06 February 2012

I'm Shipping Up To Boston


Well, I'm not really shipping up to Boston, but I've been there and I like the Dropkick Murphys and three of the four pictures in this blog post have been taken while I was aboard a ship.
Anyway, today is my only day off this week, and since I knew the temperature would be way below zero (it turned out to be -14° centigrade this morning), I also knew that there wouldn't be any clouds in the sky. Wearing two pairs of socks, thermal underwear, a sweater, followed by a North Face vest and a Carhartt ranger jacket, I left around 6 o'clock in the morning, looking - or at least, feeling - like an Eskimo.

It was worth it, though - I reached the Landungsbrücken-area before sunrise. I had planned to take some long exposures while it was still dark, but even with the many layers of clothing I had been wearing, I was still freezing and so I hurried to get into the warmth of a coffee shop for a little while. As soon as the sun started to rise, I went on a bit of a sightseeing trip down the River Elbe aboard one of the harbour ferries. 
If you're planning on visiting Hamburg as a tourist, this website offers useful information how to get from one place to another. Also, I would say that reading the Wikipedia article and a good sense of direction are all it takes for you to spend a great long weekend in this city - you need not bother reading pretentious articles like the one recently published by the New York Times, which was so poorly researched that I won't even link to it.


Hamburg, Germany.
February 2012.


Days like this deserve an awesome soundtrack.

Two and a half years ago I took a picture from the same point of view as the first photograph, while aboard a ferry from Sausalito to San Francisco. Here's the link.
The fourth photograph may look familiar... I've taken many pictures of this building over the last three years: #1; #2; #3; #4; #5.

Let me share some inspirational links: Holeshot Design Studio photostream; Sandra Dieckmann's art; Terry Fan's art; Helen Frankenthaler - an abstract expressionist whose work reminded me of Jackson Pollock's; a photo gallery on National Geographic called "Global Fashion"; and - last but not least - an amazing, one-of-a-kind, heavily customised Triumph Bonneville.

Have a great week, drive safely, and talk to you soon!

- Dom

14 comments:

Suze said...

Beautiful photographs! I feel renewed.

'you need not bother reading pretentious articles like the one recently published by the New York Times, which was so poorly researched that I won't even link to it.'

Love this.

Dom said...

Thanks! Glad you like them.

The article felt like it wasn't aimed at regular readers - one of the first activities mentioned was going shopping on Mönckebergstraße. I assume that the vast majority of the NY Times' readership are still New Yorkers, so why would they go shopping in Hamburg if they can do that at home? Those who don't have a big budget wouldn't go shopping anyway.
Furthermore, all the restaurants the author claims to have dined at are upper-class and overpriced. As far as I'm concerned, Hamburg offers a wide range of reasonably priced restaurants as well as coffeehouses (and I'm not just saying that because I'm tending the bar in a coffee shop in one of the poshest districts!).
Another point of criticism has got to be that some places that every tourist should visit were only briefly or not at all mentioned.
In conclusion, I'd say that the NY Times' author's 36 hours in Hamburg have been a waste of time and money - although I'm sure the money wasn't his own - if he has even been to Hamburg. I could very well imagine he just did a bit of research online and jotted down that article within ten minutes. Seriously, if I had read an article like that on a city that I have not yet been to, it wouldn't have made me want to visit the place.

donnie said...

lucky you - a great day out :))

- Yvonaut -
Das sind Raphael und Yvonne
said...

Very cool shots! Beautiful photography Dominic! Wonderful light!
Many greetings from Switzerland
Yvonne & Raphael

Babzy.B said...

You were very brave to go out in the cold so early ! i like very much the third pic :)

Dom said...

Thank you so much!!! :-)

T. Becque said...

Absolutely awesome photos! That ice in the river is something. Not to make you hate me, but I just got back from a run in 78 degree sunshine :)

Jenny Woolf said...

Those are truly amazing photos, I'd love to see them enlarged to about a metre wide! They have an almost other worldly quality, as if they show a different planet! :)

It's annoying when someone writes a badly researched article about something you are familiar with, but no excuse for the New York Times as they ought to have fact checkers making sure there aren't too many howlers.

Dom said...

Thank you Trisha, thank you Jenny!
Glad you both liked those pictures...

Martin Meyers said...

Hello! I'm a new blogger/writer and I just added myself to your followers for support! Maybe you could come follow me too?
Thanks so much!

Dom said...

Thank you Martin! I appreciate it. I like your blog as well, so I'll follow.

Mandy said...

What amazing photos but wow, that is cold. Not sure I'd be brave enough to venture out in that!

joo said...

Beautiful photos, Dominic! I love the pinkish light reflected on the ice. Looks really cold, brr! I returned from Rugen few days ago and there also was cold - sea was frozen:)
Have a nice evening.
J.

Sy said...

Beautiful shots Dominic