A collection of photography and exploration focusing on Upstate South Carolina and beyond.
I thought I had missed the opportunity to view the rocky shoals spider lilies for this year. I had seen social media posts about them with photos, but I was afraid peak bloom had already passed. Last weekend was Lilyfest at Landsford Canal State Park, so I hope I hadn’t missed all of the action. … Read More “Landsford Canal Lilies and the Catawba River” »
Alan Russell and I usually do a photo trek on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. As educators we usually had the day off and it made for a great mid-winter escape. Now that we’re both retired we can go pretty much any day we want, but we still try to stick to our annual tradition. … Read More “Calhoun County MLK Day Ramble” »
This past year MyHeritage released two new products that add an interesting, albeit creepy new dimension to old photos. The first of these was a colorizer for old photos. The second looks like something right out of Harry Potter. The colorizer app was released about a year ago and does a pretty good job of … Read More “Reanimating the Dead” »
Humans are weird. At least in our western culture, they expect that a sixteen square foot plot of land will be set aside for them in perpetuity, to be held sacrosanct as a memorial of their existence. It seems that over the generations we would eventually run out of land for burials. Perhaps that’s one … Read More “The Orphaned Graveyards of Greenville County” »
The Second Saturday of August meant time for another adventure with my friends from Lowcountry Unfiltered. Matt and I bounced a few ideas around before settling on The Jungle, a section of Lake Moultrie featured as part of the Berkeley County Blueways. It was a new venue for us, and turned out to be a … Read More “Exploring The Jungle of Lake Moultrie” »
The story of a “Crybaby Bridge” seems to be a common trope in tales of the paranormal. There are Crybaby Bridges all over the country. Each bridge has a similar story. Usually, a distraught mother kills a baby by tossing it into the water below. Thereafter, any travelers crossing the bridge at night will hear … Read More “An Electric Crybaby” »
For many years I’ve known about the underground railroad passage in Anderson, South Carolina. The passage hints at a forgotten history and neglected part of the city. I’ve visited the entrances to the passageway several times, but just never got up the nerve to explore it by myself. This past week fellow explorer Alan Russell joined me, and together we finally got a chance to explore Underground Anderson.
Last spring a guy with the unusual name of Beezer Molton contacted me about a photo. It turns out that Beezer is the owner of the Half-Moon Outfitters franchise. The Greenville store would be moving into a new store and he wanted a large print of the above photo to go into the new location. … Read More “Full Moon at Half-Moon” »
I worked in Spartanburg county for fifteen years. During all of that time I never got around to visiting Nazareth Presbyterian Church. I knew it was one of the first churches in the area, having been established around 1765, but for some reason I thought that the building had been updated and no longer retained its historic character. I was wrong. When I had driven by it I had seen the new Family Life Center (a.k.a “gym”) and had thought that IT was the church, somehow missing the older building right next to it. While out doing some research on another project about church architecture Alan Russell and I finally paid Nazareth a visit.
As a teenager I’d read a South Carolina Wildlife article about Capers Island, a barrier island on the coast. The place fascinated me, a wild, undeveloped island accessible only by boat. On this paddling trip with Lowcountry Unfiltered I was to learn that there are TWO Capers Islands in South Carolina, and the one we visited had some unusual human-created features.