Footloose in Costa Rica 2000-2001

Some 24 years ago, the family and I took a 3-week Christmas season trip to Costa Rica to look at birds and nature. Wilderness Travel of California operated the trip via local guides and drivers. We had a great time. We visited both coasts, stayed in the rain forest, tromped through the jungle, ate black beans and rice, drank coffee at 05:00, and flew on small propellor planes. Our fellow travelers were friendly and the guides knowledgeable. I had not been to Latin America since my oil industry years in the early 1980s, and it was nice to get back to the foods, smells, sounds, and vivid colors of the low latitudes. Here is a small sampling.

San José

We flew into San José and were immediately whisked off to a luxury hotel. Wait, I prefer to be downtown where one can wander around and look at the shops and stalls. San José is a bit rough - possibly the trip organizers were concerned about security issues. Or maybe the typical American tourist does not like to mix with the locals. Before we returned to USA three weeks later, we opted to stay in a hotel downtown, and we spent time walking around.

Supplies and soda

I think they like Coca Cola here

Sunglass Hut San José style

Don't forget your Coca Cola

Well, San José is a bit beat-up. We had to constantly scan the sidewalks where we walked because often paving stones were missing or there were construction holes. I can't recall where we walked or where we ate, but it was fun. The city does not have ominous overtones like San Pedro Sula or Guatemala City. The local citizens were cheerful.

La Fortuna

La Fortuna is a nice little provincial town in the central highlands. It serves as the gateway to rafting on the Arenal River and to visiting Volcan Arenal. 

Kapok tree near La Fortuna

You occasionally come across one of these astonishing kapok (Ceiba pentandra) trees. They can grow over 200ft high. The tree produces pods that contain seeds. These are surrounded by a fluffy, yellowish fibre that was formerly used in pillows and life jackets (therefore the term kapok jacket that you hear in World War II movies).

More chance for a Coca Cola

Waiting for a call

Monteverde Cloud Forest

There is the Resplendent quetzal (Pharomachrus mocinno) - way up there

Taking milk to market

There is the Violet Sabrewing hummingbird - way up there

The Monteverde Cloud Forest is an astonishing biological preserve of hundreds of species of birds, mammals, and insects. It rains often, like every day. Pack your rain gear and camera protection. What do you do there? Arise at 05:30, drink a strong and delicious Costa Rican Coffee, don your boots, and head off with your group to looks for birds. It does not get much better than this.

Costa Rica is a fantastic destination. Book a trip with a company that provides a naturalist, buy top grade binoculars, and have fun. And be sure to drink the coffee and eat the fresh fruits.

I took these photographs on Kodak Gold 100 film via an old Nikkormat FTn that I borrowed from a friend. The Nikkormat was a beater and I was not sure if the back was still light tight. But some electrical tape ensured a safe seal. For color slides, I used my Nikon F3. But after all the dampness and rain on this trip, I opted to send it to Nikon USA for a thorough cleaning and checkup. I scanned these negatives on a Plustek 7600i film scanner operated by SilverFast software.

The Outer Banks of North Carolina and Life-Saving Stations

Background

The Outer Banks of North Carolina are a summer playground for millions of visitors. But before the era of paved roads and gasoline automobiles, the Outer Banks were a wild, remote, and storm-tossed wilderness. Fishermen inhabited a few settlements and occasional visitors came by boat. 

Around the turn of the 20th century, Americans became interested in the beach. As urbanization and congestion increased in cities, affluent people escaped to the seashore for healthy air and recreation. Resorts arose to accommodate them. But until the age of the automobile, these resorts remained small isolated coastal enclaves tied to the hinterland by railroads (for example, Atlantic City, New Jersey) or by ferry boat. The technical revolution of the 20th century brought electric trains, automobiles, gasoline-powered pleasure boats, labor-saving devices for the home, and a new era of leisure to a prospering nation (Morison and Commager 1962). Electricity provided convenient power to energy-poor barrier islands for lighting and water pumps for drinking water. Changing morals allowed people to sunbathe and enjoy the hedonism of the beach experience (Lenček and Bosker 1998). By the 1920s, automobiles let beach-goers follow new paved roads to the coast.

But the Outer Banks remained remote and wild until the early 1920s. Victims of shipwrecks were often stranded with no water and food, and often with no way to signal for help.

Diamond Shoals and Cape Hatteras, view north

View north to Buxton and the Cape Hatteras National Seashore from the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse at its original location.

