams on either side of the trail and at other times the trail seemed to go right up the center of some of the streams. It wasn’t uncommon for me to find myself wondering if I had missed the trail and was just following the watershed. However, the blue blazes told me that I was on the right path. Waterproof boots are definitely recommended for this trail.
Here’s a view looking back down the Laura Cowles Trail… yes that is flowing water… and no this is not even close to the wettest or steepest part. I regret not taking more photos of this trail, but it was really steep and wet and I packed my camera in my pack hoping to keep it safe.
Here’s a look up the Sunset Ridge Trail with the summit of Mt. Mansfield in the background. The Sunset Ridge Trail is a little longer, but much less steep than the Laura Cowles Trail. It follows a ridge and provides some great views along the majority of it’s length. This is definitely the way to go if you happen to have kids or dogs in tow.
Now, I did take quite a few more photos. But, at some point during the hike I must have accidentally changed some of the settings and those images ended up being severely overexposed. I typically use my old D70s for trips like this because it’s lighter and if I did destroy it I wouldn’t be too distraught. However, the dial on top changes a little too easily and I’m not in the habit of checking it every time any more… guess I’ll have to go back.
This past weekend I met up with my friend Dave Tripp in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. The day actually started out with me driving Mari down to Boston to catch a flight back to Michigan. I then drove straight from Boston to meet Tripp in New Hampshire. The funny thing is that all of this happened before 11am. I have to say I’m really starting to like the variety of options within such short distances here in the Northeast.
Anyway, I met Tripp at the base of the Mt. Washington Auto Road and since neither of us had been here before and because we knew nothing about the area we decided to take the Auto Road to the top of Mt. Washington to see what we could see and maybe find some more info about hiking in the area. What we didn’t know about was just how much the fee was to use the road – $25/driver & car + $8/passenger = $33 for Tripp and I to drive to the top… next time I think we’ll just hike.
Discounting the fees, the drive up Mt. Washington is pretty spectacular as far as drives go. The White Mountains aren’t as “craggy” as some of the ranges out west, but that makes them much more accessible and once you look at a map of the area it’s obvious that there are hundreds of miles of trails and a lifetime of exploring in this area.
Here you can see a section of the Auto Road before it heads down into the clouds…
Tripp and Ripley at the top of Mt. Washington…
Tripp and Ripley at crossing over the Peabody River on our way to camp…
After returning from our drive up Mt. Washington we decided to stop at the Pinkham Visitor’s Center to find out more about our hiking options and maybe come up with some sort of plan for the rest of the day and Sunday. At the visitor’s center we chatted with a nice park representative who helped us identify a few different campsites where dogs were welcome. With that information and after looking at some maps we decided to connect the Great Gulf Trail with the Osgood Trail eventually putting us at the summit of Mt. Madison.
Filling up with water before we started heading up into drier territory…
Here is our camp for the night. The platforms are nice but they made staking the tents out more of a creative endeavor…
Tripp and Ripley moving above treeline on Sunday morning…
Here you can see Tripp and Ripley with our objective, Mt. Madison, in the background…
Tripp and Ripley on the summit of Mt. Madison…
Tripp hopping rocks on the way back down Mt. Madison…
Tripp just before the trail started heading back below treeline. In the background you can see a lodge and the start of the Mt. Washington Auto Road…
Back in the trees making our way down. The pictures really don’t convey just how steep this trail was. The 2.5 miles from our campsite to the summit climbed upwards at about 1200 ft/mile. Overally we had a great time and I am already planning to go back and do a partial traverse from Madison to Washington and then back.
Ok… it’s been a really long time since I’ve posted anything here and I’m sorry. Things were pretty busy before, during, and after the move out to Maine. I did quickly find a part-time job, and am currently looking for other–more permanent–work. Mari seems to be getting along fine with her classes. Our apartment is great. Our car is falling apart. Our new car should be here sometime this week, and looking for work is way more work than work itself.
Anyway, in the middle of all of this I was contacted by someone from the Hong Kong based magazine Sportsoho. My understanding is that this publication is a magazine focused on sports photography and sports photographers. They were contacting me because they were interested in highlighting some of my work and myself. I have to say… I truly thought this was some kind of joke at first, but it turned out that it was not. Anyway, I thought I would share the article here now that it’s out. I really have no clue what it says. The questions I was presented with were quite varied, so I can’t even speculate as to what the content of the article… but it’s always cool to see my work in print.
Now, I know I haven’t been sharing much lately, but that is going to change. I have some time off this week and I promise to help everyone get caught up.
Well, this morning I woke up to some cool news. I was going through my RSS this A.M. and to my surprise one of my surfing photos had been selected as Wend Magazine’s Friday Photo… I knew as soon as I saw “Superior Surf” in the title. Not only is this good publicity for surfing here on the Great Lakes, but I also was fortunate enough to be awarded a pair of Olukai Shoes, a GoPro Helmet Cam, and a surf board from Global Surf Industries… Crazy!
Anyway, I just wanted to give a shout out to Sam for being on the breakwall at Mclain that day and to all of the other surfers up here in the Keweenaw for getting out there, not because conditions are good, but because there are waves and surfing crappy waves is better than not surfing.
This is probably my favorite of all the spots. It’s an older commercial, but I really like the song and the editing. It get’s you pumped up and ready to go. The song in this is one of my favorites to run to.
I’m not the type to spend a ton of time poking around on YouTube. However a short time ago in a moment of boredom I went to the YouTube website and started poking around. Not really knowing what I was looking for as I wasn’t really looking for anything I eventually started trying to find examples of good commercials, commercials that did a good job of selling whatever it was, made a strong statement, or in some way helped you feel a connection with the company doing the advertising.
