SNAP!

So many photos...... want to share them with you all and bore you all stupid with my trip.

Hearst Castle Indoor pool and below more of the gorgeous gorgeous place. I want to be born again as a 1940's Hollywood silent film actress and visit there with Carry Grant even though I think there would be a ridiculous age difference ... should check my years on that but

YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN!

Lushess lushnesstuss inside and out. Even the fish said so.

Ohhhhhhh. Makes HABITAT look like Automart. Or something like that.

On the other side of Pacific Highway....

A long haired seal, less common than elephant seals.

Part of the road trip.... yawn yawn ... oh come on its a nice view!!!

Me .... drivin along ... sun in my hair.... Mr Blankets tunes on... imagining I am in a cool romantic bit of a spy film in my .... 5 door Toyota Corolla ... yeahhhh baby!

Arty farty shot especially for you.

These boxes. It's becoming an obsession.

Just liked it and thought the colours were great. Oh god I am so interesting hoah.

Thats such a bog standard thing to say. :/

Good Evening all.

Stayed last night in a treat hotel as could not find a hostel in Big Surr. It was lovely and a very romantic place to stay with a gas fire in the wall... heated floors in the bathroom and all that jazz. Shame to waste it on just me but hey I had a great sleep and a great shower. Didnt include breakfast ... thats usual here... so went to The Big Surr bakery and bought a grapefruit juice, a chocolate Croissant, half a pound of spuds, a scourer and some Vim.

Wow WOW WOW WOW WOW!

What scenery ... knock out! This place is vast.

Highway 1 is as cool as a cucumber.

Sort of given up with the idea of getting great photos as you just can't capture the scale and beauty of the place. You can get a bit lost behind your camera sometimes and I see so many people with huge great big SLR digital supersonic zoom zoom lenses snapping all over the bloody place LIKE FOOLS! Not like me at all.

Sometimes you will see someone taking about 10 photos a minute of pretty much the same thing ... they almost look at the view through the square and I, in arty farty snobbish way thinking.. 'That'll be shit that will .... godd I am so glad not to be one of your friends when you get home... boring the tits off someone with a dozen photos of half a mountain with half a head in it and a bit of fence.' OK OK. Sorry. Thats mean. I sound like a right snoot and I take too many photos myself .... and I hate it. I try to remember to ask myself.... OK so that's amazing but in a photo will it really interest anyone? Really? A huge great rock in the sea? A large green hill? A long road? Another statue. I love it when you see people taking photos of plaques. Ohhh Godddd. How dull is that. Taking photos has become addictive, a means by which we relate to what is around us, constantly trying to record the moment... 'Take a photo take a photo!'

Digital Photography has ruined photography. Its made it so bloody accessible that all we do is snap snap snap.

I wonder what on earth I am going to do with all these photos. No one wants to bloody look at them. I remember last time I went travelling I took my beloved film SLR with me. I did , even though I say it myself take some amazing photos, I was in India at the time and its not hard if you put your mind to it. This blog is great for both diary writing and a few snaps here and there. Gives it more purpose and if you get bored then just scroll on.

BUT no one really ever wanted to look at them. When they did they loved them but I felt that I was showing off ... 'ERRR Ya, When I was in India..... bla bla bla bla...'

I think that most things that you can buy as a postcard of should be left well alone ... its already been done well ... Keep the postcard business alive I say. BUY a nice photo and a stamp and post it to your Gran, your Auntie or your the guy in the local newsagent. I did!

I have sent loads so far. I even sent one to Abdul, my favourite 'Evening Post' chappy where I bought my milk for the studio everyday, the occasional bottle of plonk, packet of crisps, venue magazine or some loo roll. Basically, any address I can remember by heart so not that many.

I enjoy writing and yesterday I even bought myself an ink pen. Its also a kind of balance between the old and the new .... I mean I am writing this blog alot and some of you are probably thinking.... jeez ... where does she find the time .... well .. I am on my own and yes it will die down once the novelty of being able to do this everyday has worn off and you all get bored of my rambling on like an old tart but also ... I am determined to actually write properly.

I noticed over the past two years that my hand writing has SERIOUSLY gone right down hill, I can write better with mach emb than I can a pen. I can't write very well at all, my hand sort of goes on strike and I feel that there is a very tenuous connection between my brain and my writing. It has become small, stubborn and spidery. My Dads writing was always exceptionally difficult to read, charismatic and endearing to him especially in all his farm diaries that he still writes. You have to guess what it reads ... but I love it ... it is so much part of him and who he is; his squiffy small illegible writing. He cant read it himself sometimes. Whereas my Mum has got lovely writing and she writes letters all the time. She exercises her writing on a daily basis. She has 'letter relationships' with friends, brilliant newsy and amusing letters. We have always maintained a letter writing relationship and I frequently send blank cards packed with silly blurb and newsy stuff to my family all the time. They just cant read it.

BRING BACK LETTER WRITING!!! Go on, write a letter today to someone you would like to say hi to and show them that you are thinking about them. Get your pens out!!

So yeah... less digital photos, take them for your own inspiration, take your time, use film...? Delete the crap ones...be brutal, look them in the eye and say ...ARE YOU REALLY a good photo? Does it evoke a good memory or is it a 'been there done that' photo?

Geography news - Today I drove from BIG SURR to San Luis Obispo ---- about three hours drive but I stopped at Hearst Castle on the way and also to see the elephant seals... see snaps.

Ha ha.

Weather - Its getting hotter and drier. Want to get to Santa Barbara tomorrow afternoo, have booked a room for two nights YAHOO! A home for a day. And I want to try and stop and get into my book before I fly on Monday .. and make the most of the sunshine before the winter of NZ.

Goodnight.

Hope you like my photos. ;)

Louisa Digitararanooooooo.

x