I was actually thinking more about the architecture as well. Modern buildings just have none of the character of ones built even half a century ago.

I recently moved into a suite built into the top of a barn over a 4-bay auto shop on the western edge of my hometown.
Here are some pictures of the place and the surrounding area.

http://i.imgur.com/bPo0Yia.png?1

http://i.imgur.com/8TmqCUE.jpg?1

http://i.imgur.com/EF69CjF.jpg?1

http://i.imgur.com/VXaIWNH.jpg?1

http://i.imgur.com/eJKen0N.jpg?1

http://i.imgur.com/RVdSkHD.jpg?1

http://i.imgur.com/58fblKK.jpg?1

^ The sky in that first shot, beautiful, looks almost molten.

It's funny the night before that was my sort of house warming party, a bunch of friends crashed on my floor totally wasted, we all woke up to that at 7:30 AM and sat there on the balcony with our jaws dropped, instant hangover cure.

Yeah, I bet. That really is one pretty sky.

Nobody's ever been anyplace.

@DwnWthVwls : I loved the pics of your college; particularly the ones of the Arboretum with the college buildings visible through the trees.
@EPOCH6 : congrats on your new residence. That sky! and the landscape are undeniably beautiful, though I have to say I would not care to live in such an area myself. But then, if I'm not within sight of a bus stop or subway station, I start feeling like I'm lost in an uncaring wilderness.That's because I've spent my life nestled in the security and conveniences of an urban environment. First in streets like these:

http://i2.getreading.co.uk/incoming/...JS30863231.jpg

...and now in streets like these:

http://www.mayan-yucatan-traveler.co...REET_2_GDE.jpg

^^^

Still a beautiful city!

Thanks, Tristan ! I guess I've been lucky. I've always been surrounded by old architecture - cities built to the scale of the pedestrian, not the car.

I agree with Batlord and DwnWthVwls; modern buildings don't have the same appeal as the old stuff. To me they're so shallow and characterless. Even if they're well designed, they are missing a complete dimension, and that dimension is time.

I absolutely love the second picture, something about the yellow building really stands out, maybe that's because it's yellow, I don't know. Either way great shot!

Here's proof:


This is home 1958-1998 and once again 2015-present

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...dOR-aerial.jpg


I currently live just beyond the upper left of this image on the Washington side of the mighty Columbia River. As you head east, on either side really but especially on the Oregon side of the Columbia, the river passes through (actually it exits) one of the most scenic places in the world, the Columbia River Gorge:

http://traveloregon.com/content/uplo...7bac16d925.jpg


Waterfalls abound here, the highest being Multnomah Falls

http://fineartamerica.com/images/art...tin-k-ryan.jpg


Others include Triple Falls

https://hicksonimages.files.wordpres...ls-1.jpg?w=731

Bridal Veil Falls

https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/119/31...dacf1efc69.jpg


Most of these actually tumble more than fall (aside from Ponytail Falls), however...

http://www.wildnatureimages.com/imag...40530-092..jpg


...my unquestioned favorite is the grand Latourell Falls, of which a tiny stream drops 249 feet off an immense basalt boulder.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...rell_Falls.jpg


There is a trail all the way around the falls. It's tied for my favorite spot in my home state. There's at least a couple more to come...

Going west from Portland, you pass through the bucolic Oregon Coast Range

http://icons.wunderground.com/data/w...abagas/123.jpg


There's many great places on the Oregon Coast, the stunning Manzanita beach

http://manzanitarentals.com/manzanit...regon-wide.jpg


Seaside and Lincoln City are party towns in summer

http://lewisandclarktrail.com/sectio...e%20Oregon.jpg
https://activerain-store.s3.amazonaw...6361686314.JPG
https://res.cloudinary.com/roadtripp...ar-1531006.jpg


...but my favorite is lovely little Cannon Beach

http://www.travelchannel.com/content...m.616.462.jpeg


A beautiful downtown

http://www.cannon-beach.net/images/gv56435d.jpg
http://www.cannon-beach.net/photos_c...40x480_63k.jpg


Haystack Rock

http://www.cannon-beach.net/photos_cb/gv18023z.jpg


It's been way too long (2006) since I've been there, hopefully soon


There's a third favorite spot. I've only been there once, in 2013, but I will never forget it even if I never get back there. I'm hoping to return this summer...

I can't believe I almost forgot Bruce's Candy Kitchen. My earliest memories of Cannon Beach from the early '70's were this amazing little candy store, specializing in handmade salt water taffy


http://www.homebasedportland.com/wp-...nnon-Beach.jpg
http://www.homebasedportland.com/wp-...Beach_0005.jpg
https://www.fox12dailydeals.com/site...%20seaside.JPG

Though I visited many places so far. But few places have taken my heart fully like- Sundarbans, Cox's Bazar, Rangamati and also outside my country Taj Mahal in India was really fantastic. I never forget of that places anymore.

Good stuff Paul. Quite the contrast from living around here, and it makes me want to relocate.

Well, I'd rather relocate than dislocate.

What?

They have any vacancies where you're at?

I *am* a vacancy. I dunno what that means either.

I might be planning a trip to the far-flung Isles of Langerhans.

Make sure to stop off at the Sphincter of Oddi.

Stunning.

So, in 2013 I and my 2 siblings & their families had a reunion with a family from Madras, OR, my mother's best buddies that I've known since the early '60's when I was a tiny tyke. They're lovely people and it was good to see them in their beautiful home their, but I can't speak so kindly of that horrid, wretched dump of a sagebrush & juniper little town.

