On the Waterfront - Chalcis, Greece (Nov. 2024)

Euripus Strait, Chalcis, with lift bridge linking Euboea to the mainland

Chalcis (also called Chalkida or Halkida) is an ancient city on the Evrípou Strait, which separates mainland Greece from the island of Euboea (Evia). The weather in late November was still sunny and warm, so we thought, "Let's go to Chalcis, look around, and eat by the sea." A typical Greek outing. 

An unusual phenomena of the Evrípou is an irregular tidal current, which changes direction six to seven times a day.

Ice cream time

Nap time

The municipality has cleaned up the waterfront and added benches and recreation areas. 

This is a cheerful waterfront on a sunny day. Summer will be much more busy.

Santa checking out Ice Cream Man

They still sell Fanta in Greece?

Oh oh, getting the Evil Eye next to the Citroen 2CV (Samsung phone digital file)

 Dear Reader, you know what comes next: LUNCH in Nea Lampsakos, a few km south of Chalcis.

It does not get much better than this. And, of course, this is followed with a Greek coffee and a baklava. Ahhh.... (but no nap??)

This ends our November 2024 visit to Greece. I hope you enjoyed the short tour. 

More Wandering around Athens (Nov. 2024)

We continue wandering through Athens. I never lose interest here. 

Uncontrolled late-20th century urban sprawl, northwest Athens. Mount Parnitha is in the distance. (Samsung phone digital frame)

Parts of Athens are a congested concrete jungle. City fathers failed grossly to not impose green space requirements, build parks, or lay out arterial highways after World War II. In the scene above, the land in the foreground had disputed ownership for over five decades but will be preserved as park land.

Scooters on Asklipiou Street, near the Politeia bookstore (21mm ƒ/4.5 Zeiss ZM lens)

The Politeia bookstore has a good selection of books in many languages. In the past, we shopped at the famous Eleftheroudakis bookstore, but it closed in 2016 after 120 years of business.

Phones, Asklipiou Street

I am not a fan of graffiti, but it adds some color to the rather severe limestone walls. It does not do much for the phone booths. 

Lycabettus Hill from the National Museum (50mm ƒ/2 Summicron lens)

Mrs. Poppy's store in the Plaka (35mm ƒ/2.8 Pentax-A lens)

Monasteraki Square (35mm ƒ/2.8 Pentax-A lens)

Deep thinking, Athenas Street

Most of these frames are from Kodak Portra 160 film. If you are interested in earlier visits, including the 1950s, please type "Athens" in the search box.

2024 E. Washington Road Trip 01 - Tonakset, Nighthawk, and Oroville

Dear Readers, Happy and Prosperous New Year to you all!  

Thank you for reading my blog. I started this blog in 2010, so this is the 16th year of trying to find and photograph the detritus, decay, and abandoned remnants of our modern world. We will start the new year with a series on eastern Washington. Later, we will see Greece, Turkey, New York City, Olympia, and more. Comments and suggestions are always welcome.

Packing enough stuff? (No, never!)

Background

By late summer (2024), my wife and I had spent months remodeling, cleaning out junk, sorting paperwork, and setting up life in a new home in the Pacific Northwest. I was restless and wiggly. She wanted me out of the house. And I had not driven through eastern Washington in 49 years. My 1981 car needed some serious highway miles and exercise. Time for a ROAD TRIP!

With a week-long itinerary and a generous offer to stay with an old college friend in Spokane, it was time to pack and set off. Traveling by car, I could take a tripod and both medium format (Hasselblad plus 4 lenses) and 35mm (Pentax Spotmatic F with 5 lenses). And I stashed spare water, tools, motor oil, munchies, a battery jump device, and car parts. Pack heavy? Who cares with a car. 

For the next few articles, I will show some of the 35mm Kodak Portra 160 frames in the order of my trip. They progress through small towns, so look at a map of Washington if you are interested in the exact locations. I learned about some ghost towns from web pages that list such oddities and places to see. And I stopped when I saw a lonely farm or other interesting urban decay feature. Click any picture to see it expanded to 1600 pixels wide. 

Tonasket

Aussie Antiques, Tonakset

Wow, old time Jerry Cans

Good stuff! I love these home-grown antique/junk stores full of treasures. I don't need any in my life, but it is great that someone recycles these remnants of an older age.

Tonakset is a quiet town north of Omak, where I spent the night. Tonasket had a very nice coffee shop right across the street from the Aussie Antiques. 

Trailer with a view, Loomis-Oroville Highway (50mm ƒ/1.4 SMC Takumar lens)

Heading west on the Loomis-Oroville Road toward Loomis, and you get into rolling hills with some agriculture mixed with cattle pasture. It was dry in late summer, the grasslands brown.  

Nighthawk

Former Nighthawk general store (?)

Nighthawk is a ghost town, but there are homes and residents, so it is not truly deserted. At the turn of the 20th century, Nighthawk was a booming mining town as well as a supply center for other mines in the area. The Great Northern Railroad came through this valley. Companies extracted copper, gold, lead, silver, zinc, and antimony from the surrounding area, but most mining ended in the 1950s. There is not much to see here any more, but the scenery is sublime.

Similkameen River northeast of Nighthawk (35mm ƒ/3.5 Super-Takumar lens)

Oroville

Similkameen River west of Oroville

The Girder Bridge (built 2010) carries the Similkameen Trail, a rail-to-trail conversion. The Great Northern Railroad once carried ore and minerals along this line into Oroville and further. 

Chevrolet truck looking good on Central Avenue, Oroville

Skeleton Man on patrol duty on Chesaw Road, Oroville

From Oroville, I continued east on Chesaw Road towards the ghost town of Molson. To be continued...