The US Life-Saving Service and its Stations

During the sailing vessel era, the Outer Banks of North Carolina were a dangerous and remote expanse of coast with no safe harbors of refuge. Because of the many shipwrecks that occurred in these treacherous waters, the US Government allocated funds for a life-saving organization in 1848. The fledging organization lacked budget and training, but the brave men did what they could with limited resources. Finally, in June 1878, the US Life-Saving Service became an independent unit of the US Treasury Department with a mission statement and more adequate funding. The US National Park Service has a succinct summary of the service and the amazing and heroic work that these men performed to save victims of shipwrecks. 

From the National Park Service:

The first Outer Banks Life-Saving Service (LSS) stations were built and manned in 1874. They were, from north to south, Jones Hill (later with the more familiar name “Currituck Beach”), Caffeys Inlet, Kitty Hawk, Nags Head, Bodie island (renamed “Oregon Inlet”), Chicamacomico (now village of Rodanthe) and Little Kinnakeet (just north of today’s village of Avon). In 1878, eleven more stations were added. These included the now famous Kill Devil Hills station, which assisted the Wright brothers, and the Hatteras Inlet station. Still more were added, eventually totaling 29, averaging about six miles apart on the North Carolina outer coast from the Virginia line (Wash Woods LSS – 1878), to the South Carolina line (Oak Island LSS- 1886). In 1915, all these became Coast Guard stations.

United States Life-Saving Service stations on Bodie, Hatteras and Ocracoke Islands – includes the area in 1953 which became the Cape Hatteras National Seashore – were Bodie Island, Oregon Inlet, Pea Island, New Inlet, Chicamacomico, Gull Shoal, Little Kinnakeet, Big Kinnakeet, Creeds Hill, Cape Hatteras, Durants, Hatteras Inlet and Ocracoke.

Life saving stations, from the North Carolina Office of Archives and History, via the Encyclopedia of North Carolina 

Here are a few 1990s photographs of some of the life-saving stations, going from south to north. Some have been restored since then and are now museums or visitor centers. Not all of the 1800s stations exist now. Some, like Big Kinnakeet, were demolished after damage caused by hurricanes.  

Little Kinnakeet

1904 Coast Guard Station

Tower of the 1904 Coast Guard station

1874 original life saving building before restoration

Little Kinnakeet is just north of the town of Avon and is in the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. This 1874 station was one of the first seven life-saving stations erected on the Outer Banks. It operated from 1875 to 1915 and then continued as a Coast Guard station until 1954. The 1874 building has been restored since I took these Kodachromes, but the 1904 building is in poor condition and now fenced off.

Chicamacomico

The Chicamacomico Life-Saving Station in Rodanthe is the most complete life-saving station left in North Carolina, according to the National Park Service. It was first commissioned in 1874 and operated until 1954. In the first photograph above, note the water cistern to the left of the door. Drinking water was difficult to secure on the Outer Banks.

Chicamacomico Station has been beautifully restored and includes an interesting museum.

Oregon Inlet

1898 lifesaving main building with 1979 dormitory

This Quonochontaug-type building was the third station at Oregon Inlet. The US Coast Guard used the station from 1898 to 1988. In 1990, the Coast Guard moved to a new dock and facility north of Oregon inlet in Pamlico Sound. The old building sat empty for a number of years, during which it suffered vandalism. In 2008, the State of North Carolina funded a repair and rehabilitation, which included raising the historic building onto piles and demolishing the 1970s dormitory. 

Kitty Hawk

Oops. Years before, house lots existed on the seaward side of Hwy 12 (to the right in the photograph)

Kitty Hawk is famous as the area where the Wright Brothers did their pioneering experiments with powered flight early in the 20th century. But this part of the barrier island is also highly vulnerable to beach retreat caused by storm waves and a lack of sediment supply. In some stretches, Hwy 12 now runs along the beach because former house lots on the seaward side have been washed away. I do not know what happens to property rights when the land is washed away. It is a complicated problem that is sure to plague communities in the future in the face of sea level rise.

Kitty Hawk sunset

On this part of Kitty Hawk, land owners (or the county?) have placed sand fencing to trap wind-blown sand. And bulldozers have pushed sand up in front of the properties to protect them. But the lack of vegetated dunes shows that this beach is not stable. This part of the barrier is sediment-poor. Shoving a limited amount of sand around with tractors will not cure that problem.

Part of the former Kitty Hawk lifesaving station is now the Black Pelican Restaurant.

Duck

Duck is a fashionable town north of the frantic intersection where US 158 crosses the intersection and diverges south to Kitty Hawk. The only road to Duck is on NC Highway 12, and in summer it gets backed up with tourist traffic. Duck has some stable sand dunes with huge old oak trees. The presence of mature oak trees means this part of a barrier island has been stable for years or centuries. But further north, developers have raped the landscape and built miles of vacation homes. 

