Week 39 Trains, chairs and cemeteries

In my last post, I shared some sights from a trip to downtown Los Angeles. What I didn’t share was the mishap that occurred on the way there. To be brief, I experienced serious car trouble with my not-that-old car. Since we were on a mission to get my son’s work visa, I managed to make it to a car dealer, left the car, took an Uber the rest of the way and, when our business was done, headed to Union Station to catch the train home. By then I had loaded a new roll of  Velvia 100 into the Nikon. Unfortunately I didn’t get any pictures of the lovely Art Deco older part of the station but I did catch a few on the platform.

 

Despite the car issues I enjoyed the train ride and not having to drive home in traffic. I tried a few shots through the window, not all that successful. This is the Anaheim stadium (or as they like to call themselves the Los Angeles As of Anaheim…sort of like the New York Nets of Brooklyn, lol)

 

 

The ride along the coast is nice and you see some sights you don’t see from the freeway, or don’t get as close to. Below are two remaining reactors at San Onofre nuclear power plant. It is totally shut down but nobody knows how long it will be there before they can dismantle it, because they are fighting over where to send all the radioactive waste. Glad I don’t live anywhere near.

A few days later I climbed up into the hills behind our local community college. It was hazy but there was still a nice view of the Greek Orthodox Church below.

While climbing around I found a little clearing where someone had dragged some old chairs. They were kind of fun to photograph.

A week later I headed back to LA to photograph in one of my all time favorite cemeteries. I wanted to do some double exposures (which you’ll see in a later post) but still had some of this roll left. The sky was a bit cloudy, and some of these shots were the kind that remind me why I love film, and especially Velvia, so much.

I spent some time with my favorite statuary. This cemetery is very Catholic, including little dioramas of the stations of the cross throughout, and a large crucifixion tableau (which come to think of it I haven’t photographed – next time!). There is a lot more statuary here than in most of the cemeteries in Southern California. Much of it is devotional and quite beautiful.

But some of my very favorites really seem totally secular. They are clearly sculptures of sensually beautiful women that somebody stuck wings on almost as an afterthought. There will be more of these in the other rolls I have to post from this trip, but this one is probably my all time favorite.

Also these remind me of how much I love the way Velvia loves blue skies.