These photographs are from Kodak Portra 160 film exposed with my Pentax Spotmatic F camera with various lenses, but mostly the 50mm ƒ/1.4 and the 35mm ƒ/3.5. I scanned the film with a Nikon Coolscan 5000 film scanner.

Return to the Olympia Brewery (Abandoned Films 13a)

Kodak T400CN, expired 2005

The Film

Dear Readers, you may remember that in February (2024), I used some long-expired Kodak T400CN black and white film. Because it was old, I exposed it at EI=100 rather than the original 400. The results were successful, and the film is convenient because the infrared scratch tool in my Nikon Coolscan 5000ED scanner cleans flaws and minor scratches. 

In preparation for an upcoming trip, I bought some more T400CN film from an eBay seller who said they had been stored in a refrigerator. I shot identical scenes at 100, 200, and 400. The roll came back very thin. The 100 frames scanned adequately, but the 200 and 400 were hopeless. I must give credit to the Coolscan scanner because it extracted so much data from the 100 frames. And having the ICE function to clean scratches and dust saves an immense amount of time.  

Results in Tumwater

Here are some more frames of the old Olympia Brewery in Tumwater. These are the 100 exposures, with minor adjustment in the brightness after scanning. 

(Pentax MG camera, 50mm F/2 Pentax-A lens, yellow-green filter)

No entry here (35mm ƒ/2.8 Pentax-A lens at ƒ/4)

The back of this building was peeled off. I read that a company removed machines, and peeling off the wall was the only way to remove large equipment. Of course, now this eyesore sits here year after year. 

Waiting for a seat (50mm ƒ/2 Pentax-A lens at ƒ/8)

This concrete hulk is next to Custer Way. The back, with the peeled off wall, is within sight of the historic Schmidt House, which is owned by the Olympia Tumwater Foundation. The foundation built the 15-acre park along the Deschutes River waterfalls. 

Turn the corner to Capital Way. The Pacific Highway, formerly Route 99, runs over a 1938 bridge. It was decorated with Art Deco and Native American motifs. 

View of Rte 99 north over 1938 bridge. (Photograph 1951-1960, Item P40_N02, courtesy of the Olympia Tumwater Foundation)

Figure on northwest side of Capital Way (Rte 99)

Totem post, northeast side of Capital Way (Rte 99)

Former North Pacific Restaurant

The North Pacific Restaurant burned on June 25, 2024. Once popular with brewery workers, it had been unoccupied for many years. The "Cafe" in the color picture above is at the same location as the South Pacific (probably the same building). As of November 7, trucks were removing the debris and timbers. 

Factory walkways under the Rte 99 bridge

More walkways

View south past former powerhouse

Summary

This roll of T400CN had lost at least 2 stops of sensitivity compared to when it was new (ISO 400). But I think the frames of the old brewery, taken on a grey day, look fine. They have a classic vintage black and white look, a bit gritty (grungy?) with some grain. 

The frames above are from 50mm ƒ/2 and 35mm ƒ/2.8 Pentax-A lenses. I am impressed at the resolution of these modest-priced lenses (click any picture to expand it). Pentax made excellent glass in the 1970s, 1980s, and later, easily the equal of the big name companies. These mid-century lenses may not be as "sharp" as the newest optics (whatever that means in internet fantasy land), but does it make any difference?

Next roll: try at Exposure Index 50?

When Film is too Old (Seattle 04)

Sample film strip, Epson Perfection 3200 Photo scanner

Oh, oh, some old film is just that, film that should have been discarded long ago. 

I bought an expired roll of Kodak High Definition film (Max 400??) at Photoland, the laboratory at The Evergreen State College in Olympia. It had been frozen but was much too old. I wanted to test my new/old Pentax MG. I had never heard of High Definition, and online information was scarce. It may have been discontinued around 2005. Kodak had a bad habit of renaming their various emulsions, often changing names in different markets. 

Most of the roll was grossly underexposed, and holding the strip up to the light, I could barely see any image data. The Epson 3200 flat bed scanner was remarkable at its ability to extract something for me to review. Some of the frames from Seattle looked marginally promising. I am amazed how well my Nikon Coolscan 5000 can extract data from a lousy negative. For the examples below, I scanned the frames with the Coolscan's automatic exposure function. Then I opened some of the frames in Photoshop and manually adjusted the contrast.   

Arriving at King Street Station, Seattle

King Street Station

Smith Tower from Jackson Street

Maybe I'll Walk-In (or maybe not)

Pine Street scooters

I am a Rockfish. Make some delicious fish 'n chips from me. Note the enormous eyes.

Rockfish are rather ugly. They live on rocky bottoms in cold water. There are at least 30 species in the Pacific Northwest. But they are delicious eating. Dingey's at the Olympia Farmers Market offers rockfish fish 'n chips. 

Let's drop in to Party in Reality. Well, maybe no.

I took these pictures with a Pentax MG camera, which has aperture priority autoexposure (meaning, you select an aperture on the lens, and the camera sets the correct shutter speed based on the through-the-lens light meter). The MG meters for as long as 14 or 15 seconds, which would be useful for tripod-mounted scenes. 

But because the film was so flawed, I do not know if the exposures were correct. The lens was a 50mm ƒ/2 Pentax-A with an unusual 5-element air-spaced optical design. 

Expired color film is a gamble. It just does not age well. Do not bother buying it. But black and white films, especially slow speeds, seem to last for years, especially if stored cool. Long-term readers may remember my amazing results with 60-year-old Versapan film packs.