savannah photographic workshop

Outtakes from “Go West Old Man” tour

(Silence seems like the best response to a moment like this.)

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

“Lord, I was born a ramblin’ man
Tryin’ to make a livin’ and doin’ the best I can
And when it’s time for leavin’, I hope you’ll understand
That I was born a ramblin’ man” The Allman Brothers Band

Memories are the refuge of an old man (I’m 78 today), but they are an incomplete, biased, and untrustworthy record of a life, so some skepticism is appropriate. Recalling my early adult life though, I remember it always being interesting. Not always fun, and sometimes I was so broke I survived on bologna sandwiches, but even then, interesting.

I think it not inaccurate to characterize myself at that time as being a “drifter,” blown about randomly like a tumbleweed, with limited direction, and no sense of purpose. Then, 44 years ago, I was teaching a class which included a student named Barbara. Today is our 32nd wedding anniversary.

I will likely always approach life in a “curiosity” mode, a mile wide and an inch deep, but her personality compliments that with a willingness to dig deep. So, after we had enjoyed several bicycle riding trips in recent years, I suggested trying a horseback riding adventure. That was the extent of my contribution. She dug in and spent hours doing research, scouring the web for possibilities, contacting trip packagers, sending emails with specific questions to vendors and facilities.

She found Rancho Las Cascades, a couple of hours north of Mexico City, where the riding is tailored to the skill and comfort level of the individual, through an open range of hills, rivers, and wildflower fields. It is so much more than that, though. There is also an infinity pool and hot tub, yoga, massage, cooking classes, hiking to three waterfalls, tasty breakfasts, filling lunches, four course dinners, and a wonderful staff that accommodate every request with a smile . The self-service bar area includes coffee, tea, an assortment of soft drinks, and a refrigerator full of beer, a complete alcohol selection, lime ice cubes and margarita solution already prepared that you only need to pour into the blender. There’s always a cake platter for a snack. The only thing with an additional cost is the Nespresso machine.

The ranch is the creation of a Swiss woman who worked in tourism and aviation all over the world and then bought the land and built her dream. It is chock-a-block with beautiful regional arts and crafts scattered throughout the buildings and landscape, all selected by her, and the horses–Quarter horses, Appaloosas, Palominos, etc.–are all mixed breeds with some Criollo genes, also all selected by her.

From there to Mexico City, Barbara found Colima 71 Casa de Arte Hotel, another beautiful facility full of arts and crafts, again with a warm and friendly staff that treats you like you are their only guest. It’s in the Roma Norte area, full of restaurants, art galleries, and vintage clothing shops, and jokingly (I think) called “Gringolandia” by one of our taxi drivers.

She has brought a richness to my life that makes me so glad this once I chose to not just move on.

Happy Anniversary Barbara.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

“Empty saddles in the old corral
Where do you ride tonight?
Are you rounding up the dogies, the strays of long ago
Are you on the trail of buffalo?
Empty saddles in the old corral
Where do you ride tonight?
Are there rustlers on the border, or a band of Navajo
Are you heading for the Alamo?” The Sons of the Pioneers

Some small part of me will never let go of my childhood dream of being a cowboy. The reality is I have ridden a horse maybe a dozen times, mostly barn-runners on an over worn trail. Today I cantered across open range. Three times. That won’t seem like much of an accomplish to many, but I will be 78 next week and I was thrilled to finally have a little taste of the freedom I always imagined those men had.

More accurately, the horse cantered and I held on, bouncing in the saddle like a trampoline. But I didn’t fall off. As I walked through the wildflowers and past the Ladybug shaped sweat lodge, from the corral back to my room, my heart was so full my eyes were watering.

In a world that seems to be constantly raging at the slightest provocation, I am so grateful for the moments and places like this, where I have felt a complete peace with the universe. Other moments have been sitting outside my tent in the Serengeti staring at a predawn sky full of stars, sitting on a Wyoming mountainside watching the sunrise over Lake Jackson and the Tetons, or sitting with my dog in Washington Square by my home watching twilight blend with street and porch lights, turning my neighborhood into a fairy tale vision.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

Outtake from “Go West Old Man” tour

“To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee, one clover and a bee, and revery. The revery alone will do, if bees are few.”-Emily Dickinson

“While I know the standard claim is that Yosemite, Niagara falls, the upper Yellowstone and the like, afford the greatest natural shows, I am not so sure but the Prairies and Plains, while less stunning at first sight, last longer, fill the esthetic sense fuller, precede all the rest, and make North America’s characteristic landscape.”- Walt Whitman

“I was born on the prairies where the wind blew free and there was nothing to break the light of the sun. I was born where there were no enclosures.” -Geronimo

“A cold wind blew on the prairie on the day the last buffalo fell. A death wind for my people.”-Sitting Bull

“The wilderness needs your whole attention.”-Laura Ingalls Wilder

“Anybody can love the mountains, but it takes a soul to love the prairie.”-Willa Cather

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

Outtakes from “Go West Old Man” tour

If traveling across the northern plains of the US, Wall, SD, next to Badlands NP, is a must stop. They have something for everyone.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

Outtake from “Go West Old Man” tour

This is gone now.

