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You are here: Home / Photo Blogging / On The Road / On the Road and In Your Backyard

On the Road and In Your Backyard

by Alain Chamot (1971-2020)|  August 9, 20175:00 am| 15 Comments

This post is in: On The Road, Open Threads, Readership Capture

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On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.

From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.

Submit Your Photos

Good Morning All,

This weekday feature is for Juicers who are are on the road, traveling, or just want to share a little bit of their world via stories and pictures. So many of us rise each morning, eager for something beautiful, inspiring, amazing, subtle, of note, and our community delivers – a view into their world, whether they’re far away or close to home – pictures with a story, with context, with meaning, sometimes just beauty. By concentrating travel updates and tips here, it’s easier for all of us to keep up or find them later.

So please, speak up and share some of your adventures and travel news here, and submit your pictures using our speedy, secure form. You can submit up to 7 pictures at a time, with an overall description and one for each picture.

You can, of course, send an email with pictures if the form gives you trouble, or if you are trying to submit something special, like a zipped archive or a movie. If your pictures are already hosted online, then please email the links with your descriptions.

For each picture, it’s best to provide your commenter screenname, description, where it was taken, and date. It’s tough to keep everyone’s email address and screenname straight, so don’t assume that I remember it “from last time”. More and more, the first photo before the fold will be from a commenter, so making it easy to locate the screenname when I’ve found a compelling photo is crucial.

Have a wonderful day, and enjoy the pictures!

 

Coming up…TRAINS!

Today, pictures from valued commenter Sloane Ranger.

Further to my adventures in Norfolk. Here are some more pictures from places we visited when I was staying with my friends in Cromer during week beginning 24th August

Choo! Choo!

Picture taken at Sheringham Station.

No, not our current railway stock. This is one of the engines run by the North Norfolk Heritage Railway which goes from Sheringham to Holt and back again giving tourists a taste of the age of steam.

A close look at the engine with the fire box.

An example of the rolling stock on the North Norfolk Heritage Railway.

The ruins of Creake Abbey owned by English Heritage. Unlike many abbeys it wasn’t destroyed by the Reformation but rather slowly fell into disuse after a series of fires and the plague. The nearby cafe, however, serves very passable food if somewhat pricey.

Blakeney, Norfolk

A shallow estuary off the North Sea. A typical Norfolk scene. You used to be able to take seal watching trips from here but the estuary has become silted up so only really shallow draft boats can get in or out. So now, you buy the tickets here in Blakeney and drive down the coast to another village to pick up the boat.

Brancaster Staithe

Another small port. Locally they are called Staithes, meaning a landing stage.

 

Thank you so much Sloane Ranger, do send us more when you can.

 

Travel safely everybody, and do share some stories in the comments, even if you’re joining the conversation late. Many folks confide that they go back and read old threads, one reason these are available on the Quick Links menu.

 

One again, to submit pictures: Use the Form or Send an Email

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Previous Post: « Wednesday Morning Open Thread: (Avocado) TOAST!
Next Post: Corner cases and hard questions »

Reader Interactions

15Comments

  1. 1.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    August 9, 2017 at 5:08 am

    Nice!

  2. 2.

    OzarkHillbilly

    August 9, 2017 at 5:40 am

    When I was studying that railway guide, it was so tangible and so satisfying that something just clicked. Then it clacked. Then it clicked, then it clacked, click-clack clickety-clack, and here we are. Whoo-whoo!

    Who doesn’t like trains?

  3. 3.

    raven

    August 9, 2017 at 5:50 am

    Cool!

  4. 4.

    Waratah

    August 9, 2017 at 6:10 am

    Good memory’s, steam train to see my Mothers sister and fun cousins. Dressed up in Sunday best and not allowed to open window. Return ride not as strict a little soot blowing in allowed by my father who could not stand to be closed in.

  5. 5.

    OzarkHillbilly

    August 9, 2017 at 6:37 am

    On my last trip to Mallorca, we took the train to Soller. It’s a nice little day trip. I forget how long it took to go from Palma to Soller (1 hr?) but there were plenty of nice mountain vistas along the way. Soller is one of those beautiful north coast ports built on the side of the mountains where they drop into the sea. There is a nice little Picasso museum (he spent several years in Soller) and the sea food is exactly what you would expect.

    Some how, some way, all my pics from that day disappeared from all digital memories. …sigh…. Sometimes I’m not sure which I hate more, computers or ex-wives.

  6. 6.

