Share Six: April 2024: Curves

Posted on April 6, 2024

The theme for the month of April was chosen by Janet from @wiredtothemoon_ and it is {Curves}. Once again I decided to use images from the trip to Arizona and I was surprised at how many curves I actually came across.

The Oxford Dictionary says that a curve is : a line or outline which gradually deviates from being straight for some or all of its length.

Below ar3e some of the curves I found.

One evening we stopped by a rooftop bar to watch the sunset. Across the road was this apartment building with these weird shaped windows. Looked like a bunch of partial igloos.
I love graffiti and Phoenix has an area where you can find plenty of this type of art. I had to push my camera through some steel railings to get a clear view of this artwork.
Release the Fear – Melted Weapons Sculpture This monument is made up of around 17000 pounds of melted weapons. You can read more about it by clicking on the link.
We were looking for the tourist board when I realized that we had found Phoenix’s Arizona Center. A shopping area set around a beautiful outdoor area. I loved the curved feel of the walkway they were constructing.
The shopping center surrounded this outdoor area. To the left was outdoor seating where I sat and enjoyed the solitude. Richard was sick in the hotel room and I was trying to avoid his germs. But they got me in the end. What I loved was the artwork of metal frogs in the pond, and story telling all around the walkway. I will confess this was a green space for me, in Arizona’s very dry arid type of environment.
We were in Scottsdale and our time to head back to Phoenix had arrived. Richard always likes to get to the bus stope early and so we had a bit of time sitting out in the hot sun waiting for the bus to arrive. One of the best things I found about traveling through Phoenix, Scottsdale and Tempe was how user friendly their transportation system was and how cheap it was. Definitely worth looking into if you are visiting.
Train track curves in Phoenix. We hopped on and off the Metro train system a fair bit. The day we travelled to Scottsdale the Metro train broke down and we were stuck on the train for about 30 minutes while they tried to get it working again and then when they finally did they went backwards to the next station where we were allowed to get off and catch the next train. The good thing about this system was that they were able to switch tracks fairly easily.
We’re in Sedona and following the curving roads through the Red Rock. It’s a beautiful part of town but my warning would be that it gets pretty busy on the weekends.
Leaving Sedona and heading out to Page we happened to stop at a viewing site and took in the bridge. It always impresses me to see the framework of a bridge spanning a gorge.
I nearly missed this shot as you can see, but we arrived in Page Arizona, home to Antelope Canyon and Horseshoe bend. I really liked the curves in the sign.
Page is also home to Lake Powel – one of the largest man made lakes and the Navajo Generating Station which provides power to customers in Arizona.
Horseshoe Bend is another example of curves. It is an amazing visual and get place to stop and take a photo. For those who plan to visit be aware that it is about a 15 minute walk downhill to the viewing site which means it is a 15 minute walk uphill back to your car. It is doable but it feels like it goes on forever.
The best curves for me were found in Antelope Canyon and here are a few of the camera images that I have edited.
I don’t know if it is just me but I could see a face in this rock. Part man part leopard / wild cat. Maybe just a wild cat. Whatever it is, I see it every time I look at this image.
Where ever the light shines on the rock you get these stunning changes in color. As you went deeper so there was less light. What I did find was that I felt unbalanced walking through there. I am going to assume that it was due to the undulating walls. The visit to Antelope Canyon was a bucket list item for me and it was worth every penny that I spent on it. Thanks to Antelope Canyon Tours for this incredible tour. Our tour guide was the best.

You can find curves in every area of your life. In the shape of a branch, the edge of a flower, the shape of a vase, roads, handles etc. There are so many different ideas out there.

I hope you enjoyed my second glimpse at Arizona. If you missed the first glimpse you can view it here. I will eventually get to editing more of our trip to Arizona. Sometimes I feel like I can hardly keep up with everything that is going on around us.

This is a circle blog and as I mentioned, we have some very talented artists in the group. Take some time to follow the links and see what they have for you this month. My incredibly talented friend Katherine of Cobert Photography is up next. I can’t wait to see what she has to share. You can see more of her work by clicking on her Instagram page.

Until next time, stay well.

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Share Six: March 2024: Sky

Posted on March 15, 2024

We have just spent 8 days in Arizona, specifically in Phoenix, Sedona, Page and ever so briefly Flagstaff. So this month’s Share Six theme {Sky} I really wanted to use photo’s taken on the trip. Outside of that I have some crazy sky photo’s that I have shared before, mainly sunsets which I love. But for this blog, Arizona sky is what you will get.

