Photographic Logbook: Civilization Photographs

April 3, 2005: From the Chicago waterfront, the Navy Pier juts into Lake Michigan at the mouth of the Chicago River.

April 3, 2005: The magnificent Chicago skyline.

April 3, 2005: A close look at downtown Chicago and one of the world's tallest buildings.

June 29, 2005: The main library at Indiana University, Bloomington, IN. The tower controller at Bloomington was kind enough to allow us to circle and take some photos of the university. Kristy and I lived in Bloomington between 1994 and 1999 as graduate students. Because the Chemistry department had its own library, I rarely set foot in the main library - though I think that there may be a copy of my dissertation archived there.

June 29, 2005: Beautiful limestone buildings rise among the trees at Indiana University's heavily wooded Bloomington campus. The particularly long, massive structure slightly above and right of center is the Indiana Memorial Union; purportedly the largest student union building in the world.

June 29, 2005: In the center of the frame is the "Old Crescent" portion of the Indiana University campus. This is the oldest part of the Bloomington campus. The Old Crescent buildings surround a dense wooded area, unbroken save for brick paths running under the tree canopy. The construction taking place in the center of frame is a new multidisciplinary sciences building (Simon Hall) under construction adjacent to Chemistry and Biology.

August 21, 2005: The interchange of I-94 and US-131 in Portage, MI on a quiet Sunday morning. When flying over these, I always find them to be striking in their nearly perfect symmetry.

August 21, 2005: Historic Clarkston, MI. Though I was not born here, I spent my teenage years in this little burg and often refer to it as my home town. This photo was taken from 7500' looking northeast.

Viewers familiar with Clarkston will notice that I have trimmed the photo in such a way as to eliminate the congestive nightmare that is Dixie Highway, a conduit of urban sprawl leading northward from metropolitan Detroit. Sitting in traffic on Dixie Highway generally validates my decision to leave Oakland County. The body of water at the top of the frame is Parke Lake. We lived in a neighborhood of historic homes ("historic" = "fixer-upper") south of Parke Lake and east of downtown . The narrow body of water adjacent to town is the Mill Pond. At the bottom of frame is Deer Lake, its lighter color indicative of how shallow a lake it is (despite sitting next to the biggest hills in town ... go figure).

January 22, 2006: Downtown Rochester, NY. With the Genesee River meandering through, it's a reasonably photogenic place. I'll have to photograph it again during the warmer months when there will be more green visible. Even so, THIS is January in Rochester?

January 22, 2006: We moved into this neighborhood in January of 2006. Our house is the one without a yard. I have to say, Rochester ATC was extremely helpful in providing radar services while I circled the area.

September 17, 2006: A closer look at the new house, nine months after we moved in (the yard was still a work in progress). This photo was taken by my neighbor, Mark. This was Mark's first ride in N21481 as well as his first flight in a light aircraft in 18 years. Once again, thanks goes to the great controllers at ROC for working with us while we circled the neighborhood on yet another busy morning.