Spokane Skyline
In which Dan remembers to look up and see the less-seen.
I used to live in Spokane. Cool town.
The town made its money in mining and logging, and that money shows in many of its buildings from that era. A gew are newer but they still do a good job of filling the skyline.
I’ll double-check but most of these buildings are on the Spokane Register of Historic Places. I’m a sucker for places on that list.
Let's Go To The Movies! - Twin Drive-In
It's funny what you can find when you're making no effort to find it.
It may not look like it, but this awesome gem is STILL operating as a drive-in theater during the better-weathered seasons. The Twin Theater has been going strong for more than 60 years and the new owners have invested enough time, effort, and $$$ in the place to make certain that it keeps going for another 60!
I can't recall the last time I went to a drive-in but I'm pretty certain that I'm gonna make a visit to this place this Spring.
Mission Reach - The San Antonio RiverWalk
The San Antonio RiverWalk is an extraordinarily popular attraction in San Antonio but most of our visitors don't realize just how extensive the developed area is
I've done it again! I went on a little adventure, captured and edited images and never got around to posting them in a blog post. No worries. The San Antonio RiverWalk isn't going anywhere anytime soon.
For this quick trip, I only brought my iPhone but wasn't disappointed. That little thing can capture so much wonderful imagery in the world around us, no? Sure, there's no replacing a bigger, "grown-up" camera but I've never been disappointed with what I can create with it.
The visitors to San Antonio love the RiverWalk but so rarely get to see the parts of it outside of the main hub. That's just fine with me as it means there's so much less traffic on the outer stretches of the river. Go north of town and you'll find what's called Museum Reach which goes near the museums, the zoo, and a few awesome parks. I go there quite often and this trip was my first exploring the Mission Reach portion and I was certainly not disappointed.
So many bits of nature and beauty popping up. Many wonderfully cool and abandoned structures along the way and if you've known me for awhile, you know that I'm a sucker for a good freeway underpass.
Again sorry (not really) for the delay.
Springtime in the Suburbs
I don't have a favorite season of the year. They all have their equal charms but I won't lie and say that I don't get a bit giddy when the new flowers pop up ... even the ones in the yard.
Yep. I'm still a sucker for flowers in almost all forms
Texas is blessed with warm temps for most of the year so these little suckers are popping up left and right with no fear of frost. In the fields, there are plenty of native grasses and wildflowers springing forth and in every yard in town (in this case Olmos Park), the colors are coming on full speed.
I had an hour to kill so I spent it in one of my favorite ways ... walking. This time is was through the very nice homes in this little township near my home. So much color.
I don't even have a yard at the moment so I've been tempted to find an ignored part of town to adopt and tame. I spent many years as a landscaper and as a certified Master Gardner and the desire to start working in the soil again is quite strong.
The book below is one of my longtime favorite gardening books. The folks at Sunset do a great job of updating the climate information in the various zones and the number of plants that they have contained in the book is stunning. Soon I'll have a yard again ... but not soon enough.
Don't forget to look up!
I've told you enough times ..... Look up!
I read something years ago about how we've lost our instinct to look up as we walk. Our evolutionary ancestors would need to scour all angles to be on the lookout for predators. We haven't always been the top of the food chain, ya know. Many of our primate cousins still need to be wary of raptors from the skies coming to swoop them up but the odds of a pterodactyl or harpy swooping from the skies yo swoop up a Texan in the streets of San Antonio is negligible ... so we seem to have stopped looking up.
I've always felt that this was a shame for there's so much to see in the third dimension above us.
I've never known how much planning or design goes into making a building or skyline visually appealing from this angle. Maybe it's simply a positive byproduct of good design.
There's a part of my German, analytical brain that appreciates the symmetry found in these angle yet the artist in me likes the asymmetry, too. How boring if all the angle were the same, the shapes alike.
The foggy weather was a rare blessing. It took some of the crispness out of the uppermost edges of the building and softened the sounds of the city. The mist wasn't thick enough to hide any lurking pumas or saber-toothed cats but still, I walked around looking up most of the time.
No pterodactyl gonna catch me!
A Foggy Morning Walk
Since my arrival in San Antonio, the weather has been mostly sunny and warm. Yes, a few good rainstorms but never fog. It was lovely!