In last fall’s “Go West Old Man” tour with my two pals, there were only two places in the 17 day drive that I had never visited–Bryce Canyon, and the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. We left our budget hotel the morning after seeing Bryce, heading for the nearby North Rim. “Breakfast,” was a lobby counter with some stacked, packaged food that was their “included” breakfast buffet.

That minimal effort didn’t bother me. When you are traveling for photography, a lot of meals come down to accepting what you can get when and where you are. I love a 7 course Chef’s Tasting with wine pairing as much as anyone, but I can also live for days on Honey Buns, power bars, coffee and beer if the location is good shooting.

When Paul opened his pastry and looked at the heavy mold covering the bottom he tossed it in the trash. I had already finished eating mine and tried not to think about what might have been growing on it, so as soon as we got into the park we looked for more food and coffee, at the Lodge.

Our drive was always pushing on, spending little time most places. I had a date certain from Barbara that I was to be back home, so we grabbed something to eat, looked around for a bit, and headed on. I wish now I had taken a little more time to explore the place, and photographed the Lodge. The original was built in 1928 and, after a fire in 1932, was rebuilt in 1937, so you expect it to always be there. Things change.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

Outtake from “Go West Old Man” Tour

It would have been nice to visit the town, but three old men don’t need to risk a random flea bite. What struck me about this was the almost casual nature of the warning. I always assumed you would write THE PLAGUE!!! in all caps, and large, maybe boldface, type, with multiple exclamation points.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

Last fall two old friends and I did a rapid road trip from Savannah out to the mountain west and back, our “Go West Old Man” tour. This last spring, March and April, I posted several blogs about the trip, tied to portfolios/galleries posted on my website.

Organizing a grouping of images based on some shared aspect is useful (thus galleries based on location-State/chronology/geography). Inevitably, in a total shoot of thousands of pictures, there will be some you really like, but that just don’t fit easily into any of the groupings.

This is one of those, an accidental find of a classic diner. I have several of these unicorns I’m calling “Outakes” which I will be sharing in the next few weeks.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

“Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.” Dylan Thomas

Yes, this photograph is supposed to look like this, and no, it is not out of focus. In fact, everything in the photograph, from closest to farthest, is in exactly the same focus, because this was made with a pinhole optic, not a lens which would bend the light. By refracting the light with a lens we can make a selected distance much sharper, but then every other distance will be softer, the further from the focus point, the softer it will be.

Some might say that with smaller apertures on the lens we can make multiple distances sharp using greater depth of field. Not so. We can create the illusion of relative sharpness because of the “circles of confusion,” but I’m not going there.

I have mentioned my mentor Wiley Sanderson several times in this blog. Throughout my life I have had good teachers, formal and not. Sanderson was different. He was a hard, demanding teacher, the toughest I ever had, and I learned more from him than anyone I’ve ever met, except my parents, sister, and Barbara.

Here at his 90th birthday party I learned he had Alzheimer’s, but was assured he was doing well, contented, smiling, and happy. That was just wrong. If anyone was going to rage against the dying of the light I always thought it would be him.

So much student work at the beginning of his course sequence was done with pinhole, and most of his personal work explored so many possibilities of that approach. I don’t mean an oatmeal box with a needle hole punched in it. The pinholes we and he made used precision drilled apertures, giving us an accurate f stop and allowing a calculated exposure.

It seemed appropriate to use a pinhole to photograph him.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

“And you are young and life is long, and there is time to kill today
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you” “Time” Pink Floyd

The first thing she said was, “The barrels were so much larger then.”

I see my daughter and grand-kids infrequently. When my granddaughter first visited River Street Sweets she was about 5 and blown away, paralyzed by indecision. Twenty two years later, as we stepped out onto River Street she remembered the shop and wanted to go back to re-create the photo. We sort of did, here with her “baby” brother on her right (he missed the first visit by 4 years) and partner on her left, filling a bag, again.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index