Views from the commute

Scenes like this are pretty common in Iowa, Nebraska and Missouri, on whose highways and bi-ways I have been traversing for the past two weeks, but for a boy from the city it seems like a different world. I have driven through dozens of towns and communities just like this one and I have to admit that I feel pretty removed from the means of our food production. I know that getting a cob of Nebraska corn in Vancouver is about as likely as finding a BC wine in Omaha, but I think you can see my point. Where ever our produce comes from, it has to travel both a literal and figurative distance to land in our fruit and veg markets on Cambie, Gravnille or West 4th. I have spent a lot of time thinking about the GMO/Organic debate over the past week and I cannot help but wonder if there is a much broader argument to be made for both sides. In this argument I am having trouble taking a side and will remain grateful that my decisions are made at the grocers and don't have to be made in the field.

Kirk Cameroned

Yesterday I joined a ride out of a local bike shop in Omaha and I was unceremoniously dropped off the back by much stronger riders up front about half way through. The shop is called Bike Way and I felt like the fat kid at summer camp. You know the one. The slow kid that one of the counselors has to hang off the back with on long hikes. Oh wait, I was that kid. And yesterday night on a bike path in Omaha I was left behind.

I really wanted to hang on, but they were on a tear yesterday, through wooded bike/pedestrian paths, and residential subdivisions. It was a much more competitive ride than was suggested by Trev, the guy who invited me out for the ride last week. I was feeling good that no one was showing up for the ride in matching jerseys, but yet many of the riders had wheel sets worth more than my whole bike! Thanks to the guy who lead me back to the shop and to Brian who was out for the first time also. I'm still interested in the Taco Ride, can I ride it on a crossbike?

The photo is a recreation of how I felt when I got back to shop and before my hour long drive back to the truck stop in Iowa where I stayed last night. I got a note from my sister Lindsay and a follow up from Art (see Art Show link) about my comment settings. I think I have fixed the problem and interested parties should be able to leave comments without joining blogger. Cheers.

Breakfast in America: I am the Super Tramp

Morgan Spurlock has nothing on me. Well except for the hit movie, the tie-in book and the TV series, but try being a VRX Photog for 30 days in the rural outposts of the Great Plains. I have been cruising the small towns and back roads of Iowa and Nebraska for the past couple of days and have found little to eat other than the usual suspects which seem to show up in every town no matter how small; Burger King, Pizza Hut and McDonalds. I am forced to admit that I am two for three on that list. I used to chide my fellow photographers for complaining about food offerings on the road by saying "if you really wanted to find good food, you would". I now know better. The past two nights I have driven into cities an hour away to find reasonably healthy and tasty fare. But as the photo suggests there just isn't time for such explorations in the morning.

This is breakfast in America, and this is the view.

It's Ok, I'm from Wisconsin

Just for the record I'm no cheese head, no offence to anyone from Wisconsin, but I am certain that there are drivers in Iowa and Nebraska who are sure I am. The Falcon has been reincarnated and I am on the road again in a Silver Subaru! Which incidentaly have Wisconsin licence plates. Out of state plates are so much more than mearly licence plates they are a licence to swerve eraticly and without notice to avoid taking the wrong exit. Though we curse and wave our fists it is so easy to dismiss the poor manners of a tourist when they clearly don't know where they are going.

The Iowa Heat Index

The heat index is a measure of how hot it feels, it is a combination of the actual temperature and the relative humidity. Today the index will hit 115 degrees F. Perhaps the real heat index is how long it takes a fat man to sweat through a shirt while taking pictures from the side of an interstate overlooking value oriented lodgings. Welcome to the heat.

Welcome to Iowa.

I arrived in Council Bluffs, Iowa late Sunday night for the start of a month long trip to the Great Plains region for client work. Lonely Planet does not offer the most flatering impression of Council Bluffs, "At Iowa's western end of I-80 is Council Bluffs, known for its casinos and budget motels, which make it a good base for exploring its big brother across the Missouri River - Omaha, Nebraska".

So far I am unable to refute this discription. Which is to say that much of my free time has been across the River in Omaha, but this is only half the story. After finishing up Monday afternoon in good time, I paid a visit to the good folks at The Endless Ride Bike store in Council Bluffs for a little local riding knowledge. I have a plan to help preserve my sanity over the next month on the road. I am, for the first time, traveling with a bike.

So I paid a visit to a local bike shop, looked at a map and planned a ride. I offered to the staff that I was looking to ride about 50km or about two hours and he responded "Well I don't really keep track of milage, but it's a good loop." He was even gracious enough to warn me that there would be some good hills along the way. In my perspective a good hill is one that falls away infront of me, not one that stands to meet me.

