Fantasy Fest 2009

Well last week we were off to Key West for Fantasy Fest 2009. We kicked off our fun weekend at the Pet Masquerade and Parade. Great costumes not only on the animals (mostly dogs) but on the people as well. Shara and I saw great costumes as well as fabulous body paint. We met our friends Rob & Ronna who came in on a cruise ship. We look forward to this fun get together in future years.....

First Place Picture at the Walk

I recently found out that I won the local contest for the Kelby Worldwide Walk. I was quite humbled. There were lot's of great photographers there that morning and now the competition gets even stiffer. The best 913 photos world wide. We'll see how it goes.....

World Wide Photo Walk

This past Saturday Shara and I participated in the Kelby Worldwide Photo Walk on South Beach. We had a ball getting to South Pointe prior to sunrise and meeting up with 48 other photographers. World wide there was 913 different walks with over 27,000 photographers participating. I took several photos and submitted 2 in the contest. The images are on my website, but my favorite subject is attached here. I'm looking forward to next years walk. Who knows, maybe we'll go to Paris.......

Off to Chattanooga

Shara and I came home for 2 weeks (to do laundry and pay some bills) and then we were off to Chattanooga and Asheville. This time we have our daughter Alaina and her husband Danny with us. We also have our grand dog Ace (along with our 2, Sophie and Snickers). We went to several great spots of interest in Chattanooga, including the Aquarium, Ruby Falls (lantern tour), Rock City, and an Art Festival. We tried to go Hang Gliding, but it rained for 4 days, so something left for next time. After 4 days we drove to Asheville along US Highway 74, what an absolutely beautiful road along the Ocoee and the Nantahala George. We would highly recommend that drive. Off to Asheville........

St. George Island

What a peaceful location. Nothing but sand dunes and pines. We stayed at the state park. You can walk the beaches for miles and hardly see another person. As I walked the beach a blue heron flew bye. Good thing I had my camera!

On our way home.........

Jazzfest in New Orleans

Jazzfest was an absolute blast!! We certainly got our exercise going back and forth to the different venues. We saw artists that I never heard of that quickly became Shara and I's favorites, such as James Rivers and John Boutte. Tony Bennett, Neil Young and the Neville brothers were certainly hits!!. Shara and I decided that we definitely need to come back again.

The food at the fest was awesome. Catfish with crabmeat, jerk chicken and jamaican curry pies were a hit!

We're off to St. George Island near Appalachicola, Florida......

Off to Lafayette

After leaving St. Augustine we stopped in Panama City Beach, Florida. We had a fabulous meal at Firefly, a must stop. Then we were off to San Destin, Florida to visit with some old friends we hadn't seen in years. It was great seeing them and it seemed as though we had just been with them yesterday. Then it was off to Lafayette, Louisiana for the Festival International. It was the height of crawfish season and we couldn't wait. The food in Louisiana is sooooo good. 

Lafayette is real cajun backcountry. We toured several swamps, including Lake Martin and the Achafalaya Basin. I'm sure it amazes a lot of visitors who never have seen swamps, but since the Everglades is in our backdoor it was not anything we hadn't seen before. Although I must say the cypress trees were very impressive.

We took the dogs everywhere and as you can see from Sophie's face, they loved it. Well we're off to New Orleans to hook up with our friends Rob and Ronna from Ashville, NC. We going to Jazzfest.......