East Coast Vacation

Well I finally got around to sorting and editing my photos from out east. Have alot of photos and stuff. Will seperate days by new posts.

Day1 - We got up early and headed to michigan for the Nascar race. We got there and it was raining - so the race was canceled.

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Day 2 - after we found a place to stay. We got up and checked the weather and it was still raining. So we started to make plans to head into Detroit, but Nascar was drying the track and was hoping to run the race - so back to the track we went.

Here are a couple shots of the parking area.

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Shot of the garage area from the stands with my 70-200 with the 1.7 tc

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Trying to dry the track

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Flag in the rain - they never started the race - so back to the hotel.

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Day 3 - STILL STUCK IN MICHIGAN !!!!!

We got delayed heading to the track and they ran 10 laps under caution - Nascar was getting the race in today - We got to the track and this is what it looked like.


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Not alot of people in the stands to watch a race on TUESDAY

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The cars sitting on pit row after the 10 laps - had to wait for the fog to lift cause the spotters couldn't see them on the backstretch.

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BOOGITY BOOGITY BOOGITY BOYS - LETS GO RACING!

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Montoya bringing out an early caution flag - one of a very few.

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Tony Stewart making his move on Gordon - GO TONY !!!

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Tony making his move on Dale Jr. - GO TONY !!!!

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A busy pit row -

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Sunsetting while we are on our way to Washington DC after the race - We were in Pennsylvania at the time of the sunset - We ended up staying somewhere in Pannsylvania for the night.

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Here we are on day 4. Finally made it to Washington DC.

Iwo Jima -

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Changing of the guard of the tomb of the unknown soldiers.

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Arlington cemetary -

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Korean War Veterans Memorial -

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Lincoln Memorial -

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Vietnam Memorial -

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Washington Memorial -

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The White House - The security in this area was pretty tight.

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Some cool architecture - alot of old buildings out there.

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Subway tunnel -

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Then it became night - If you ever get to DC make sure you see it at night!

Thomas Jefferson Memorial -

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Lincoln Memorial at night -

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Washington Memorial in the reflection pool -

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Washington Memorial with the fountain from (I think) is the WWII Memorial -

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What a long day - time for some rest and to head to North Carolina to the coast.

Here we are to day 5. We stayed just outside of DC. On our way to the North Carolina coast line.

Naval base in Norfolk Virginia - from the car. We were hoping to stop and check it out but the extended stay in Michigan really set us back.

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We made it to the coast - sun came out too today !!

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Kid playing in the ocean -

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Lighthouse -

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Now we head to the west side of North Carolina to go into the Smokey Mountains on the Blue Ridge Parkway -

Day 6 -

Had a pitstop on our way to the mountains - Joe Gibbs Racing!

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Now we get into the mountains - We were taking a back road to get to the parkway - we were getting close to it and it was taking us through one of the parks on the mountain and they had a storm go through and block the road so we had to go back and find a different way to get there.

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Was amazing how the vines grew down the sides of the mountain and were right to the edge of the road - the vines would also wrap themselves around the power lines and climb up. They were everywhere.

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When we got to the Blue Ridge Parkway - a quick shower was just finishing and the fog was rolling out of this bridge - the bridge is the parkway. It was very cool.

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The scenery along the parkway was AMAZING - definately a place we want to revisit with more time.

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Tunnel into the side of the mountain -

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Resturant / ice cream place in the middle of no-where

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More scenery shots -

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We hiked back to a waterfall -

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Thanks for viewing my vacation shots - It was a great time. Would definately go back to Washington DC and the Smokey Mountains.

Here are a couple Panoramic shots I took in the mountains if you care to take a look.

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Quite a trip there, Ben. Never been farther east than Kansas/Nebraska so every image from back there is interesting to me.

Wow, lots of pics to look at . . . .I like the Washington memorial image , has an abstrat-like quality about it with the reflection. The last Pano is really good.
Thanks for sharing

Ben, great images. It is always nice to see photos of places that those of us in the great white north probably will never get to see. Thanks.

Cheers,

WesternGuy

Thanks for the comments. Glad that you are enjoying the shots. We had planned more time elsewhere than being stuck in michigan for 3 days! But we made the most out of our trip and the time we had in the places we went.

I was pleasantly surprised how well the pano's turned out. I did take another one of the waterfalls but it distorted it way too much .... I was really hoping for that one to turn out ....

The vines you are mentioning are in fact KUDZU, and you can't get rid of it. I have of it drowing upward of 2 feet in a day during the summer. The DC shots were excellent by the way, especially the night shots.

Looks like a great trip Ben. The Parkway has been on my must do list for a long time now, as well as D.C. One of these days...

Zrfraser - the president of our photo club is from down there and told me what the "vines" were. He showed me some other shots of the stuff on flicker - do a search for kudzu on flicker - there is some cool shots of it and how it can take over an area. I am sure dealing with it just sucks.

Mike - it is definately worth the trip down there - we were only on the parkway for about a half a day. Could of stopped at every turn / lookout / trail. So much to see - was nice we got up there just after a quick storm so we had alot of fog and cool clouds to help the shooting. Just wished for more time.

I know there was talk of a motorcycle get-together down there this next summer - I am hoping that it still happens / wether I have a bike or not will be a different story - maybe the wife and I can be the group hauler and drive down ....