    Central Planning

    August 9, 2017 at 6:42 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: Exactly. I think it has something to do with the size and sound of them.

    When I was a kid, my grandmother’s uncle would visit us on Long Island, and he would then take the train back to NYC. We would go down to the station, put some pennies on the track, and retrieve the squished coins after the train left.

    One of the most exciting field trips was taking a train 3 or 4 stops down to Greenport. I think that was probably 2nd or 3rd grade. Lots of farms/countryside to see back then. Not so much now.

  7. 7.

    JPL

    August 9, 2017 at 6:43 am

    The early morning travel post is so much fun to read and dream. Often I use google to map out the various locations.
    Thanks Sloane!

  8. 8.

    OzarkHillbilly

    August 9, 2017 at 7:15 am

    @Central Planning: When I was a kid in the 60s we (extended family in Joliet too) took the train all the time. Many early memories of Union Station in downtown STL as well as the trips north to Joliet both with the whole family and alone with my brother. Fond memories for me.

  9. 9.

    debbie

    August 9, 2017 at 7:21 am

    Those ruins are amazing. I’m surprised they let people get that close.

  10. 10.

    MomSense

    August 9, 2017 at 8:23 am

    Trains and ruins and sailing ships OH MY!

    These are some of my favorite things. Thank you Sloane Ranger!

  11. 11.

    rikyrah

    August 9, 2017 at 8:50 am

    Love the pictures today..thanks..

    When I was younger, my family decided to hold our family reunion in Seattle. We decided to go by train. So, we took the Empire Builder out to Seattle. The workers on the train told us that they’d never had that many Black people at one time on the train. It was quite interesting when we’d get out for the stops in these little cities along the route…LOL

    On our way back, we decide to take the train that goes the Southern Route…I saw so much of the country on that trip.

    One my mother’s sisters refused to fly on an airplane, so her siblings, if the family reunion were in a place where you’d ordinarily fly, would go on the train with her. Some of my favorite memories growing up were traveling with my family to those reunions. We thought we had her the year we decided to have the reunion in Los Angeles…Nope….train..LOL

  12. 12.

    Sloane Ranger

    August 9, 2017 at 9:31 am

    @debbie: One of the things Britain has in excess is old ruins. It makes us somewhat blase about them. I didn’t mention that entry to the ruins is free and there are no barriers preventing visitors from touching them.

  13. 13.

    Alain the site fixer

    August 9, 2017 at 10:07 am

    @Sloane Ranger: That is one thing I love about Europe and the Middle East – ancient ruins, open to the sitting, touching, and contemplating. There are some Roman ruins near the lake shore where my father’s from in Switzerland, a reminder of the “Rom” in “Romance language”. When I was young, I would sit on them, explore, and fantasize. As an adult, I sit on them, contemplate, explore, and fantasize. There’s something primal about touching old ruins, standing or sitting in a spot where people did the same thing, hundreds of years ago. I felt the same way when sitting in a souk in Tunis, having a cup of hot mint tea. I realized that the stone bench I was sitting on had likely been there for both World Wars, and likely back into the 1800’s. I’m sure the tea spot dates to 1000 or earlier. It was neat to feel a spiritual connection with travelers and merchants across the ages, even if it only lasted as long as that cup of tea.

  14. 14.

    No One You Know

    August 9, 2017 at 10:26 am

    @Alain the site fixer: Same here. The old ruins have a presence and touching them is like touching time made physical.

  15. 15.

    J R in WV

    August 9, 2017 at 11:11 am

    Interesting, Alain. My paternal grandfather’s folks came over from Switzerland, and granddad spoke nothing but Switzerdeutch until he started school. He took his whole family, 6 of ’em to visit the old country in ’38. I’ve never visited, though he had albums of traditional music and photos of ancient views. Farmers from around Bern I believe; no doubt I have many cousins over there to this day.

    Granddad was orphaned at an early age, got a job working as a very young helper on neighbor’s farm, but broke and lost his leg at 13. County orphanage taught him to hand-set type as this was before mechanical typesetting worked, and it was work you did on a stool.

    By the end of his life he owned 3 newspapers and had actually sailed on aircraft carrier and other USN floating ordinance. I grew up in a big print shop that published two daily newspapers: Giant whirling presses, molten typesetting metal, nitric acid engraving shop, etc. Growing up, I worked summers starting in Jr High. Amazing I survived.

    But nothing compares to the ruins in Europe, as you say.

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