Travel Photos

If you enjoy photography at all, you gotta take your camera anywhere you go in the world, right? Sometimes I get in trouble for dawdling too long trying to capture just the right shot while I’m on vacation, but that’s just the way I am.

Mauna Kea Observatories

One of the things I wanted to do when visiting the “Big Island” of Hawaii was to get to the top of Mauna Kea, and say I’d stood at the summit of the tallest (but not the highest) mountain in the world. Enter Mauna Kea Summit Tours.

What follows are some of the observatories and telescopes I photographed during an early February sunset, as well as a 30-second exposure (50mm, f/1.4, and ISO 125 to minimize noise, if you care) of the clearest nighttime sky I’ll likely see during my life. That’s what shooting at over 13,000 feet will do for you.

Golfing in Greater L.A.

It’s been a busy month so I haven’t put up a lot of new photos, but here is a little travel set from my golfing vacation to L.A. and to see the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach with my friend Joey. We wrapped five rounds of golf at various courses around a weekend of viewing golfing greats. Unfortunately, they wouldn’t let cameras into the tournament, or else I would have snapped a photo of a glaring Tiger Woods. Next time maybe I’ll spring for the weekly pass so I can shoot during practice rounds.

For any golfers wondering, the courses we played at were: Oak Quarry GC in Riverside, Olivas Links in Ventura, Rustic Canyon GC in Moorpark, Angeles National GC in Sunland, and Lost Canyons GC in Simi Valley.

Sushi and Ramen and Saké (oh my!)

I’m not a food blogger, and I rarely take photos of my food (it gets cold!). But I may make an exception when I’m on vacation and I already have my camera with me. And I definitely make an exception when I’m in Vancouver and eating omakase-style at Tojo’s.

The light is difficult, and the focal-point is razor thin, but Tojo-san and his kitchen do such marvelous, innovate things with Japanese cuisine that I almost feel like I can even capture the taste and aroma of each of his dishes if I remember to snap a few shots before I take a bite. Sadly, that’s not the case, and we find ourselves returning every time we visit Vancouver.

If you have the appetite and the inclination to splurge a little, I definitely recommend making a reservation and sitting in front of him. Let him choose your menu for the evening. He’ll go on and on about how his local ingredients are the best anywhere, but prod him for stories about the craziness of the Olympic Games, and how he had to kick several heads of state out of the restaurant after two hours so more people could sit down.

Other culinary highlights of the trip: Ramen at Benkei, dim sum at Fisherman’s Terrace in Richmond (new to us and very good), and of course, incomparable Indian food at the famous Vij’s.

Tokyo 2008

Scenes from Tokyo, 2008.