The US Army Corps of Engineers Coastal and Hydraulics Laboratory operates the Field Research Facility (FRF) just north of Duck. The tower houses cameras and laser measuring equipment. The laboratory conducts experiments on beach processes, wave action, and sediment transport. During WWII, the site was a US Army bombing range. 

Corolla

The town of Corolla is the northern end of NC 12 on the Outer Banks. The only way to reach the mainland is to turn around and head south back to the US 158 causeway (a long drive). Some homes have been built north of the end of the paved road. Their owners or summer tourists use 4-wheel drive vehicles to get around the sand roads or the open beach. 

My friend, Bill Birkemeier, former director of the Field Research. Facility, described the recent history:

While there were always people living here, modern history probably began in 1967 with the development of Carova Beach with 2,300 plotted lots. At the time, there was an expectation of a paved road from Virginia. When the Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge closed off access in 1974, interest shifted to a permanent road from the south. A private, partially paved road connecting Corolla to the south was opened in 1975. The It included a guardhouse to limit access only to property owners (at the time there were just 12 permanent residents).

The State of North Carolina removed the guardhouse in 1984, opening the area to the visiting public.

Then in 1988, medical waste washed ashore in New Jersey, closing the beaches there. Many New Jersey shore vacationers discovered the Outer Banks. They found beautiful, undeveloped, empty beaches that were free to visit (many New Jersey beaches have access fees). They also found real estate prices that were significantly lower than in New Jersey. The real estate market and the number of new homes took off. More recently, the area experienced another development bump, this time Covid-related.

Although the number of permanent residents has increased—most of the homes are vacation rentals.

The Walehead Club was an exclusive and luxurious Art Nouveau mansion built between 1922 and 1925 for two very wealthy duck hunters. One was female and not allowed to join any of the other hunt clubs, so they built their own. In those days, visitors crossed Currituck Sound from the mainland by steamer or motor launch. The building has been restored and is open to tours. Don't mind the "wild" horse chowing out on the grass. 

The horses are of Spanish and English origin and were left behind by early explorers. The Corolla Wild Horse Fund has a history.

Ferocious wild horses chilling out in the surf and avoiding mosquitoes

Tourists like to watch the wild horses. They are reasonably mellow but are not domesticated critters - definitely not to be petted. They have adapted well to their sandy environment. When the flies are bothersome, the horses walk on the windy ocean beach. When the weather is hot, I have seen horses wallow in some of the canals on the sound side, like little hippopotamuses. Smart critters.

Heidi instructing coastal scientists and engineers on beach processes in Corolla.

Further north, a gate blocks the border between Virginia and North Carolina. A few old-timers who lived in Corolla in the 1970s had keys to open the gate. They could drive north to Virginia Beach to buy groceries. 

This has been our quick tour of the Outer Banks. Go visit this fascinating geological phenomena. (But visit in the off-season to avoid the traffic).

I think my friend, Bill Birkemeier, for helping me with background information on some of the lifesaving stations. 

References

Lenček, L., and Bosker, G. 1998. The Beach: The History of Paradise on Earth. Viking, New York, 310 p.

Morison, S. E., and Commager, H. S. 1962. The Growth of the American Republic. Fifth Ed., Oxford University Press, New York.

Another Look at the Fifth Ward, Houston (TX 12)

 

Fifth Ward

The Fifth Ward is one of Houston's former former political wards. They are no longer political entities, but people still think of them as geographic places. They include historic neighborhoods, and some blocks in other wards have been renovated. The Fifth Ward is rather rough; I posted black and white pictures in an earlier Houston post (please click the link).

 

Mary Street (alley) view north (35mm ƒ/3.5 Supar-Takumar lens)

Former school and recycling company (out of business?), Semmes Street

This molded concrete building, which I am sure was originally a school, resembled the aesthetic of the unused Culkin Elementary School in Vicksburg. I do not know details, but this type of construction appears to have been common during the New Deal era for schools and possibly other public buildings.

Noble Street

Restored shotgun house, Semmes street

2318 Hailey Street

Poison ivy farm, Semmes Street

No services today, 2623 Estex Freeway

A rainy/drizzly day made the Fifth Ward a bit gloomy and ominous. It was perfect for my type of photography. But I did not take my wife to some of the the rougher blocks. 

Follow-Up

After a few hours photographing in the Fifth Ward, what next? 

Flash Drive mobile photography education unit

The Houston Center for Photography at 1441 West Alabama has interesting exhibits and an active education program. Their Flash Drive, housed in a repurposed ambulance, is a working camera obscura.

