A Long Walk on the Beach, Watching the Sun Set… Into a Factory

Posted on by

Photo #563: Lakeshore PowerLocation Taken: Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore, Indiana
Time Taken: October 2006

It’s easy to forget Indiana has a coastline, complete with fine beaches. But it does, and it’s even part of the national park system, though at the National Lakeshore level, one of the more minor ones.

Lots of people come visit for the sand, surf, and sun, as well of the lovely views. Look one way and you can see the skyline of Chicago right at the edge of the horizon.

Look the other way, and you can see… A power plant?

I’m not sure what type it is. It obviously involves something that has to be cooled, since that’s a fine cooling tower venting steam there. And, oddly enough, that smaller smokestack and its building look very similar to the coal power plant in the Sim City games I used to play…

*checks the internets*

Yup, that’s the Michigan City Generating Station, and it runs off of coal and natural gas. Amazing what video games can teach you.

Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore has the slight problem that its fabulous beaches are surrounded by the aging remnants of what used to be a major industrial region. This used to be right next to the heart of the steel industry back in the 60’s. It’s still heavily focused on industry, and not the clean kind. There’s factories all over, and well, those (and the people who work in those) need power.

Hence the power plant. And putting power plants by coastlines is pretty common, it seems. Probably for easy access to water and the like.

Still, it’s tough to fully enjoy the wonders of nature when there’s a reminder of some of the least nature-friendly aspects of mankind just right over there. Especially since that cooling tower shape has become one of the symbols of nuclear power, despite it being perfectly suitable for other forms of power plant…

  

The Purpose of Giant Statues is for Tourists to have Something to Pose in Front of.

Posted on by

Photo #562: Giant Bird StatuesLocation Taken: Chaplin, Saskatchewan
Time Taken: June 2010

I think today I shall go really random in my photo choice. So here’s my mom standing next to two giant bird statues in a parking lot.

This was a small roadside museum/nature center and viewing point along the Trans-Canadian Highway. It was right next to a large salt evaporation pond, as well as a large (salty) marshland/lake fully of all sorts of birds. The nature center was focused on the birds as well, talking about how the area was a major migration stop for hordes of species, especially shorebirds.

The main gist of the place was that this large salt water lake right in the center of a large continent is downright crucial for birds used to living near oceans. It gives them a place like they’re used to on their long continent-crossing migrations, heading from South America to the arctic and back again with the changing of the seasons.

The local town of Chaplin is proud of the importance of their large lake for the birds, not to mention that it provides a nice industry extracting salt for them to sell.  The people, not the birds, mind you.

This is all incidental, really, but at least it explains the giant bird statues.

The fact that my mother is posing in front of them is something that has no explanation.

  

Almost Perfect, such a Perfect Term for this Flower…

Posted on by

Photo #561: Almost Perfect FlowerLocation Taken: Cypress Hills Provincial Park, Saskatchewan
Time Taken: June 2010

This is one of the very few photos where I had to really think to decide to put it in the Almost category rather than the Best. Usually those photos that have enough flaws to post on my Almost day aren’t anywhere close to the quality I seek for the Best photos. But this one…

It’s just a random wild flower at the edge of a scenic viewing point’s path, nothing special really. And I took the photo at twilight, and the light was already fading fast. It colored everything a dim blue, and removed a lot of contrast. I also didn’t quite get the focus right, since I didn’t want the flowers to be blurry.

On the other hand, well, look at that composition! You’ve got the flower rising out of the grass, showing itself beautifully against the distant landscape, which is showing itself off nicely. And that angle of the flower! The dim light, while it removes the contrast, actually creates a beautiful shade of green saturating the piece. The flower is at once part of the background and set apart from it, elevating the ordinary to the realm of the spectacular.

Hence my dilemma. On one hand, obvious flaws, on the other, marvelous merits.

I think if I’d gotten the focus just a little clearer on the flowers, I would have put it in the Best category. That’s all it would have taken.

  

The Delicate Curl of a Rose Petal is Prettier when there’s just a Few…

Posted on by

Photo #560: Wild RoseLocation Taken: Skihist Provincial Park, British Columbia
Time Taken: June 2010

I’m fairly sure this is some variety of rose, though one of the wild types instead of the cultivated and highly modified variants you see in the flower shops. Either that or it just looks a lot like a rose, which is close enough for me.

My grandma has a few rose bushes that look a lot like this one. They’re fairly large, the size of small trees.

I always associate them with one of the odd tasks set by my grandmother during the many summers I spent at her place during my childhood. Perhaps I remember this task because it was so peculiar, or maybe it was just because I got paid.

You see, these rose bushes were infested with hordes and hordes of rose chafers at the height of summer, as they sought out both food and mates. Let them run wild and all your pretty roses will be stripped bare in no time.

Incidentally, I just learned it’s rose chafer, not rose shaver. They sound alike, I never saw it written out, and the second one made more sense given how those bugs ripped apart the plants…

In order to keep her plants at least somewhat intact, my grandma made use of the random grandchildren running around the place. She’d give us a jar full of soapy water and tell us she’d pay us a penny for every rose chafer we brought back drowned in the jar.

It was, as you may expect, effective. It was oddly fun pulling the bugs off the bushes. They were rather dumb bugs, didn’t really struggle at all, and you’d frequently find stacks of them just sitting around. I’ll let you figure out why they were stacked. I was too young and innocent to have a clue about that at the time. But it did mean you could collect a goodly number fairly quickly, which even at a penny a pop still added up.

So for hours at a time, I’d wander around pulling bugs off roses and drowning them in soapy water for the sake of fun and a few dollars to spend on candy or toys. Ah, the good old days.