2024 E. Washington Road Trip 03 - Chesaw, Brodie, and Wauconda

This is Part 3 of my September 2024 Eastern Washington Road Trip. 

Reaching Chesaw Road south of Molson, I turned east and drove through beautiful mountainous terrain.  Scattered about on the farmlands and hillsides, I saw an occasional abandoned house or barn. Some were a distance from the road, and I could see silhouettes against the sky. 

House, Chesaw Road

These are handsome old houses - how many families lived here over the years? Why did they leave? Where did they go? Are they happier now somewhere else? Did they move to a city?

Unoccupied house, Chesaw

Chesaw is an unincorporated community in Okanogan County. It thrived during a brief gold rush from 1896 to 1900.

Beaver Lake from Chesaw Road, southeast of Chesaw

Continuing south and east from Chesaw, I drove through the beautiful Okanogan National Forest. This is quiet country with infrequent traffic (and only intermittent cell phone coverage).

 

Brodie house

Log cabin, Brodie

Bodie fixer-upper house

Bodie was another gold-mining town that thrived for about 20 years starting in 1888. The mines played out, and the town finally closed completely in 1934. I arrived late afternoon and wish I had more time to explore.

Serious driveway, Toroda Creek Road, Wauconda (135mm ƒ/3.5 SMC Takumar lens)

Wauconda Cafe & Store, 2423 State Rte 20 - closed for good?

Wauconda Cafe & Store

A pay phone! Alas, kaput.

I thought I'd buy a snack, but the Wauconda Store & Cafe appears to be closed permanently. The buildings looked recently renovated with fresh paint. In this lonely terrain, these wayside stores are far apart. To be cautious, I always made sure I had plenty of gasoline in the car because stations can be far apart. From Wauconda, I headed east on State Route 20 towards Republic. To be continued....

I took these photographs on Kodak Portra 160 film with a Pentax Spotmatic F camera and various lenses. 

2024 E. Washington Road Trip 02 - Molson

 Molson was another mining town that went through a rapid boom and bust.  It is at 3700 ft elevation about 2 miles south of the Canadian border. The town was founded in 1900 and soon had 300 residents. At its peak, it featured a saloon, general store, dance hall, hotel, and blacksmith shop - the normal bits and pieces of a remote mining town. Mines extracted copper, antimony, lead, silver, and gold. Mining in the area ended around 1938, and today, Molson is an agricultural area. 

Empty farmhouse, Molson Road south of Molson (50mm ƒ/1.4 SMC Takumar lens)

Molson's historic buildings are now clustered together in the Old Molson Ghost Town Museum. A local man, Harry Sherling, formed the museum in 1960 in remembrance of the rich pioneering history of the town.

Walker & Odell office, 1906

1896 Poland China & Molson Gold Mines assay office

Molson Post Office or bank? (35mm Super-Takumar lens, 1 sec exposure)

I usually prefer to visit historic structures in their original locations, but in this case, they were preserved at the museum. The air is so dry here, the wood seems to last for decades. This is a dramatic contrast to where I lived before in Mississippi, where rain and humidity quickly destroyed any building whose roof had failed. 

After walking around for a couple of hours (and changing a flat tire), I headed south on Molson Road and caught up to Chesaw Road again. I love this dry high altitude terrain with the pure brilliant light.

Lonely barn, Molson Road

I used KR1.5 skylight or polarizing filters for these frames. But I over-polarized, a mistake I often make. Look through the viewfinder at maximum polarization and then back off about 50%. This is especially valid in dry high altitude air like this. 

I took these photographs on Kodak Portra 160 film with my Pentax Spotmatic F camera. 

More Fun in South Shreveport, Louisiana

In previous articles, we looked around Olympia, Washington. Let us take a quick diversion back to the US South. 

On our way from Vicksburg to Houston, we overnighted in Shreveport, Louisiana. I wanted to do a last documentation in a southern neighborhood that shows elements of traditional wood architecture, decay, and neglect. In the morning, we drove west on 70th street in south Shreveport and looked at some of the side streets. The light was soft and even, quite suitable for architecture. 

Click any picture to see it at 1600 pixels on the long dimension.

Quiet times on Bates Street (Fuji Acros film, Spotmatic F camera, 28mm ƒ/3.5 SMC Takumar lens)

Cottage on Bates Street (24mm ƒ/3.5 SMC Takumar lens)

Bates Street house

Bates Street was quiet, with empty lots and houses that were boarded up. I could not tell if they were going to be repaired. If they were to be demolished, no one would have bothered to secure the window with plywood, so possibly there was a plan to restore some of them. Still, it is not a pretty scene. 

Bethany Street

Bethany Street house (24mm ƒ/3.5 SMC Takumar lens)

Bethany Street had many empty lots, meaning the former houses had been razed and the lots graded. 

Time for some crawfish at 925 E. 70th Street

7020 Line Avenue - not much happening now

The Little Shanty art store on Line Avenue, also unfortunately closed

Line Avenue runs north south. It was more commercial than the side streets but was very quiet. The street just to the right of The Little Shanty was East 71st Street. It offered a bit more photographic material.