It turns out the hills weren't the greatest challenge, it was the heat. At nearly 40 degrees celcius it was like riding in an oven. But it was the combination of the hills and the heat that made me wonder if my efforts to stave off a heart atack may end up enducing one. Life is great cruising along at 30 km/h, the wind helps keep you cool so the slower I crawled up the hills the hotter it seemed to get. At one point I had to pull over into the shade and hang out. All things considered it was still a great ride and a great way to get out of the city. I have become so used to city riding that I have forgotten how nice riding on county roads can be. No traffic lights, light traffic, and winding roads.

One caveat, however, is to beware of the road kill. The county roads I was riding were littered with hairy, bloody mounds of baking animal flesh. You miss the joy of such discoveries riding in a car. But on a bike in a heat wave you can actually smell the rotting carcases before you see them!

The photo is from last Saturday's hillclimb in Whiterock, BC. It's Super Week at home, and heaps of great racers are in town. I was thinking of these guys while I was draging my self up the aforementioned hills here in Iowa. The race was cool to watch though the most exciting races were the finals where the five fastest riders sprint it out. You should check out Gastown this Wednesday, it's a great venue, great riders, and an exciting race.

What the %$#& was I thinking?

I am posting another picture of the Lonsdale Classic of last weekend, well because I like it. I am preparing for another extended leave of Vancouver. I am heading to Nebraska for client work and hopefully some milage on my road bike, which for the first time in three and a half years of traveling for work, I am taking with me. It's already packed and waiting for the rental car to arrive.

Of all the things we do to injure ourselves I cannot help but believe the most ridiculous is body waxing. Two days ago I found myself face down on a table with a woman applying hot wax to my back and thinking "what the hell am I doing here?" Rest assured there was an inner monologue filled with four letter words for the 30 minutes it took for that brave esthetician to denude my back of hair.

I have to admit I did not go into this act unaware. I have been before. I wax, or rather, have my back waxed several times a year. Of all the things I am self conscience of, my growing forehead, my short stature, or my round girth, I wax. What an idiot. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise, it hurts like a dirty SOB. I hearby retract any comments I have made in the past about the value of bikini waxing. The irony is that no matter how much this last visit hurt, painfully so, it was so much better than the first time I went. The first time I waxed it was at the hands of a woman who was no doubt an esthetician at a Hungarian Gullag. "Wait" you say, an esthetician at a Hungarian gullag? Maybe that's why it hurt so much.

The Blogger in Question (Bio)

This is the part where I introduce myself. I am a professional photographer based in Vancouver, BC, where I have lived off and on for the past 20 years. My time away has been spent working in Whistler, studying in Victoria or Ontario or traveling for work. While I have and I do travel for fun, there has been a lot less of that in the past four years.

I studied for, and recieved, a bachelor of Humanities from the University of Victoria in 1999. At UVic I studied BC and Canadian History with forays into art history, film studies and sociology. Yes it was a classic liberal arts education, and no, I don't regret my choices. Things have turned out pretty good for me.

After UVic and a two year break I enrolled in a two year diploma progam in Photojournalism at Loyalist College in eastern Ontario. I completed the two year program in an accelerated ten month stream and dived into the daily grind of daily news. After being turned away by a number of smaller community papers in BC I was offered an internship at the Spokesman-Review in Spokane, Wa.

The Lonsdale Classic

Last weekend I trecked over to North Vancouver to do something I don't often get a chance to do, photograph sports. Since finishing an internship four years ago I have left sports shooting largely behind with the exception of a few events I have come across in my travels. I want to say how much fun it was to "cover" the races, but I felt rusty as hell trying to keep up with the action and the speed of the riders.

The Lonsdale Classic is a Criterium race which consists of a short track and multiple laps, up to 50-70, for the highest category divisions. The fastest riders were breaking 70km/h and posting lap times of less than a minute. As a bit of a bike geek it was quite humbling to watch riders scream past at that speed knowning that even with a downhill grade and a stiff wind, available only to me, there would be absolutely no way I could keep up. Which was kind of how I felt in trying to photograph the races too. Leah Goldstein crushed the senior womens category, it was an impressive win which I got to watch and shoot from the back seat of the pace car.

Itinerant jackass

So everyone else is posting a blog and far beit for me not to jump on the bandwagon. But make no mistake, this isn't an attempt at being discovered and offered a movie deal! It's July 7, 2006 and I have spent more than 100 nights away from home this year and I have amassed a collection of boarding passes. So over the next couple of weeks there will be more to follow including my rare and unique insights about the world as I see it and pictures too, 'cause that's what I do. I take pictures. I travel and I take pictures, it's not always pretty, nor picturesque, but that's the grind.

The Virtual Tourist