I have moved around a bunch and have lived in many different regions. Some of those residences have been in areas where the weather can often be unfriendly; on the cold side. Northern Germany, Idaho, Eastern Washington and Alaska. All wonderful and their changing seasons always pleased me.
Since my arrival in San Antonio, while there have been a few epic rainstorms, the weather has leaned towards, hot, sunny and humid. I'm not against those things, of course, but the frequency of the hot days and days in which I sweat too much come far too often for my taste. When the recent chilly days passed through and brought some early morning fog, I headed to the downtown canyons to take a peek.
Had I gotten downtown earlier, I'm certain that the fog and mist would have been even stronger. Despite my tardiness, it was still a treat to see the tops of the bigger buildings obscured by the low clouds. With such shallow cover, city noises seemed to be dampened. There's a strange type of echo where the noises roll a bit then get swallowed up by the void. It's eerily comforting.
I'm not certain if it was this phenomenon that kept the city's visitors speaking in hushed tones or simply the less-than-postcard-perfect weather but those that were out in the morning light seemed almost reverential to nature.
You'd think it odd coming from a California boy but too much sun bogs me down. I get headaches from the light flares, I don't handle prolonged heat well and, this is unproven, there's something about living in harsh, cold environments that toughens people up and weeds out the weak and silly. Where you find heat and sunshine, you'll find more people. Where you find chill, fog and sleet, you'll cross paths with folks that either HAVE to be out in it or WANT to be in it. I want to be in it.
Now, a bit of fog on a 53 degree morning isn't like haddock fishing in Alaska but it was sufficiently out of the ordinary that it seemed reason enough to make a trip to the concrete canyons of downtown San Antonio
And what canyons they are. It seems that as the city grew, the low, flat plains made it more worthwhile to build the newer, taller buildings outside of the city center. It seems that most of the buildings from the early part of the 20th Century have been left intact and the ones added to it seem to have a similar feel and look to them. Everywhere you look, you see the familiar orange stones. Very seldom will you see sleek marble or shiny steel. Sure, here and there but it seems rather tastefully done.
I dare to say that many of these buildings are on historic registers. There is certainly a large number of history plaques about, more per Sq/ft than I've seen in the US. Seeing as the city is approaching its 300th anniversary, that's understandable. So much richness!
And lastly ... don't forget to look up!
A Walk Along St Mary's Ave
You may have noticed that I like to walk a lot.
Perhaps my new friends in San Antonio have noticed that I like to walk and run a lot; to be in motion most of the time. I do so because I have a desire to see the world and experience its flavours and sights. My family emigrated here and I've been back to their homeland on many occasions to see what they saw. I've travelled when and where I could but whether I go to a faraway place like Malta or merely take walk through back alleys of Spokane, I do what I can to "see things".
There is so much colour and history all around us. Countless numbers of folks have walked through the same doorways that we have and have trod the same stairways and sidewalks. As a species, it's in our nature to alter our environment, to add goodness or remove blight, to improve efficiency or size. That's all fine and well but let's not forget that those who came before us did a pretty darn good job of crafting the world in which we live.
My new home is settled in the middle of several cool areas, all historic districts in central San Antonio. Tobin Hill, Olmos Park, Alta Vista and Monte Vista surround me and all have their splendid historical, architectural pieces interspersed with the newer ones and the hints of gentrification. All in all, it's a very pleasing mix and I haven't yet decided which areas I like best yet ... so I'll continue exploring.
For this trip, I decided to pick the low-hanging fruit. I needed to stop at a shop at the far end of N St Mary's St so it was an easy choice. If you click on the names of the shops under the images, you'll see on a Google Map exactly where they sit.
The styles of buildings are so very different than those in Spokane ... really from anywhere I've lived. California has its Spanish-styled buildings but this area seems to have a much deeper well of styles to choose from. This simple service station is an art deco marvel but I'd guess that it was considered quite pedestrian and utilitarian in its prime.
Perhaps the most striking building along the way is this 5-sided marvel. It's a cool pub and live music venue that seems sleepy most of the day then gets insanely busy on weekends. Also, WAY too loud for my taste. I give it a wide berth but do enjoy looking at the way it catches the sun and throws out oddly shaped shadows.
Another service station, this one seems to be much younger and has a more atomic-age feel to it. Superb angles and lines to it, no?
