Charlotte Motor Speedway - NASCAR Racing

Though headquartered in Daytona Beach, Florida, NASCAR has always had a strong bond with North Carolina, especially Charlotte. Even today, all but a handful of NASCAR teams are based in or around Charlotte. Charlotte Motor Speedway hosts some of the more prestigious NASCAR races including the Coca-Cola 600 and Sprint All-Star Race.

Watching a NASCAR race is quite an experience. With the advent of the racing season, thousands of racing fans descend on Charlotte, making it their home for the next couple of months. Camps are set-up, fires lit and the aroma from the cooking pots wafts through. There is a general festive atmosphere all around. If you are in Charlotte during the race season, it's certainly a must see event. And don't forget your ear muffs :)

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!

St. Patrick's Day is celebrated on the 17th of March every year. The St. Patrick's Day parade is an annual tradition in Charlotte, North Carolina. I was fortunate to witness the 15th Annual St. Patrick's Day Parade last year. More than 60,000 spectators had gathered on both sides of the street to watch the parade. Crowds cheered and cameras flashed as the parade marched through the heart of the city to the sound of bagpipes. The combination of flags, floats, kids and pipe band music made everyone smile and be Irish for a day.

It seemed the city had turned green. Most of the spectators had sportively dressed up in green for the event. They even had green wigs and green jewelry. Some were dressed as leprechauns with fake orange beards while some had shamrock shaped sunglasses. Many kids could be seen sporting some bobbly, antennae like shamrock headgears.

Carolinas Aviation Museum

I give Ela credit for most of my Photography ventures. This one is no different. One evening, on his suggestion, we went over to the Carolinas Aviation Museum. This place is less than 3 miles from the place I stayed in Charlotte but had not been there. Still late than never. The visit was entertaining as well as educational.

We were treated to a good collection of aircrafts and helicopters, both civilian as well as military. Among the exhibits is a Douglas DC-3 which is an award-winning classic example. It was restored and flown by Piedmont Airlines in original airline configuration to air shows and other public events before being sold to the aviation museum.

The above picture is of a Harrier aircraft, or the Jump jet as it was informally referred.
It is a British-designed military jet aircraft capable of vertical/short takeoff and landing operations. The Harrier aircraft, capable of taking off vertically, can only do so at less than its maximum weight. In most cases the aircraft does a short take off where it gains forward speed and thus aerodynamic lift, saving fuel. The main problem for the model was getting it to quickly cool down after landing due to the hover configuration. Redirecting thrust downward from the nozzles generated a lot of heat.

Next to the museum there is a military airstrip. If you are lucky you can catch some breathtaking action as military planes land and takeoff.

Queen City Skyline

Came across this picture taken last December and thought of posting it here. It reminded me of a very cold thursday evening with Ela and Madhan on Central Avenue Bridge, battling a freezing wind. We would have presented a sight to passerbys, cocooned in our jackets, monkey caps and ear muffs, and huddled over cameras and tripods. Most of the shots were taken using the timer, partly to allow us to keep our hands warm inside the jacket pockets. The location is great for Charlotte skyline shots both at dawn and at dusk. Hope to make it here sometime at dawn to capture the skyline against the first rays of the sun.

The Enchanted Woods!!

October is a symphony of permanence and change. Autumn's fire burns slowly along the woods while day by day the dead leaves fall and melt. The changing leaves of autumn colored brightly red, yellow and gold either dance in the golden sun-light or lie on the tired forest floor as a pile of dried up leaves.

A forest of these trees is a spectacle too much for one man to see. Their elegant shape, showy colours, and slow, sailing mode of flight, make them very attractive objects, and their numbers are so great, they easily compensate for the scarcity of flowers. Autumn can be equated to a second spring where every leaf is a flower, blissfully fluttering from the autumn tree.

Listen!! The wind's rising, the air wild with leaves. Leisure summer evenings gone, days grow shorter. Soon it will be dark.
Listen!! With faint dry sound, like steps of passing ghosts, the leaves break free from the trees. And fall.

Stanley Horowitz has said, "Winter is an etching, spring a watercolor, summer an oil painting and autumn a mosaic of them all". I couldn't agree more.

Autumn in Renaissance Park

A few days ago I walked along the trail in Renaissance Park and was treated to the crunch and rustle of leaves with each step I made. The acoustics of this season are different and all sounds, no matter how hushed, are as crisp as autumn air.

The leaves fall, the wind blows, and the forest slowly changes from the summer cottons into its winter wools. Leaf falling on leaf, on mounds of leaves, falling leaves hide the path so quietly. Autumn, the year's last, loveliest smile.

Full moon at Lake Wylie

TGIF!! Last day of the week, start of the weekend. With fall seaon in full swing, its natural to head out to catch some colours every opportunity that one gets. Charlotte is always a bit late for fall and it may be two more weeks before we see Charlotte in its full splendour. But there are some places that get colours early. Lake Wyile is one such place.

Swamy, Praveen and myself headed out to the lake to catch some colours before the sun sets. On reaching the place we realized, it was still early for the full fall splendour. But we did have some colours. Much to my surprise and amazement, it was full moon night. It was a beautiful sight to see the moon shining brightly over the colourful tree line. As it was lower on the horizon, it looked huge. I captured some shots of the treeline and the moon separately and later merged them to create a composite image (learnt couple of days back). Not bad for a first attempt!! :-)

In office...on a holiday!!