Shed on E. 71st Street

Fixer-upper shed on E. 71st Street (28mm ƒ/3.5 SMC Takumar lens)

Asphalt shingle cottage, 569 E. 71st Street

Asphalt shingles were common mid-century for inexpensive housing. We look down on it now, but it was a practical building material because it was easy to install, inexpensive, long-lasting, and repelled bugs and vermin. It did not need repainting, as do shingles or clapboard.

 

Non-cottage, E. 71st Street

Duplex under renovation, E. 71st Street

Another duplex, E. 71st Street

Some of the houses on E. 71st Street were being renovated. That is a hopeful sign.

Muscle Therapy Center, 7101 Southern Avenue

This clinic is in a rather bunker-like brick building with burglar bars over the windows. It was unfortunate pragmatic (=cheap) architecture and looked unkept.

This finishes our quick tour on October 26, 2023, of a neighborhood in south Shreveport, Louisiana. Maybe I posted too many photographs. But, I may never return to this part of the world, although one never knows. 

I took these frames with my Pentax Spotmatic F camera and 24mm or 28mm SMC Takumar (thread-mount lenses) using Fuji Acros 100 film (exposed at EI=80). These lenses were multi-coated and among the best mid-price 1970s optics for SLR cameras. Praus Productions in Rochester, NY, developed the film. I scanned it with a Plustek 7600i film scanner operated by Silverfast Ai software. I made minor contrast adjustments with Photoshop CS6.  

Olympia in the Morning, Part 2 (Oly 05)

Let us continue our morning walk through downtown Olympia, Washington. It is quiet, and most stores are closed. I saw only 5 or 6 homeless people his time. Two years ago, there were 10s or 100s of them. How did the city purge them? Regardless, downtown Olympia is still grungy.

206½ 4th Avenue

Dumpster on 4th. I bet that stuff looks better than most of my wardrobe. 

Capitol Way view south

Alley parallel to 4th Avenue (25mm ƒ/4 Color Skopar lens)

My favorite Olympia alley (25mm ƒ/4 Color Skopar lens)

Jefferson Street view north. I have not yet seen a train, but I occasionally hear them, usually at night.

Frog Pond Grocery in the historic South Capitol district (50mm ƒ/2 Summicron-DR lens).

Argh! Another Taco truck, this time on Plum Street. The fire system is for the hot sauce? 

Well, enough of exploring downtown. Time to walk home and have another coffee.

State Avenue view west (50mm ƒ/2 Summicron-DR lens).

Proceed north and soon you reach East Bay. On many mornings, it is still as a mill pond. The buffleheads and surf scoters love it here.

East Bay from Olympia Avenue NE (50mm ƒ/2 Summicron-DR lens). Swantown Marina is in the distance.

The Bigelow neighborhood has charming traditional cottages from the early 20th century. It is not as elegant as South Capitol, but is more modest and is free from the background drone of I-5.

 

Traditional cottage on Quince Street (25mm ƒ/4 Color-Skopar lens)

Historic Quince Street house

This ends our walking tour around Olympia with Kodak Gold 100 film (another one of my experiments with expired film). I used Pentax Spotmatic F and Leica M2 cameras. We will see more of Olympia in future updates. Thank you all for walking along.

Olympia in the Morning, Part 1 (Oly 04)

Early morning in December, the light is soft and misty in Olympia. Well, it rains much of the time, so indeed, the light is softened and colors are muted. It was time to experiment again with color negative film. One early morning, I left my car at a repair shop on Capitol Way and walked home through the city. Here are some random scenes on the way.

Capitol Way, early morning

Time for some wiggling, 117 Columbia Street NW

Alley parallel to State Street

Alley parallel to State Street

Rhythms Coffee, 210 4th Avenue W.

According to Rhythms, "Stay tuned for some of the finest coffee on earth, never before served in Olympia." I think the best coffee I ever drank was in Colombia, but that is a story for another day.

 

It is fishy at 116 4th Avenue

Capitol Way view south, rather uninspiring

OSSA Skinworks, 109 Capitol Way N. Could they make my skin look good?

Washington Street view south, also uninspiring

Every city in USA seems to have a Washington Street. This one is not inspiring, but it does have some older architecture.

This ends Part 1 of our morning walk. Please type "Olympia" in the search box if you want to see other Olympia articles.

I took these photographs on long-expired Kodak Bright Sun (i.e., Gold 100) film using my Pentax Spotmatic F camera and the 50mm ƒ/1.4 SMC Takumar lens. This is one of the mid-1970s versions of the 1.4 lens with multi coating and without elements containing thorium salts. Some early 1970s versions yellowed because of the thorium glass. Those are renouned for superb optical quality. Most of my exposures this morning were at ƒ/2 or ƒ/2.8. It is convenient to have a large aperture lens. 

This Gold 100 is more grainy that the Gold I shot years ago when the film was in production. The colors have that old film look, but this roll survived the decades reasonably intact. Still, years have passed, and I suggest you not seek out Gold 100. I wish Kodak would reintroduce it. I tried their contemporary Gold 200 and thought it was too grainy. But in 120 size (medium format), the modern 200 might be fine. The Gold 100 decades ago was superb.