June 18, 2006
San Francisco Stairways #5
This is a minor climb to a little spot I like, called Tank Hill. It's easy to miss; I drove past it hundreds of times before I explored the obscure little stair at Twin Peaks Blvd and Graystone Terrace, which looks almost like a stair leading to someone's house...
It leads to a delightful knoll with a great view to the north and east over the City.
This is not a great picture, but these are the first experimental shots with my Father's Day gift, a new Canon Powershot SD-30, which I think I'm going to like very much! It's tiny, so I can just carry it with me all the time. (I'll probably never see another interesting thing in my life!)
This is a view of the hill (the green knoll center right) taken from the stairs I blogged here. Twin Peaks Blvd is the road in the middle. It curves around the hill to the right, and the stair is on the other side. The previous pic was taken near where the white house peaks through a gap in the trees.
The hill at the upper left of the picture is the edge of Twin Peaks...
And now I’m homesick again! The worst part: if all goes well, It’ll be years before I can move back...
(I wanted to let you know how sorely tempted I was to leave a comment here about hot coffee...)
You should have done it--that would have been funny!
Posted by: John Weidner at June 19, 2006 04:25 AMVery cool...looks like a great skyline view, especially for a night shot with a tripod and some zoom! I'm on a board called UrbanOhio all the time (in fact, that board and this blog are my only real daily must-reads), with a bunch of urbanist geeks who love Ohio's various cities and small towns, and we're always looking for new views of the skyline - something folks aren't familiar with, might not recognize right away. I'm wondering, might this be such a spot for San Fran, or is it a popular skyline shooting range?
Posted by: Ethan Hahn at June 19, 2006 02:03 PMNot popular, not developed or improved, something the neighborhood knows about. Never more than a handful of people there at any time. Which is why I like it especially...
I like your forum!
Posted by: John Weidner at June 19, 2006 06:01 PMA cool and shaded stairway - very inviting on a hot New York day - and at the top of the steps, a suddenly expanded perspective. Our daily surroundings can be full of surprises and revelations if we are alive to them.
An art student once complained to Andrew Wyeth after a month on Monhegan Island. He'd painted all the available subject matter and he was bored. He knew the island from one end to the other. He'd gotten to the bottom of it. Wyeth told him, 'You haven't gotten to the bottom of anything. Nobody ever can. You've gotten to the bottom of yourself as an artist.'
Posted by: lyle at June 20, 2006 07:28 AMIt is a great board...my favorite thread:
http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php?topic=8556.0
Aerials of Cincinnati...the photographer and I went up in a Cessna and took tons of pictures - mine were on film, his were digital (and his came out so much better than mine! But, I did get my house from near and from far away, the park where my wife and I got married, and one very cool downtown/bridges/river shot). Such a beautiful city...
Sorry to plug another site, and it's probably of zero interest to anyone else reading this but me, but I do love Cincinnati...
Posted by: Ethan Hahn at June 20, 2006 09:18 AM...second favorite thread - Part I of Chris's Cincinnati aerials:
http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php?topic=8555.0
(it doesn't really get to downtown and the nearby neighborhoods until about halfway through...before that, it could be nearly anywhere...)
Posted by: Ethan Hahn at June 20, 2006 09:20 AM