How about some jazz at the Menil Collection Museum? This was a concert in commemoration of the famous museum curator, Walter Hopps. The estate of Walter Hopps at the Menil included original silver gelatin prints (i.e., real photographs) from William Eggleston, Eugene Atget, Robert Frank, Allan Ginsberg (the beat generation denizen), Henri Cartier-Bresson, Walker Evans, Dennis Hopper, and W. Eugene Smith. Amazing, what a treat.

The Menil does not have the vibe of a Mississippi juke joint - it is more oriented to the wine and canapés set.

Niko Niko's on Montrose

After a long day, one is tired and hungry. Where to eat? Why that is obvious. Find Greek. There are Greeks in Houston! And they make delicious food and baklava big enough for two. And they have Retsina. Ahh, contentment.... 

(I could handle living in Houston again - but we did that in the 1980s, so not again.)

I took the Firth Ward photographs with Kodak Portra 160 film using a venerable Pentax Spotmatic camera and Takumar lenses. Pentax's Takumar lenses were top grade in the 1970s and are still totally usable on film or adapted to digital bodies. The Spotmatic's light meter works in stop-down mode, meaning the viewfinder darkens as you stop down. For best results, be careful to avoid large areas of bright sky in the measuring area. I still have the correct mercury (mercuric oxide) V400PX batteries for the meter. The camera and lenses are reliable and compact, well-suited for travel. 

Copyright note:

I recently saw some photographs from this blog reposted on Flickr and Pinterest. Some anus lifted them them without my permission. I'm sorry I need to note something as basic as this: these are copyrighted. Ask permission if you want to use some of this material.

Another Look at Tower 26, Houston (TX 11)

My wife and I revisited Houston in March (2023). The weather was too wet to visit NASA, so I suggested we revisit the Fifth Ward. She is very patient with my photographing grungy neighborhoods and industrial sites. The light was soft and gloomy, my favorite for urban decay exploration. 

Tower 26 Railroad Junction

Lyons Avenue view north

Tower 26 diamonds

Tower 26 junction view west from Mary Street

Waiting for the light to change, Mary Street

View east from Mary Street

Tower 26 was once a 2-story railroad control tower. There is no building any more, but three railroad lines still cross here. Google Maps shows the location. Early in the 20th century, this was a complicated network of intersecting rail lines, all manually controlled. 

Tower 26 in the early-1950s (from Texas Railroad History)

Note the handsome wood construction. "The tower architecture gives unmistakable evidence that it was built by Southern Pacific (SP), resembling many other SP towers,"

Brooks Street cottage (Gold 200 film, Kodak Retina IIa camera)

A group of cottages on Brooks Street formerly had their backs to the railroad tracks. I photographed them in late 2022. As of March, they had been totally removed and the land was freshly graded.  

I took the railroad photographs on Kodak Portra 160 film with a Pentax Spotmatic camera and the Super-Takumar 35mm ƒ/3.5 lens. Takumar lenses were top grade in the 1970s and are still totally usable on film and on digital. The Spotmatic camera's light meter works in stop-down mode, meaning the viewfinder darkens as you stop down. For best results, be careful to avoid large areas of bright sky in the measuring area. I still have the correct mercury (mercuric oxide) V400PX batteries for the meter. The camera and lenses are reliable and compact, well-suited for urban decay. 

When Photographs Go to a New Home

My office at home holds boxes and boxes of photographic negatives, prints, slides, and Kodak Carousel trays. I needed to seriously downsize (i.e., discard junk). But I hated to throw this body of work in the trash. Did anyone want it?

Coastal and Beach Slides

Examples of pages containing slides

During the years I worked at the Coastal and Hydraulics Laboratory, I took thousands of photographs (mostly Kodachrome slides) of beaches, coastal features, harbors, and bluffs. They included the Great Lakes, Long Island, Florida, Alabama, California, Calabria, Chiapas, Greece, and more. I stored them in archival pages in black 3-ring binders. On each slide, I wrote a date and location. When I retired, the binders came home in cardboard boxes. But I never looked at them. Someone surely could use them. 

After some emails, the American Shore & Beach Preservation Association (ASBPA), the publisher of Shore & Beach, said they would like the collection. I promised that I had only saved technically good slides and they would not be receiving faded generic beaches with no location or date information. I had published some articles in Shore & Beach before, so we had a personal connection. ASBPA was in the process of scanning slides from Mr. Orville Magoon, a famous coastal engineer who practiced in Hawaii and California for decades. His pictures are on a very clever ArcGIS display of the California coast.