Flying high above the clouds is always interesting. This looked like cotton candy or snow just hovering below us.
Another image from the sky. Hello, we are not in Florida anymore. I was pretty excited to see mountain ranges, even from up high in the sky. Florida is so flat that you can barely see an undulation.
Phoenix airport from the plane, and the sun setting in the sky. It was nice to land and have my feet back on the ground, and to be able to experience something new and exciting. In addition, I got to see my brother as well so that was really nice for me.
Day 1. My brother headed off to his conference meet and greet and we had dinner at the hotel restaurant before heading to a rooftop bar to see if we could get a sunset. The building had a very interesting rooftop that made me think of Game of Thrones. When the sun had set the lights on that upper floor came on, alternating red and green. I never found out what it was but enjoyed seeing it.
Day 2: Train and bus was our mode of transportation out to Scottsdale. Transportation is efficient and cheap. We spent the day walking around the downtown area. We were doing the Art Walk. There was some interesting outdoor art, but a lot of it was “shops” selling art. We found an interesting little “country” bar/restaurant where we rested for a while and had lunch.
Day 3: It was back to the train and bus method of travel. We headed out to the university town of Tempe. I loved the strange feel to the sky in this image. We did not get a lot done here because by midday Richard was not feeling well and complaining of a splitting headache. 5 hours later we discovered he apparently had pneumonia. Not happy to hold onto his germs he graciously shared them with us. I ended up with bronchitis and my brother was complaining that he chest felt tight. Day 4 was spent with me wandering around on my own and Richard conserving his energy at the hotel.
Day 5. We are now planes, trains and finally automobiles. We headed out on the road early Thursday morning for Sedona. The weather was great although somewhat cloudy. There was definitely a moodiness to the sky.
We passed through an area that gave every indication of a storm about to happen but somehow we missed it.
We finally arrived in the beautiful but busy Sedona. Thursday was busy and Sunday was a parking lot. That said the town is gorgeous, our hotel was awesome and the red rock was just spectacular. Given our time limits and Richard not well, and me starting to feel iffy, we just drove from location to location and did little to no hiking. We climbed a couple of hills but not too high and not to far. In the afternoon those clouds let go and we were trapped indoors for a couple of hours. It was fine, we all wanted to snooze. That evening we went to an Indian Restaurant and had a really nice curry.
Day 6: Cloudy sky but no longer raining. We were ready to head out after a stop for me at the Urgent Care and then the pharmacy to get antibiotics. Sedona and the red rocks are stunning and well worth the visit. What fascinated me was that outside of this area the red of the rock seemed to disappear and the color become more neutral. Sedona is known for it’s vortex sites as well but more about that in a later blog.
We are heading up to Page, Arizona, up near the Utah border. We had to head up through some windy mountainous roads. The sky was cloudy and the weather was cold. The mountains were scattered with snow. We stopped at an American Indian trading area, and it was freezing when we got out of the car. In addition snow started falling on us. I was happy to get back in the car and keep moving.
Over the hills and down the dale and the scenery changes again. The sky was brighter, the clouds light and puffy and the rocks a completely different color.
We had arrived in Page. Two things I wanted to do there was Horseshoe Bend and Antelope Canyon. We opted to go down at sunset hoping that it would be good. It wasn’t and it was bitterly cold. In addition to all of that it was a fairly long walk down hill, which meant that it was an extremely long walk uphill. It took me 15 minutes of huffing and puffing and being totally out of breath to get to the top. I was timing myself because I knew there was a time limit at Antelope Canyon and I was worrying about that. It was nothing to worry about, Horseshoe Bend was much harder for me. The combination of being sick, higher altitude and just generally unfit took it’s toll. I told my brother I was convinced I was an undiagnosed asthmatic.
Day 7: Page, and I am super excited and super nervous. We had time in the morning to explore and we accidently explored into Utah. I could not resist taking this photo. The sky was clear, the temps were moderate to cool, and we were standing in Utah.
Antelope Canyon has been on my bucket list since I first saw photo’s of these beautiful rocks. The tour is not cheap and I paid for all three of us, but I promise you, it was well worth it. In the next couple of photo’s the really bright light is the sky shining through the gap at the top of the rocks. The walls undulate and it feels kind of disorientating. I found myself at times feeling a little unbalanced.
There were times I felt like the rocks looked like molten lava or that they were on fire. I cannot wait to sit down and start editing all the trips images. If you can do one thing in Arizona, my choice would be Antelope Canyon. It’s busy but the tour group we used Antelope Canyon Tours were very sensitive to the busyness and staggered the entry so that the groups were able to get images without a million heads bobbing up in the images. I tended to shoot up when our group got in the way.
Straight from the tour we were back in the car again and heading back to Flagstaff. Clear skies were perfect for the drive. Although in Flagstaff the snow was still on the mountain, some was on the streets and there was a chill in the air. A lot of my photo’s were taken from a moving vehicle because our driver, Richard, does not like to stop and start.
Flagstaff on a Sunday morning was not cutting it for us, so we headed out back to Sedona for a short while. Unfortunately we discovered that weekend travel causes Sedona to become super busy. That is not my thing. So after buying my baby boy a t-shirt, we headed back out, making one more stop in Black Canyon City. I read about a place called Rock City Pie shop and we made a detour for coffee and pie, which I will add was really, really nice.
A whirl wind week and I will confess that I have had better weeks where we are not sick. We were back at the airport with a long wait time. My brother was flying out international and had to be there by 5pm. Our flight was only at 10:40pm. Drinks were had, farewells were said, some tears where shared and then we were back on the sky train to our terminal for the 5 hour wait. Fortunately they had some chairs along the window that were really comfortable, so I settled in to read while Richard crashed on the floor.

We saw some interesting skies this week and I was grateful for the changing sky and scenery along the way. It definitely makes the trip more interesting.

This is a circle blog and as I mentioned, we have some very talented artists in the group. Take some time to follow the links and see what they have for you this month. My incredibly talented friend Lupji from Lupji Photography is up next. I can’t wait to see what she has to share. You can see more of his work by clicking on his Instagram page.

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