Grand Canal at Night (Weekend Reflections # 103)

Newport Beach, California (Little Balboa Island)

 I wish this was a photo of Venice but it's not.
Grand Canal is the name of the walkways on both sides of this canal. Balboa is actually two islands that are connected by a bridge. This is a photo of the little island. I go to Balboa Island almost every night to walk and take pictures. I think both islands combined are only about two miles around so it's a wonder that I'm not bored with it yet.

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The Sun and the Moon 2 (Weekend Reflections # 101)

Balboa Island, California

This is another version of a reflection that I posted for Weekend Reflections # 19.  It's an interesting and colorful house on Balboa Island. Last time the reflection was in a water puddle in the alley and kind of dull, but this time it's on a garage door window of another house and much brighter.

 I thought is was pretty cool that we had exactly 100 links last week. :)

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Surreal Waterfront (Weekend Reflections # 96)

Balboa Island, Newport Beach, Ca

The two people walked into the reflection and I'm glad they did. If you look very closely you might be able to see the black statue of a boy sitting under the tree at the top of the stairs that lead to the water or in this case the land because this is upside down.
In case you couldn't tell, almost everything in this photo is an upside down reflection on water. :)

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Island Reflections (Weekend Reflections # 92)

Balboa Island, Newport Beach, California

Vicki and I love to take evening walks on Balboa Island. Normally I watch the sunset but this time I turned around in time to discover some pretty cool reflections. About a second after I took this shot a duck swam by and ruined the reflections. :)


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My Walk in a Blizzard

I've been waiting for it to snow and yesterday a blizzard blew in so I decided to leave the car parked and go for a walk.

This is a little further down the road from the last picture.

It wasn't snowing very hard but the wind was starting to pick up when I went in for a closer look at this mailbox. I bet there were a few birds that could have used it for shelter last night.

I walked a little more and onto a little one lane bridge. That's when I saw this Christmas tree hiding beside the creek. It must be a good spot because it made it through another Christmas with it's roots intact.

You might have noticed this old house in one of the pictures above. It sits beside on the other side of the creek from the Christmas tree.

I stood here for a while admiring the old house and noticed that it was built in 1831. Id love to look inside.

I walked some more and then took some shots of this old building and train tracks. I'd been cold for a while but this is when the reality of having to walk home hit me. It was really cold and I was covered in snow but even worse so was my camera and lens.

After I took some pictures of this building I stopped at Starbucks for a much needed hot chocolate. Then I finally made it home. That's when the blizzard really hit.

This is my world. Visit "My World Tuesday"

The Sun Setting on Two Houses

The Above photo is an old abandoned house that I pass by all of the time. The setting sunlight was so nice this time that I finally stopped and took a few shots. I also took some shots of some ruins and the abandoned house next door. I'll post them another time.

A couple of weeks ago I rushed out to take some pictures of the setting sun but I was almost too late. In my hurried up state I fumbled around and dropped my camera in the weeds. I decided to take a shot while I was down there picking up the camera. I think the weeds and lighting give it an other worldly look. It almost as if the night was being pulled down like a curtain. I think next time I'll try to get more shots of that big beautiful tree.

The house in the bottom photo is the same house as the one in my post titled "An Old House Nestled in the Tall Grass" except from a different vantage point and time of day.

Changing Seasons

A time to slow down




A time to watch and listen

A time to enjoy the warmth and comforts of home

The sky is gray, there's a chill in the air, the scent of burning wood is all around and the sound of geese fill my ears. I love this time of year!

The Last of the Colorful Leaves

After I had a blood test the other day I noticed a farm next to the medical building. I happened to have a camera in my pocket so I took a few shots. Most of the colorful leaves around Newtown have fallen already but the tree in the top photo still has some.

Happy Thanksgiving!

An Old House Nestled in the Tall Grass

I took this picture in Tyler State Park, about a half of a mile from Schofield Covered Bridge. I'm not sure but I think it's used as a ranger station.

Amish Horses

I bought some homemade root beer at an Amish farm a couple of weeks ago. That's where I met these two horses. I noticed that the horse on the right has a beard that looks just like his owner's.
I laughed and as you can see the he didn't see the humor, but I think the other horse cracked a smile. This photo is at a weird angle because I was driving(on a farm but braked for a second) and the horses were on the passenger's side of my car.

This is my Face of the Week post.

An Old Amish Farm

I used to see orange orchards when I was a kid in California but I don't recall seeing many farms like this one. I think I read that there are thousands of farms in Pennsylvania. If I took a photo in this spot a hundred plus years ago it might have looked the same.

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The Satterthwaite farmstead

I've been exploring Bucks County now that the weather is warmer.

This is three views of the 18Th century Satterwaite farmhouse that I found about five miles from home. The bottom photo includes the the rest of the farmstead. I recently found out that the oldest wood framed building in Pennsylvania is a short walk from my apartment. I'll post a picture in the future.

Around Newtown (Houses)

Today I'm featuring some of the local houses. When I go for a walk I usually see several different styles of houses. Most of the houses are over a 100 years old and some are over 200.

Turtle Rock Light

This light house is right next to the Viking statue on Boathouse Row , and was built in 1887 to aid traffic on the Schuylkill River.

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Polish Rainbows in Newtown?

So while I was walking one evening last week I saw a rainbow over a house upon further inspection I saw a very puzzling sign and flag. Is there really a Polish embassy in little Newtown? Either way it's a nice rainbow and a very interesting house. Also a mystery to be solved.

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Newtown Historic Houses Walking Tour

At 6:30pm on Friday I with camera in tote walked over to the historic Half -Moon Inn also known as the Court Inn (built in 1733) and gathered together with about thirty other people for a historic homes walking tour. The tour was led by members of the Newtown Historic Association. We walked around for about an hour as the guide gave a little history about Newtown and described the different styles of houses along the tour. The tour mainly focused on homes built in the 19th century. I didn't catch most of what he was saying because I was straying away and taking pictures but from what I heard there are lots of Victorian era and queen Anne styled homes also some of the homes have whats called French roofs. What I found interesting is the contrast of styles from pre and post railroad era. Pre-railroad the houses were built with a limited amount of mostly local material and post railroad opened things up as they could easily import material from far away. It makes sense but I'd never really thought about that before.

Anyway here are some of the homes that I saw on the walking tour.

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Historic Fallingston

This is some of the 300 year old Quaker community called Fallsington. It's about five miles from Newtown. I've been wondering what style of architecture the houses are. Early American? American colonial? They're all over this area but I'd never seen houses like that in person until I moved here. Maybe after 300 years the graveyard's residents got bored and tried to escape. What do you think? :-)

Mellow Yellow House

This is another old house we saw on Saturday in Doylestown, it looks pretty Mellow Yellow to me.
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Civil War Museum

This Doylestown house is where the Buck's County Civil War Museum is located. It's on my very long list of things to do. Doylestown is about 11 miles away from Newtown and from what I've seen has a bigger historic downtown and a really great variety of old homes in many styles.I found out that every last Saturday at the Newtown Farmer's Market the Amish merchants have a pig roast. Today we were able to get some of it but just the last scraps, next month I want to get there early.

More Newtown houses

I love these 18th and century homes and buildings.