Binders organized by location

Boxed and ready to go, March 2023

I looked at each and every page and removed non-pertinent slides. I also added extra annotation to some of the labels. My steel bulk slide boxes also contained some coastal photos, especially extra photographs from Greece. I placed them into archival pages and added them to the binders. Finally, I made new labels for the binders, packed them in new cardboard boxes (U-Haul Small) and sent them to ASBPA. 

 

Examples USA

Here are a few samples of coastal photographs.

On the breakwater at Los Angeles Long Beach Harbor

A coworker and I went to the Los Angeles Long Beach harbor to change data tapes and batteries in the SeaData wave gauges. The tower at the end of one arm of the breakwater held one of our radio antennas. We stayed in a cheesy motel on shore, but then I discovered we could have slept on the Queen Mary within the per diem rate. I recall my coworker knew a lady at the motel.

Cape Hatteras view north over Diamond Shoals, February 1993

A coworker and I rented a plane from Naval Base Norfolk and flew the shore from Cape Henry south to Cape Hatteras. The light was hazy. The stormy seas outlined the double sand bars that extended almost this entire stretch of the Outer Banks. The rough water in the lower part of the picture is the infamous Diamond Shoals. These shoals were treacherous for sailing vessels and were called the "Graveyard of the Atlantic". In 1993, the Cape Hatteras lighthouse was still in its original vulnerable location next to the ocean. You can see it in the photograph above (click to enlarge to 2400 pixels wide).

Cape Hatteras Light House at its original location. 

View north from the Hatteras light house. The town of Buxton is to the left.

The National Park Service generously opened the tower for the coastal processes class that we taught at the Corps of Engineers Field Research Facility (FRF). This was a beautiful day with a much gentler sea that the one during the 1993 flight. You can see the single offshore sand bar.

Rocky (granitic) coast, South Harpswell, Maine

South Street Seaport, Manhattan, New York City

Boardwalk at Rockaway Beach, Queens, New York

Erie Harbor North Pier Light, Erie Harbor Entrance Channel, Presque Isle, Pennsylvania

Dredging and maintaining the entrance channel at Erie, Pennsylvania, was one of the earliest civil projects conducted by the US Army Corps of Engineers. President Monroe signed the first Rivers and Harbors Act in 1824, which directed funds toward initial improvements of the harbor at Erie. 

Examples Europe

Guardia Piedmontese, Calabria, Italy, June 2000

The Provincial Government of Cosenza sponsored three of us from the lab to conduct a survey of beach structures and coastal erosion and advise what could be done to mitigate the erosion. Note the train on the embankment just behind the beach. One critical problem was that during winter storms, sea spray caused arcing between the overhead electrical wires and train service had to stop. This is the main rail line between Naples and Messina.

Storm-cut scarp on a gravel beach, Agios Ioannis, Pelion, Greece

Greece has a rugged and complicated coast. Years ago, a coworker and I proposed compiling a book, Coastlines of Greece, which would have been one of the Coastlines of the World series by the American Society of Civil Engineers. Sadly, it never happened.  

 

Agios Dionysios Monastery, Moni Athos, Greece (founded in the 14th century)

Agios Panteleimonas Monastery, Moni Athos, Greece (founded in 1169; rebuilt after a major fire in 1968)

Moni Athos, or the Holy Mountain, is a peninsula southeast of Thessaloniki, Greece. It has been a semi-independent and self-governing community of monks for over a thousand years. The scenery is utterly spectacular because the mountains have never been forested. The coastal scenery does not get much better than this. 

The monasteries, some of which date back 700 years, are self-contained communities. They now constitute a Unesco World Heritage Site. The cultural aspects are extraordinary. For example, the Grand Monastery of the Lavron has frescos in the dining hall attributed to the painter Domenikos Theotokopoulos, better known as El Greco. 

Saint Panteleimonas is the Russian monastery and houses exclusively Russian monks, sent by the Russian Orthodox Church. The liturgies are spoken in Russian. President Vladimir Putin visited the monastery on September 9, 2005.

An unusual note: Most of Athos still uses the Julian calendar. After all, we are the ones who switched to that new-fangled calendar. But I suspect the monk's mobile phones show the new calendar, unless they have a conversion app.

Moni Athos is a popular trekking area, but for men only. Access is strictly controlled. You must get a permit to visit the peninsula.

Family Photos

Oh, oh, where did these hundreds of family photographs come from? I love the children but can't store the prints, negatives, and slides forever. They have gone to the appropriate parents. Here are a couple of examples.

A quiet afternoon with a book, Nerantza, Greece

Discussing beach processes on a gravel beach, Nerantza, Greece

This has been a lot of work, but I hope my old photos have gone somewhere to have another life. Will the recipients eventually discard them? Maybe, but I tried.