Ghost of Cape May on Lafayette Street
Boo! There are two ghost tours in Cape May, New Jersey. The one above is on Lafayette Street; the other, located in an inn on Beach Avenue, calls itself the “original” ghost tour. Unfortunately, we didn’t have the opportunity to go on either ghost tour (boo, hoo). My middle son, who typically likes getting scared, insisted that it would be too much history (both are walking tours). And for my daughter, who wanted to go, well, the next tour *started* at 9 pm, which is only 1/2 hour past her bedtime. And I’m afraid she *would* be scared.
Here’s the above ghost on Lafayette Street in her setting on the porch of Elaine’s Bed and Breakfast. Maybe this is Elaine?
We went into the office of original Cape May ghost tour at the Hotel Macomber, which was across the street from this dusk scene. The woman behind the counter assured my son that the tour was indeed scary, but my son didn’t take the bait.
We visited two great haunted houses when we were at Lake George a few years back. Do you have any memorable haunted house stories?
I wanted to post something fun this morning, and I stumbled upon James’ fine photo of Glenside, Pennsylvania. It turns out this was a challenge to post the fourth photo from my fourth folder and explain it. I had previously posted about these American sycamores on a Skywatch post here. The photo was taken in the depths of January winter, and I love the idea of posting off season photos.
The rules are below:
1. Open the fourth file where you store your photos.
2. Pick the 4th photo.
3 . Explain the photo.
4. Pass challenge onto 4 other bloggers.
Please, anyone who wants to do this please do so, but to give some of my photo blogger friends a poke I’ll pass this on to Ilana-Davita, Jientje, Robin, and Ellie. Do it whenever you are in the mood for something different.
On this day in 1609 the Maharal of Prague, Rabbi Judah Loew Ben Bezalel, passed away: “…For many the Marhal’s greatest claim to fame was tied to a fictional creation called the Legend of the Golem. That legend is a medieval version of the story of Frankenstein, according to which the Maharal breathed life into a human-like figure by sticking a slip of paper with the Tetragrammaton to his forehead.”
I started working on my tech-business blog, and I wrote a whole post about it. On a piece of paper. That I haven’t re-read in over a week. Maybe I’ll have something coherent to say about my new upcoming blog on Sunday or Monday. Meanwhile, this existing blog is where I give myself permission to talk about struggle. Does one really have to present oneself as never struggling in order to be successful? I don’t think so.
Sky Watch Friday is a photo meme with photos of sunrises, sunsets, blue skies, gray skies, pink skies, dark skies and any other kind of sky posted by bloggers all over the planet.
View from the BeltParkway next to the Verrazano Bridge, Brooklyn
I took this photo from the car (I wasn’t driving, don’t worry), and it has less blur than many of my “from the car” photos. Toys R Us has a smart marketing department; the logo for Kohl’s, a store that sells discount clothing, does not stand out nearly as much.
My local birding expert thinks this is probably a laughing gull that I photographed at the Cape May Migratory Bird Refuge.
I learned a lot about birds at the museum near the Cape May lighthouse. Can anyone guess what this is for? OK, I’ll tell you: it’s for housing purple martins. Which apartment would you take if you were a purple martin? To me, a purple martin looks like someone dunked a bird in a oil slick.
This big stuffed thing in the museum was the closest I got to photographing an osprey.
Waves against the Rocks by the Beach at Cape May, August 2009
Because we vacationed between two hurricanes (neither of which came ashore in the U.S. but they do produce waves and rain), we had the lucky experience of beautiful weather and frolicking waves (can waves frolic? – consider this as anthropomorphism). A year-round resident of Cape May told me the waves are usually quite gentle (i.e., boring to my boys).
I had a whole slew of scenic Cape May photos I wanted to post for Ruby Tuesday yesterday; however, life (family, work, and need for sleep) got in the way, so I am glad next Monday is Labor Day and I look forward to posting them for next week’s Ruby Tuesday meme.
Lighthouse in Cape May, taken from Cape May Migratory Bird Refuge
Cape May is quite scenic, with open space and natural beauty. I took this shot from the Cape May Migratory Bird Refuge using the Landscape setting on my camera, which tends to enrich blues and greens and compensate for distance. After visiting the refuge, we headed to the lighthouse. My seven-year-old daughter did not want to climb 200 steps, so with some trepidation I handed my camera to my twelve-year-old and asked him to take photos from the top. I think he did quite well, but I wish I had left the camera on Landscape instead of Auto. Auto seems to look a bit washed out on such a bright day. Here are three of his photos:
Those red bars are protective bars on the walkways of the lighthouse. Rather artsy shot, no?
For more photos of summer stock fun, visit Robin at Around the Island.
We visited the Cape May Migratory Bird Refuge this morning. My kids basically rushed through the whole trail walk, eager to be finish what their mom looked forward to viewing the most on our little vacation. But at least they were good sports about it. I would have enjoyed having you, my blog readers, there, so you could help me with photography tips and identifying the birds and the flowers. And just generally enjoying looking. Lots of beautiful scenery.
So, please raise your hand if you know what kind of butterfly this is. Please raise it even higher if you can name the pretty purple wildflower (to me it looks like purple ageratum). Stomp your feet on the ground if you like looking for butterflies. Or photographing wildflowers.
He thought he saw an Albatross
That fluttered round the lamp:
He looked again, and found it was
A Penny-Postage Stamp.
‘You’d best be getting home,’ he said:
‘The nights are very damp!’
I’ve been lurking at a photo meme called Ellipsis Monday. I found it because EG Wow! sometimes participates. Anywhooo, we get to Cape May, a beautiful, old fashioned town at the bottom of the New Jersey coastline and what do I photograph: someone’s laundry so I can participate in this meme. Sorry, no detergent was seen at the scene.
I did also happen to get some nature, beach, arcade, zoo, Victorian houses, lighthouse, birds, wildflowers, butterfly and other shots. Stay tuned.
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