I've saved the best for last! Another 5-sided gem, this shop sits right next to Hi-Tones. If you look at them on the map you'll see that their shapes are a product of the crossing and divergent streets near them. The wonderful "Art Island" sits in the middle of the intersection where Dewey, Josephine and St Mary's meet and this place is just across from that. It was after their normal hours when I captured these images but one of the barbers, Jesse, was still there and we had a nice, quick chat. When I came back the next day, I got the best haircut that I've had in a while. Dude was awesome from start to finish.
Where should I go next? Which part of San Antonio deserves some time and attention. Leave a comment below and tell me your thought.
The Doors and Windows of Railroad Alley
Broken, boarded up, bricked over, replaced and some even still in use! Take a walk along Railroad Alley and you'll see all manner of portals into Spokane's history
Behind, you guessed it, Scratch.
Railroad Alley is actually 2 different alleyways, one north and the other south. It's the northern one that has more access to it, more daily use. The southern one has many areas that are blocked off or are now private areas. That's OK, there is still plenty of territory to cover. With the exception of one block, the portion between Howard and Wall Streets, one has a straight walk from Washington St westward to Adams St.
Along that path, you'll find bits of our mining and logging history in the form of offices and building that formerly housed those offices, stylish new condos and lofts, modernly renovated offices and ones that look as if they're still from the early part of the previous century. You'll also find countless portals that go between the open alleyway and the inside of the buildings
Many of the doors and windows have been replaced yet many seem to be the originals from their era. Many others have been covered in one way or another. Where the paint is chipping, you can see the numerous layers and the different colors attempted over the many years. On the bare brick, the scars of graffiti and its removal ... and RE-vandalism show. How many taggers have "owned" part of the alley at one point or another?
This isn't some quiet back alley, though. It's an active thoroughfare for folks getting from the street to the business to make deliveries and for the many tenants that make their homes in the cool lofts and condos that dot the path.
Every color and texture imaginable is on the walls. Brick, wood, stucco, concrete all have their space in this gallery. Though the newer designs are present, the bulk of the doors and windows harken to older days. There doesn't seem much point in replacing the old ones with newer designs. They're still quite functional and have lasted this long. Thank goodness because, like many things from past eras, they're much more interesting to look at than a solid collection of new steel and glass.
Go on! Go take a walk and what you can see!
#Hoopfest2015 from atop The Liberty Building
Spokane's Liberty Building has a front row seat to Hoopfests! I was lucky enough to be allowed on top this year.
I've visited The Liberty Building a couple times before, each time finding more gems held within this treasure. With its prime location at Washington and Main, the building has seen more than its share of Spokane history. Plus, they are in the middle of Hoopfest every year! This year, I was lucky enough to be allowed atop the Liberty Building to get a bird's-eye view of #Hoopfest2015. Escorted by the owner, Shannon Ahern, I went during the peak of the day, with the baking sun directly overhead. On any day, it's one of the best views in town but on this, Day One of Hoopfest, with the games in full swing, there was no better spot in town to catch this special glimpse of Spokane's premiere event!
With 7,000 teams, 3,000 volunteers, 225,000 fans and 450 courts spanning 42 city blocks, it seems that one could see it all from up here. Truly it was the highlight of my day!
Shannon was very kind to enjoy his aerie and I was very grateful to be able to catch this rare glimpse into Spokane and its richness. I hope that you enjoy the view as much as I did.
The Geometry of Snow
The Geometry of Snow
We live in a beautiful portion of the country. From any part of Spokane, you're just a few minutes in any direction to being in the wilderness, the prairie or the rolling farmlands. Mountain streams and the hidden valleys abound. With this heavy snow, even a walk through the South Hill becomes an escape into nature.
The Trade Winds Motel
What was once an ultra-cool travel lodge is now, well ..... a sh#thole!
From the Spokesman-Review:
Once a fashionable motel, built when the country loved Tiki-style architecture, the Trade Winds in recent years became a rent-by-the-month apartment complex for Spokane’s hard-luck crowd.
Well, yes. It has become, how should I say this ...... a shithole ..... but it's a shithole with amazing textures and colors to it. In a different world, it should be brought back to its motor-lodge glory and made a hub of hipster coolness. I suspect that's not going to happen, though. Too many strikes against it. Shame. It's cool to look at so I'll enjoy it while I can.
