The Bradbury Building

This subject is a landmark Italian Renaissance Revival building and was erected in 1897. You have seen it before, I'm willing to bet, a lot of things have been filmed there. The most famous is probably Blade Runner. Once again, this is something totally free that you can go and see and photograph. This is right smack in the heart of Los Angeles.

I only had my phone with me to take pictures with, but I had been wanting to take photos there for AGES, so I wasn't missing the opportunity. I think for phone pictures these are fine. And yes, there are filters on all of these to make them look older. I liked them better that way, and hey, my blog.

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An overall shot of the main courtyard.



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Some elevator detail.



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The second floor hallway around the courtyard.



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Light filtering down near a stairway. My favorite shot by a long margin.

Belmont Shore (Long Beach)

I do believe this is from the last real beach day I had in Southern California before the quarantine days materialized. We actually got to the beach during the quarantine to see the dinoflagellate plankton in the surf glow, but that was at night and beyond my photography skills. This is from a beach where you simply put a couple dollars in the meters to enjoy the day, Rosie's Dog Beach.

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A handsome fellow with the foam behind.



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Here's a gull, who is most likely hoping for snacks.



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Some of the gorgeous waves from that day. Some you could see completely through.



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Between the birds being used to people and a good lens, I could get some very detailed shots. Here's a sweet lady, now.



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"Time for yelling!"



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A sunset stroll along the sand.

A book!

Yes, I've gone and done it! There's a book of my photography available!

You can buy the hardcopy version through Blurb.com or through Amazon.com in a few days, but honestly, this is a vanity project, pure and simple. If you're really interested, there's a PDF version you can download through the Blurb site for only 6 bucks. If you get the PDF, I get a whopping one dollar profit, as opposed to the .85¢ I get if you purchase the book from Amazon. So I'd rather push the PDF version, although I'll admit the book looks very nice on a coffee table.

If you click through, you can preview it for free!

Pacific

By Misty Crowe

San Luis Obispo through Gaviota

This is a bit of a mixed bag. We were on the last day of our vacation and there was so much to see in this area! There are a couple pictures from the San Luis Obispo Mission (recommended donation only), Buellton's Ostrichland USA (5 dollars) and a beach in Gaviota. The beach was actually the most expensive, because it was at a campground, but it was still only 40-60 dollars for a night on the beach.

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Actual mission grapes from one of the ancient vines originally planted by the original founders of the mission! We did not eat any of these, because it would be rude, but I will admit we found some that had fallen out of the way and tried those.



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This is one of my traditional shots. I love shots of seating, especially in those long, lovely corridors in the missions.



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Here's an ostrich at Ostrichland USA. (They also have emus!) You can pay a little extra and feed the ostriches. These seem like cool, funny birds until you get right up close to them, and then you wonder how anyone had the courage to farm them in the first place!



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A close up of some ostrich feet. You do not want to be on the receiving end of this sort of thing. You can easily see how they may have been dinosaurs at some point.



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Here's the pier at the Gaviota beach. It was golden hour and everything at the beach photographed well.



And a shot of the beach proper.

Piedras Blancas Elephant Seal Rookery

I very much suggest this particular location if you can visit. It's totally free and it's positively packed with elephant seals, as well as hungry squirrels and crows. If you like wildlife, this is not to be missed. You can find more information through this link, but of course I'm also going to show you how adorable some of the animals are right below.

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Here are a couple of these lovelies in the water.



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There were a lot of them sleeping. Don't they look soft??



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Their faces have so much personality!



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You can practically hear the funny little sound when this soft baby pushes their nose into the sand.



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Plan to bring something healthy to feed the squirrels when you visit! They will absolutely beg!



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I love how you can see their tiny mouth in this photo.

Avenue of the Giants

The Avenue of the Giants is a beautiful road you can travel through Northern California, with all the tall gorgeous redwoods alongside. There are fun tourist things to do, such as the trees you can drive through, plus there's always a chance to see Bigfoot! And all it costs to see this is the gas to drive along the route.

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This is what most of the road looks like.



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As someone who grew up in the Los Angeles area, it was nice to finally see firsthand what a real forest looks like. I love the mountains in Los Angeles, but they're a lot scrubbier than this.



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This picture is through one of the old fallen trees in one of the little tourist areas alongside the road.



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Look at how incredibly LUSH this area is. Once again, this is RIGHT off the roadside, and you ordinarily need to hike to see forestry this gorgeous.



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Here's the road leading you off through the trees, so you can see even more grandeur.

The Cali/Oregon Coast

More photos from my trip along the coast in September 2018! Yes, I've been busy. There are Washington and Oregon photos at my Flickr account, but for the purposes of this blog I'm trying to narrow my trip shots to the California photos.

These are from along the coast around the area where Oregon and California meet. It's VERY hard to take a bad photo there! I highly recommend visiting, people will love your Insta photos! And the coast is free! More beautiful places to visit in California that cost nothing (except maybe gasoline.)

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While the whole area is gorgeous, there are several official overlooks that are particularly stunning.



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A morning shot of the land stretching off behind the ocean.



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The water really was this lovely.



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A hidden cove along the way. I'd love to live in this area and swim here when it's warmer.



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Some flowers blooming over the ocean.