Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Short Spring Trip

Last Spring I drove to Dayton, Ohio up I 64 to Charleston, West Virginia where I connected to Rt. 35 all the way to Dayton. This is a very scenery route and I stopped a couple of times to make sure that the camera was working. Off I-64 near Sandstone is the New River where I took the above image of a what is called a horseshoe bend. This is an HDR image resulting from 4 separate exposures. The Norfolk and Southern railroad follows the river; this track is mainly used to deliver coal to Hampton Roads for export.

Route 35 goes through several small towns with peculiar names such as Nitro and Asbestos among others and runs parallel to the Kanawa River through beautiful farm lands in the flood plain. Althougth I am not sure, I would venture to say that the names of towns is related to the mining industry that is big business in West Virginia. There are several locks and hydroelectric plants in the river, and lots of barges and tugboats can be seen navigating up and down the River. The Mail Pouch in the side of an old barn used to be common sight in farm country through the South East but these are mostly gone by now.

Dayton in its days of glory used to be a city of inventors as the Wright's Brothers, Kettering and others. It used to be an industrial center with companies such as Delco, NCR, Dayton Tire Company and GM assembly plants; the later just closed last December. The green house above was the electrical shop where Kettering invented the electric starter and igniters for automobiles.

This barn is also one of the many historical structures left in Dayton; it hard to comprehend that less than a hundred years ago this city was mainly a dairy and agricultural community that transformed itself into and industrial power and now it is a declining community as lots in the Mid West.

While I Dayton I stayed with relatives and one early morning I was looking into the yard and to my surprise, I saw female Cooper's Hawk collecting branches for a nest. She was making it in a tree in the yard next door. Imagine, this is in an urban community full of people. She was being closely supervised by her male companion that was very vigilant watching all her moves from a nearby tree. But working was below his dignity.

5 comments:

SAPhotographs (Joan) said...

Hello Jose. I have been to Dayton but it is a case of a person riding passed these old buildngs and not knowing the historical value. I had family who stayed near there.

Love the hawk!! Typical male, sits around while the woman has to do all the work!! :)

Tim Rucci said...

Really nice, Jose. I really like the shot of horseshoe bend. I've been there a couple times and stood in just about the same spot a few years back. The train was coming around the track at the time, but I didn't have a wide enough lens to capture the entire scene that you did here. Makes me want to go back...

NatureStop said...

Hello Jose,Greetings from Oman! What an interesting blog and great images.

Ken Conger Photography said...

Don Jose another dynamic post. Great scenic and the Copper's images. Blue Skies.

Rene said...

Love that you saw a Coopers gathering branches for a nest. You'd be surprised how much wildlife you see in urban areas. I'm in the San Francisco area, and that's exactly what I blog about.