EBR-1 Atomic Museum

The first power plant in the world to produce useable electricity from atomic energy is located near Arco, Idaho.

Before I continue with photos of the plant...

This object was photographed next to the parking lot.  Can you figure out what it is?  The answer is at the end of this post.

Experimental Breeder Reactor - 1 first produced electricity on December 20, 1951 and was decommissioned in 1964.




The control room looks like a 50's science fiction movie with dials, toggle switches, and paper graphs.  No computers here.

Scientists were ready for all emergencies.




PHOTO TIP:
EBR-1 has a dark interior with different kinds of lighting.  Many of these photos were taken at ISO 3200, and white balance had to be changed for some rooms.

Where else can you stand on the core of a nuclear reactor?  Fuel rods used to be lowered into this hole which is now covered by plexiglass.


EBR-1 was fueled with U-235 and created plutonium.  It was a "breeder" reactor which produced more fuel than it consumed!


The first bulbs ever lit by atomic energy were right here!  This circuit is the original, but the bulbs have been replaced.

WHAT WAS THE MYSTERY OBJECT?
It was a HTRE-3 prototype atomic jet engine mounted on a test stand.  This monster engine actually worked in a test, but was never placed in the X-6 bomber designed for it.  No one ever figured out how to avoid frying the airplane crew while keeping the weight of the engine down, and the program was scrapped by President Kennedy.

Thunder Mountain, Nevada

Thunder Mountain... the name sounds like some high Sierra location in the wilderness, but it is much more difficult to descibe.

Thunder Mountain Indian Monument is a State of Nevada historic site.  Bizarre, artistic, eclectic, artsy, and even kind of scary, Thunder Mountain is a collection of faces, towers, junk, statues, old cars, and buildings made from concrete, bottles, windshields, typewriters, and whatever other building materials the artist could find.

The creator of the monument was Frank Van Zant who later in life called himself Chief Rolling Mountain Thunder.  He described his creation as a monument to the American Indian.  During his life he was a World War II veteran, assistant pastor, sheriff's deputy, and private investigator, but inspired by a bottle house he had seen in the desert, he moved his family to rural Imlay, Nevada and created his unusual home.

A bottle wall seen from the inside. 

 

                                                                                                                                                                  Nightmarish faces, deteriorated by years of exposure, are found everywhere you look, peering out from corners or towers, and a Madonna seems to watch you from behind a wire fence.  Native American symbolism is everywhere, but other symbols are harder to understand, like an amazing human / butterfly.  The site is deteriorating, but the artist's son is trying to preserve and restore it.  There is a caretaker on the site, and he gladly let us inside the fence to take photos.  There is no charge, but donations are accepted and welcome.

Rent a locomotive!

One of the highlights of this year's annual camping trip was renting a locomotive for an hour at the Western Pacific Railroad Museum in Portola, California.

The 917-D was built around 1951 or 1952 and has a 16 cylinder engine.  Visitors can rent this engine or a smaller switch engine and run it around a relatively short section of track.

                                                 

Ross Walker ran the locomotive under the watchful eye of Charlie, a museum docent. Photo by Bruce Gregory.

Stephen Johnson was the second engineer.

 Bruce Gregory got the next turn.

This was the view from the cab as the train traveled around the border of the museum property.

The victorious engineers as photographed by Charlie the museum docent.



Forest City, California - Almost a ghost town

Day 3 of our 30th annual camping trip brought us to one of our favorite photography subjects, a ghost town.  This trip typically takes us to places that most people don't go.  We don't look for in-your-face gorgeous well-known places, but rather we go to historic out-of-the-way places that we find personally interesting.  Today it was a semi-ghost town in the northern Sierra foothills called Forest City.  Some of the buildings here are used as summer homes, but the place is largely deserted.

The first thing you see as you enter Forest City from the dirt road is a cemetery.  Many graves here date from the 1880's.

The old dance hall is now an informal museum, open by donation if you can find someone to unlock the door.  The sagging building looks extremely unstable but is still used for community events.

The interior has an eclectic mix of historic items and dusty modern stuff.  It looks like an attempt has been made to shore up the shaky building with a cable stretched across this window.

An uphill climb reveals a wonderful old school building hidden in the trees.  The few people we saw here were friendly and helpful when we showed an interest in their historic town.

30th Annual Camping Trip

I have been camping for 30 years in a row with the same guys; sometimes twice a year.  This has been called the "desert trip" even though we have camped in California, Idaho, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, and Oregon.  Check out the story of the "Desert Rats" here:
http://www.hisandhersphoto.com/friends/hhdrats.htm

This year we are camping in the northern Sierra in California.  This was the first day of exploration and we included Donner Summit, Yuba Gap, Emigrant Gap, and more.

We heard rumors of indian grinding rocks in a remote location near Yuba Gap.  It was difficult to get to, but we did find the grinding rocks.  However, the main attraction for me was the surrounding area.  There were a number of natural patterns like this huge snag behind a lichen spotted rock.





















Another snag had been there awhile and formed a death pattern on the granite.



An un-named marshy pond added color and patterns to the scene.



Reflections of a dead tree made a great subject in the marsh.



I will try to add more photos as the trip continues.

Horse-drawn plows

There are still people who cling to the old farming methods here in the Bear Lake Valley.  Today I was fortunate to photograph three teams of horses and one of mules working a field in the small town of Sharon.  As usual this spring, there was heavy overcast and light drizzle, but you can't put the camera away when an opportunity like this comes along.  This is not a set-up horse show, but a working farm.

The teams are hitched here before starting work.

Horses pull the plows to dig furrows in the heavy soil, then a harrow pulled by mules breaks up the plowed soil into smaller clods.

Monte Smith works hard to control a four horse hitch of beautiful draft horses.

Monte shows the hand positions needed on the reins that control the four big horses.

Daryl Woolstenhulme owns the ranch, and plows with a massive three horse hitch.  What a privilege to be able to witness a scene like this!

Yellowstone in Storm Light

This is the year for nearly continuous storms in our part of the country.  When we visit Yellowstone, we prefer to take photos in great light, but we certainly aren't going to put the cameras away if the weather doesn't cooperate.  So, what can be done to get decent photos in storm light?

One option is to use the storm clouds as part of the composition.  Here at the Upper Terrace at Mammoth Hot Springs I think the storm complements the steam.


                               



Images with a more graphic composition may work better if the sky is excluded.  This tree at the Upper Terrace seems more dramatic with the subdued folds of black hills in the background.

Lower Falls and the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone are normally shown with gorgeous yellow color in the canyon walls.  But, we were there in light snow and bald skies which erased much of the dramatic color.  Without color, one approach is to try to capture the atmosperic conditions while retaining the sweep of the canyon walls and the falls.  To do this, one option is to minimize the uninteresting sky, showing just enough to retain the shape of the horizon.  That way, the light snow softens the mountain and trees in the background so the viewer can understand the stormy conditions.