September 2009

In Search of the Perfect Lighthouse Photo

by Kay~Kacey on 9/23/2009

Outer Banks Lighthouses.

Okay, so there are a bunch of lighthouses around The Outer Banks. I, of course, was in search of the perfect lighthouse photo. Let me just skip to the end of the story…I did not find it…

It was a hazy early morning when we went by this lighthouse. Why, oh, why do they put up those big towers right near the lighthouse? Don’t they know they are positively ruining a perfect photo op?? Well, yes, if the sky had been bluer, and not so much haze, I would have spent the time to photoshop out all the garbage stuff in this photo.

This photo is okay, but I sure wouldn’t call it a perfect lighthouse photo. This one is the Bodie Island Lighthouse. We pulled off the highway and grabbed this shot.

This is the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse. You could see its light flashing at night where we stayed. A pretty lighthouse, but no real way to get near it to grab a photo without cars around it. Oh, and people up in the top of it. Kind of detracts from the whole perfect lighthouse shot, doesn’t it? I do love the base of it.

We decided to go drive around a bit and see if we could get a shot of it from the other side…

Okay, that’s doable, but I still don’t like the look of everyone hanging out on the observation deck of the lighthouse. Oh, and you can’t see the cute base of it.

Here I tried to do an artsy shot through the trees…but SuperGuy moved the car right when I took it. :mad2:

He then said I should just climb over a fence and walk up a pathway to try and get another shot. When I started to do that, he revved up the motor of the car…I wasn’t totally convinced he wouldn’t leave me there after an hour of driving around looking for that perfect shot…

I guess this is my favorite…of the Bodie Island Lighthouse. I wish it would have been a bright blue sky day with big fluffy clouds though. Or maybe even a stormy bleak day.

Well, I don’t like any of them as much as my photo of the lighthouse we saw last summer off the coast of California on our way to Carmel.

The best thing about not capturing the perfect lighthouse photo? The quest for more lighthouse shots!

Virginia Beach Review

by Kay~Kacey on 9/22/2009

I glossed over the fact that we stopped at Virginia Beach on the way to The Outer Banks. Neither SuperGuy or I had ever gone to an east coast boardwalk beach, so we thought that would make a good stop over on our vacation. We got caught in Friday night traffic…sat for two hours in a traffic jam by the tunnel, so it was almost dark when we got there. Not fun. We stayed right on the ocean at the Courtyard by Marriot south. It was nice and we had a wonderful view.

We ate dinner at Catch 31, the restaurant in the Hilton. It was noisy. Very. It looked like it was THE place to be. We waited a bit for a table and luckily got a table in front, outside. We were seated at a wicker love seat, nestled in between some palm trees and it was cute, nice, and not as noisy out there. The food was just okay, our waiter was horrible…like ignored us, mostly. Sometimes I think waiters size you up and decide if they think they’re going to get a big tip and give you great service if they think you are a tipper. Too bad for him…he guessed wrong…all of our boys have been waiters. We tip well. We know it’s a hard job. We tip well when our waiter is decent that is. But, we still had a great time watching the people go by on the boardwalk. Fun.

I thought there would be more little cafes along the boardwalk, but it was mainly a long, long run of high rise hotels. Not really what I expected.

We woke up early and this was the view out of our hotel. I swear, the east coast does the. best. sunrises. ever.

There were a lot of early morning joggers and beach walkers. We went in search of coffee.

We are much nicer people when we’ve had our coffee :love:

We went to a cute place that was recommended to us by SuperGuy’s new best friend…the bar waitress at Catch 31. 🙄

It’s in this cute little house on a side street. Best. Breakfast. Ever. Friendly waitress. Inexpensive menu. Had a great time. We were there really early, but evidently there is quite a line to get in a bit later in the morning.

Isn’t this wall cool? I’d love to have it for portrait shots! Can’t you just see a cool high school senior lounged against this wall? Wonder if we could move it to St. Louis…??

We walked around the town, seeing the sights in the daylight. SuperGuy kept urging me to buy a new swimsuit. I kept saying I brought two with me. I finally asked him WHY I needed a new swimsuit… He wanted me to get one of THESE swimsuits…and wanted to know if the 50% that was missing was the swimsuit top or bottom… :mad2:

We walked around on the boardwalk….which, to my surprise was not a BOARDwalk…it was a CEMENTwalk. Who knew? We took pictures (of course) and watched the dolphins swimming along the shore. Moms with baby stollers. Bike riders. Roller bladers. People 30 years older than us and in excellent shape. A lot of “beautiful” people. Quite a few older men with young blondes on their arm. They had a separate pathway for the bikers. Very nice setup.

I doubt if we’d go back again, but we did have a great time and were glad that we stopped there for the night to see what it was like. I could see if I lived near there, that it might be a great place to get away for a night or two.

Hi Honey I’m Home

by Kay~Kacey on 9/21/2009

Did you miss me? I guess, not so much since I posted while we were gone. We’re home. I could just reach out and kiss my iMac desktop. So tired of trying to edit on my tiny macbook and try to decide if I got the pictured edited correctly or not.

Ah, yes, I miss The Outer Banks already. Sigh. We had our 18 + hour drive home. We drove about 12 1/2 hours the first day, and finished up on Sunday. We did a last minute maneuver on Saturday to head to a more northern route because the southern route was getting hammered by rain. I tried my best to navigate us with my iPhone. It was…interesting.

Anyway, I have more photos to show, more adventures to share…but for now I’m just all tuckered out. I have mountains of laundry, and work to get caught up on, and blogs to hop…you know…re-entry stuff.

Oh, and some of us…who shall remain nameless. S.U.P.E.R.G.U.Y tan up like this. You so are not getting a photo of me in comparison. Of course, I’m the lady with the suntan lotion, long sleeves, and the hat…

House is still standing. I am pleased.