For a while I wasn’t finding anything except examples of commercials that weren’t anything more than pretty pictures, cool music, or slick CG. Take for example the Old Spice commercial. It’s cool. It’s funny. I really enjoyed watching it and I really like some of the knock-offs. But, it doesn’t make me want to go out and purchase Old Spice, and it doesn’t get me fired up to do anything that might eventually lead me to buy Old Spice… it’s just visually and verbally funny spot. It made me wonder what agency came up with the idea. I ended up being more interested in who produced it than the product they were selling.
After a little while searching I came across some of the early Nike commercials. Many of them didn’t do much for me either. Again they, more or less, used some celebrity to promote some product hoping that your affinity for said celebrity would make you more likely to buy said product.
But, some of the Nike commercials were different. Some of them I thought were really quite good and did a great job of accomplishing what they set out to. These commercials were the ones that weren’t trying to sell a particular product. These were the commercials that played off of Nike’s famous tagline, “Just Do It”… and they work. Some are definitely better than others, but I find they all pretty much make me want to get up and go for a run or do some pullups.
Anyway, here are some of my favorites from my search.
Later.
I really like this soccer commercial. I think the choice of music is spot on, the 1st person perspective puts you in the hot-seat, and they tell a good story in the short amount of time they have.
The reason I think this one is great may or may not be obvious. It all depends on how familiar you are with the typical Jordan highlights. Just in case you don’t get it… all of the players in this spot are imitating moments from Jordan’s career. If you search for Michael Jordan Highlights it won’t be long before you’ve seen all of the moments that appear here.
I thought this one was pretty powerful. No action, good monologue, perfect music selection… This one really reminded me a lot of Chase Jarvis’ 60 second portraits. It’s really simple, but super effective.
This is another favorite. Regardless of what you think of Lance… they did a great job with this spot. I love the photography, they really have a knack for choosing the perfect piece of music, and again the monologue is inspiring. I think the commercials with Jordan and Lance are so strong because of the athletes involved. We’re so familiar with their stories and with them that it’s really easy to feel what they’re saying… and that is the key. These commercials do a great job of making you feel something and that is what makes them so powerful and effective.
I don’t have any clue who this guy is, but this is just another example of what you can do with good writing, smart editing and good sound. There’s no music in this one, but the use of the bouncing balls and the slight echo in the gym are really important to this spot.
Pete Karinen destroying all of the other 16mi competitors…
Well, you’ve probably noticed that I haven’t been posting much on here lately. Things are still pretty busy and I just haven’t been shooting all that much. Anyway, this last weekend was the annual Chain Drive MTB race. The numbers were a little down this year, but it seems like all of the events are a little down. Maybe it’s due to the gas prices, maybe not… Either way we still had a great showing and this year Mari decided that she wanted to join in on the action.
I just wanted to congratulate all of the participants and everyone that helped out with the event. Everything seems to run super smoothly and it wouldn’t be possible without all of the volunteers. Congratulations everyone… maybe we will see you next year.
Caleb riding strong…
Mr. Mancini on the home stretch after riding the 32 mile course on a rigid single speed 29′er…
Mari finishing the 16mi course with a smile on her face…
Well, another successful Ride The Keweenaw weekend is coming to an end. For those of you that don’t know, Ride The Keweenaw (RTK) is a yearly event held here on the Keweenaw Peninsula. It’s a non-competitive event with the goal of building awareness, both locally and regionally, of the plethora of mountain biking trails available in the Keweenaw. Things kick off on Saturday with guided no-drop group rides at the Michigan Tech Trails, the Maasto Hiito/Churning Rapids Trails, and the Swedetown Trails. On Sunday people are invited to come up to Copper Harbor to take advantage of the bike shuttle available at a reduced rate, and to participate in another group ride that follows a particular sequence of trails that were recently designated as an International Mountain Biking Association (IMBA) EPIC. It’s a great weekend as each trail system is it’s own unique beast. We’re lucky up here. Not only do we have a large number of trails to ride, we have a large variety of trails to choose from as well.
Yesterday, Mari and I were busy with errands, helping friends with wedding stuff, and other things like my weekly long run. So, I can’t say we did much with the RTK yesterday. But, we weren’t going to miss Sunday because shuttling the trails in Copper Harbor is one of the most fun things this side of the Mississippi and it was going to be half price. My plan when we arrived in CH was to head up Brockway to shoot some of the new trails and bridges that were built towards the end of last season. Today I assumed there would be a lot of riders out and that the shuttle would be running almost constantly providing a stream of riders to serve as subjects. Well, I drove up Brockway, grabbed my gear and headed down the trail. I knew the bugs were going to be out, but I didn’t know just how bad they were going to be. I waited around for a little over 20 minutes and just decided to call it as I was getting eaten alive! I did manage to grab a couple of quick snaps right before heading back down to ride… so it wasn’t a total loss.
I also had grand intentions of shooting a series of portraits of the participants at the event, but again the bugs made things difficult as everyone was walking around waving their hands and swatting at their legs. Things just weren’t conducive to sitting still even for a minute or two. Thankfully, once you were on your bike you’d never know the bugs were even around. Just don’t stop.
I did manage to get Spandrew to sit still for a second. Maybe I’ll try this again at the upcoming Chain Drive MTB Race and try and capture portraits of the finishers. Anyway, below are a couple of snapshots I grabbed while dodging bugs and the portrait of Spandrew.
Later.
Here’s a section of the trail “On the Edge” as is carves its way down the south side of Brockway Mountain before hooking up with Woopidy Woo…
Here’s another view of “On The Edge”. This is a pretty fun little trail…
Pete Karinen destroying all of the other 16mi competitors…
Caleb riding strong…
Mr. Mancini on the home stretch after riding the 32 mile course on a rigid single speed 29′er…
Mari finishing the 16mi course with a smile on her face…