A day after Columbus Day; it's a holiday at office. And despite my best efforts I end up in office. Huddled togather in a conference room, the whole MDM team has been busy trying to debug the dreaded "deadlock" issue that has mysteriously resurfaced, this time in Production, after MDM implementation.

At the end of a long day during which the grey cells were tested on multiple occasions, I expected to see exhausted and tired faces. But it was a totally different scene that presented itself outside the office building. People made wisecracks and everyone had a smile on their face.

At such times, its difficult to resist the temptation to capture the magic of the moment. This time was no exception.

Sunset at Lake Norman!!

Been a while since I last posted. Actually its been quite a while since I went out with my camera. The past couple of weeks have been hectic. Weekends have been good but it takes effort to get the lazy bones moving. Anyway end-result no new pictures.

So thought why not take the opportunity and post some pictures from my backlog. And I do have a big backlog. This is from a sunset I took on Lake Norman. This is the largest man-made lake in the entire state of North Carolina. To be precise, the photo was taken in Jetton Park on the lake. On previous two occasions I had made futile attempts to reach this location on my motorcycle. Fortunately, I was third time lucky.

Jetton Park has a small artificial beach where kids can be found playing. A nice tree shaded shoreline and a beautiful view of the setting sun.

Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden

Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden is a botanical garden located in Belmont, one of the suburbs of Charlotte. It includes manicured gardens, natural surrounding areas including woodland trails, sparkling fountains and an Orchid Conservatory. During Christmas and New Year, nearly 60,000 holiday lights are on display at the garden transforming the garden into something ethereal. Just 30 mins from home, we visited the place on a evening. The holiday lights were beautiful but the heavy fog somehow dampened the visit.

Two angles at the entrace welcomed us to the Visitor's Lobby of the Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden.

There was some Irish music along with some traditional dancing in the lobby. Some traditional Irish intruments were playing out beautiful tunes.

They had a full christmas tree made up of orchids. But then this place has an Orchid Conservatory.

Managed to capture the holiday lights decorated here from a good angle giving a different perspective.

There were lights of different colours. Some red, some blue, some yellow, some green. And some were white.

The beautiful lighted tunnel leading to the fountain.

Another capture of the lighted tunnel leading to the fountain.

The lights were decorated in the shapes of trees and birds. Saw one in the shape of a large butterfly.

Some christmas lights in the shape of flying birds.

Some in the shape of trees and colourful flowers.

Soldiers standing sentinel infront of lighted christmas trees.

There were some lighting in the Orchid Conservatory as well.

Linville Gorge and Linville Falls

One week later, another nice warm October day. Late fall, but the bitter days of winter still a month away, or so it seemed. Too good a day to spend at home. So the four of us - Sandy, Ela, Pattu and I set out on a trip to the Linville Gorge. We were hoping to catch some fall colours. Being an experienced campaigner and a frequent visitor to the mountains, Ela did advise us to dress snugly. But none of us paid much heed. Sandy's Mustang was our ride for the occasion. It's a fantastic car, climbing up the mountain trails like a wild mustang riding over rough terrain. The first hint of cold in the air hit us while filling gas at a roadside filling station. It was a subtle hint , nothing much to be bothered about, and we moved on.

Reaching the town of Linville around noon, we opted for a sumptuous country meal before starting on the hike to the gorge. The trail we followed was moderate and well trodden by hikers over the years.

The trail passed through the woods which I agree were lovely, dark and deep. But somehow didn't remind me of any promises I had to keep.

At places, the trail was extremely beautiful, exhibiting the full splendour of fall. Colours of bright yellow and red adorned both sides of the trail.

We caught the first glimpse of water as we climbed down these steps cut into the path.

And then there it was!! Facing us was the Upper Falls.

The water flows through here and then disappears down a hole into an underground passage finally emerging on the othe side as the Linville Falls.

The Linville Falls creates a beautiful sight, the water from the waterfall crashing down to the rocky bottom. It creates a creek which flows down the Linville Gorge.

The mountain stream continues to flow down the beautiful gorge.

The view of the gorge is breathtakingly beautiful. We found it impossible to resist the urge to stop and devour nature's beauty. Sitting on the ledge, our feet hanging down over hundreds of feet of nothingness, it was exhilarating to say the least.

We had a distant glimpse of the peaks of Mt. Mitchell. It seemed to be getting the first snow of the season. Ela came up with a sudden idea insisting we had to drive to those peaks on the same day. It was too good an opportunity to let pass. We concurred. In retrospect, it was a great decision. But that's another story for another time.

On the way back to the car, I caught the sun once peeking through the woods.

Lake Wylie

Finally got down to creating my own blog. But after thinking for a few hours couldn't decide on a topic. All of a sudden a thought came, why not Lake Wylie? And I know why this thought wave generated. Lake Wylie has been the default place to go whenever I didn't have any other destination in mind. Located just 15 miles from the place I have called home for the past couple of years, this lake is a photographer's delight. A lovely place for boating and night-time fishing, the lake is characterized by a rich variety of colours which fill its skyline almost all throughout the year.