Pam and I headed to Boston to connect with Kirsten &
Alan (Elmo) for some fun and relaxation.
We parked at Wellington Station and took the subway in to the Marriott
Long Wharf. K&A were waiting for us when
we arrived around 10AM.
We checked in and decided to take an early afternoon “Boston
Duck Tour”. We had some time so walked by the harbor which
was nice. We walked back by way of the Rose
Kennedy Greenway with many statues and art works along the way.
The Boston Duck Tour was fun. We cruised through the Boston and over to
Cambridge to enter the Charles River. The
tour guide was full of historic facts about the different buildings along the Charles.
The hotel had a very nice outdoor deck/landing just off
the pool. It had nice views of the
harbor looking east toward Logan Airport.
For those of you that know me I had my camera and decided my mission would
be to take some time laps photos. Why I didn’t
decide this before we left home was a mistake.
No Tripod … Because of this I would need some Tripod Creativity.
For dinner we decided Italian in the North End. Kirsten likes Lasagna so that was a must on
the menu. We made a reservation at
6:30PM. Several restaurants didn’t have
openings until 8:30PM and even 9:30PM. I
have never been able to figure out how people can eat that late at night but that’s
just me.
Returning from dinner we headed for the outdoor
deck. Looking toward the airport the
planes were landing over the water. No
kidding … once I thought about what I wanted to do they shifted and started
landing on a different runway.
The rails were rounded over and the tables didn’t clear
the top of the rails. Tripod Creativity
- I ended up leaning out to set my camera on top of the light fixtures hanging
beyond the rails. I was told several
times not to drop my camera. It wouldn’t
survive a 4 story fall so I kept my lanyard around my wrist the whole time.
I took pictures from 1 to 15 seconds. Increasing the exposure time increases the
amount of light or brightness of the picture and shows object movement so
experimenting was fun. Here is a day
picture and a night picture to compare.
The horizontal lines on the horizon of the night picture are planes descending into Logan
airport.
Next we headed to Faneuil Hall and I took a couple
pictures. Tripod Creativity - used the
side of a flower planter and a phone charger to point the lens to get the right
angle.
There were several wedding parties and a reception at the
hotel. As I was looking down from the fourth floor
to the first floor I took a couple pictures of the colorful panels near
the escalators. Also, there were orange
colored ornamental lights hanging down from the high ceilings. They were open at the bottom to project light
down toward the escalators. Still in my
experimental mode I decided to take time lapse pictures (pointing my camera straight up) of those lights with different camera settings while going up and down the escalators. Because I was moving it was tough trying to point and hold the camera straight up. I did receive some
rather perplexing looks while doing this.
Tripod Creativity - I used the hand rail of the moving escalator
to try to hold the camera straight up pointing at the lights. Note to Self … The inside hand
rail of the escalator going down at the Marriott Long Wharf moves at a slower
speed than the steps you are standing on?
I found that out in my experiment.
It’s something to watch out for next time you are in Boston! hehe ...
Sunday morning up at 5:15AM and off to take more time
lapse pictures. Tripod Creativity - I
used a table and my wallet to prop up my camera at the right angle. At one point I set a chair in the middle of
the road and set my camera on that. Not
much traffic that early in the morning. The
red streaks were from the side markers of 2 panel vans going past me when the
shutter was open.
Boston is great and full of history. I decided to think more historic so headed up
the street to “The Old State House”. This
is one of the stops on Boston’s Freedom Trail.
The plaque on the building says: “The
Old State House, Boston’s oldest public building, was built in 1713 as the seat
of British colonial government. Here the
Royal Governor and Massachusetts Assembly debated the Stamp Acts and the Writs
of Assistance. The Declaration of
Independence was first read to the Bostonians from the east balcony on July 18,
1776.
The building served as the State House until 1798, and
was also Boston’s City Hall from 1830 to 1841.”
My pictures show the east balcony where that took place. The headlights and tail lights are from cars
as they passed by me. Tripod Creativity
- My camera was resting on top of the corner garbage can lid while using my
lens cover to get the right angle … really!
I headed back to catch the sun rise out of the east over
the water and started to wake people after 7AM.
Once everyone was up and moving we found a place for
breakfast and ended up at the Boston Common by the pond. We enjoyed the rest of the morning, checked out
around noon, and headed for home.
We had a great time and decided New York City may be next. OH, next time tripod too …
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