So, it was time for me to drive back to Seattle (again not realizing how blind I am), and a thought struck me: I've come this far, why not drive a little farther and go to Crater Lake? It's without a doubt the jewel of Oregon, but I've never seen it and this is a golden opportunity.

So I turn my car south on US 97 and head out, passing threw the amazing Bend, OR

http://www.centraloregonresortliving...DP-HEADER1.jpg


...threw Newberry Volcano, which no longer *looks* like a volcano since it blew itself to smithereens about 16 million years ago

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...ry_caldera.jpg


All the ground of this entire area has a reddish hue from the cinders left behind, as a local brewery implies

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-j7CWbPUL4A...derConeRed.png


So as I approach my destination, I pay a $10 entry fee to one of these fine persons

http://media1.s-nbcnews.com/j/msnbc/...a.grid-6x2.jpg


So it's about 10 miles past that point, winding UP and UP and UP to ear-popping heights, and I reach "Rim Drive", the road around a lake that at this point I still can't see. So I get out and hike up to the edge...

http://www.musicbanter.com/members/p...7-img-0247.jpg
http://www.musicbanter.com/members/p...8-img-0249.jpg


Those were taken with my POS Iphone that I absolutely hated (never again) and in no way portray the majesty of this vision. I've tried to relate this place, and few people "get it", "oh, wow, a lake, neat". No. This place is transcendent. This is almost eight thousand years of rain water, filling a caldera of what used to be the highest volcanic mountain in what is now Oregon, and because it's 100% rain/snow it's nearly 2000 feet deep of the purest, cleanest, clearest water in the world. I'll try some better pics but it's just impossible to relate the breathtaking beauty of this lake

http://www.terragalleria.com/images/...crla80028.jpeg
http://1-4u-computer-graphics.com/Di...terLake012.jpg


Artist rendering of what Mt Mazama might've looked like before it blew it's top 7,700 years ago

http://www.nps.gov/hfc/products/ways...e/CRLA-004.jpg


As I drove around the lake I also caught, from about 1500 feet away I'd guess, the "Old Man Of The Lake". This is a log that's been bobbing vertically in the water since at least 1902 when it was first described by Joseph S Diller. You might recognize this image:

http://allkindsofhistory.files.wordp...pg?w=209&h=467

I did try to take a picture with my perfectly atrocious Iphone, but it just looks like blurry water. You'll have to take my word for it, it was the "Old Man".

My two nephews live in Bend, that's only a couple hours from Crater Lake. I'm hoping to get down there with them soon, maybe even this summer. Trust me, you don't try going to Crater Lake in winter.

So, like I said, nobody's ever been anyplace.

Everything you can do, I can do better.

Nobody can do anything

:love: That's not far off paradise. What's the diameter of the rim?

It's about 5 miles by 6 miles

Wow. Magical.

Thanks, Qwerty, but please don't think that I took any of the photos I'm posting; still, I'm happy to take credit for clicking on google and wrestling with all those jpg code numbers!

Nice pics and lots of enthusiasm from Paul for Crater Lake. My own lake favourites: Lake Bled in Slovenia, with its much-photographed island:

http://angieaway.com/wp-content/uplo...5/IMG_1115.jpg

While I was there, I hiked up one of the mountains in the background. Also rented bikes one day and cycled all round the lake area. Hidden behind the conifer trees, there are little farms with handerkerchief-sized apple orchards that look more fairy tale than real.

You really have to be there to sense the grandeur of Wastwater with its long dark flank, so often in its own cold shade while the sun shines over the rest of The Lake District. Does that make it forbidding or foreboding? Grammar Police please advise.
http://www.walkingbritain.co.uk/feat...mages/p051.jpg

Houston is a dirty ass city lol

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r...ps149942b0.jpg

Would that be considered the eastern edge of the Alps?

We had our first controlled burn of the forest on campus this past sunday...

https://soozi3q.files.wordpress.com/...1200&h=&crop=1

https://soozi3q.files.wordpress.com/...=700&h=&crop=1

https://soozi3q.files.wordpress.com/...1200&h=&crop=1

That first one is an incredible shot.

I swear to god, if you say anything about composition I'm gonna hit you in the face with a brick.

It's not about the composition really, the rays of light illuminating the smoke is really beautiful though. It's like a metaphor for mortality.

*waves brick threateningly*

*gets out atlas*

Yes, that's right, Paul. Lake Bled is only 10 miles from Slovenia's border with Austria, where you have the Alps proper. To be pedantic, it's more like the southern edge of the Eastern end of the Alps.
At Lake Bled the hills are called the Juliske Alpe, but they only go to a max of about 4,500 feet above the lake surface, and in fact don't have the same kind of rock either, so the definitive answer to your question is "sort of".

I like the photo you took of "The Old Man" - makes a good complement to your avatar, which I'd sometimes wondered about.

Perhaps the world's most intriguing lake is invisible. Have you read about Lake Vostok, Paul ? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Vostok
There's a good documentary about its discovery somewhere on the internet too.

Beautiful photos of the controlled burn, DwnWthVwls, especially that first one of course.

^ Because of this, I'd better PM you my remarks about the interplay of light and shade, ok?

Didn't even need the link, Antarctica. I'm a geography/geology fan, it actually ties in to my interest in the origins of everything, which ties into my opposition to Creationism. Kind of a long roundabout way of looking at things, but *that* ties into the fact that I'm a major, major dork. :bonkhead:

Also, for an invisible lake it's pretty visible (at least from space) :)


https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...hoto_color.jpg