Delaware Water Gap Flood Damage

On a recent workshop to the Delaware Water Gap, I was amazed to discover the damage from both Hurricane Irene and the recent October snow storm. Many roads are still closed, including Copper Mine Road and Rt 209, as well as many point of interest such as Dingman's Falls, Millbrook Village and Child's State Recreation Area. Knowing how limited funding is for the National Park Service it will take many years for these areas to repair the damage.

Delaware Water Gap- Wilderness Return

The Delaware Water Gap (DWG) has always been an area I've considered part of my homeland since I first started coming here with my Father some 50 years ago. Soon after I received my driver's license this was the one place that was on my list to explore. Recently, I walked back to the point of my first aborted hiking trip. There are just a few terminated hikes that I can think of and most of them were in the west where a trip into the backcountry when a snowstorm might strand you for weeks or for the whole winter. This abortion was while I was on my first long Appalachian hike. That was back in 74 during the Tock's Island days of the DWP's tumultuous beginning soon after the Feds condemned hundreds if not over a thousand homes and a few farms though eminent domain to make way for the damning of the longest and last undamned river east of the Mississippi.

Today, one could never know how developed with homes the DWP was back then. While on this recent hike it was totally obscured of it past development history. I can remember that aborted hike day long ago quite well. A friend and I were a week and one hundred miles into a hike on the Appalachian Trail. A hike that began at Bear Mountain near the Hudson River. My dad had dropped us off on a comfortable late spring day with clear skies. We made it through the Highlands of Harriman State Park of NY and Waywayanda State Park of NJ then across the great valley of the Wallkill River with it's permeated smell of onion fields.

Everything was going fine until we got on the great ridge of Kittatinny Mountain. Then the rains came and it rained for days and we were soaked- Gore Tex was in it's infancy and they had not learned to tape the seams! So cold were the nights that we could not dry out our clothing even with a good fire. The next morning, we once again woke to freezing rain then marched through it. Later that day, sick of the constant downfall, we came to the area around Crater Lake in DWP and found a very enticing condemned A-Frame home to spend the night. A much better choice then sleeping in our soggy wet tent. There was no heat but it was dry. Again the next day we woke to rain and ice. We decided it wasn't fun hiking in a near hypothermic state. Now 35 years later, as we walked the roads and driveways removed of its asphalt except for a few pieces here and there, we could not even find the smallest remnant of foundations of that A-Frame or of the many other homes in this past development estate. The wilderness has returned to Delaware Water Gap.

William Brennen Court House Shoot

Recently, I had the pleasure discovering the fantastic William Brennan County Court House in Jersey City, New Jersey, for a client's print renovation of their New York/ New Jersey offices. The court house is built in the Beaux-Arts architectural style. Its exterior only vaguely hints at the art wonders inside. Italian white/pink marble floor, walls and columns all in the Italianate style adore the interiors. Large colorful Murals or Lunettes cover the third floor walls depict the early history of New York/ New Jersey region and are of the finest art works found in any museum on that period. Ornate roman columns surround the great court of the rotunda.

Photographing it was an lesson in extreme panoramic digital photography. Picking the right perspective in Photomerge was a part of that lesson. Making panoramic landscapes with Photomerge (a feature found in Photoshop) is basically easy but in a interior with many vertical tapered columns is much more difficult! In many cases, many of the Photomerge's settings would just end up so distorted that they would unusable as prints. But, success was accomplished and the client was wholly thrilled!

If you get the chance while in the New York City area, take a ferry to Liberty Island and take a taxi to the court house. You don't need permission to visit, but you do need permission and clearance to photograph in the post 9/11 environment. When I first scouted out the location, I was disappointed to find that the exterior was under restoration with its windows covered in plastic, but once inside I was awe struck. I have been in court houses and state capitals before but this place was amazing. You will be too!

Below is an excerpt from Wikipedia:

"Roberts delegated the assignment of artwork to the muralist Francis David Millet, noted for his work as decorations director for the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago; Millet assigned himself two lunettes on the third floor and a dozen small panels in the second floor corridors. Also on the third floor, Millet assigned two lunettes to Charles Yardley Turner, as well as eight more to Kenyon Cox. Cox also provided the groined ceilings. Edwin Blashfield painted the glass dome and the four pendentives between its supporting arches. The Tudor-style legislative chamber of the Board of Freeholders on the second floor was adorned with murals by Howard Pyle depicting early life of the Dutch and English in New Jersey. This room has been called "one of the handsomest legislative chambers in the United States."

David G. Lowe, writing in American Heritage magazine, described the interior of the building:

"The courthouse interior is a rush of color—pearl gray and green-veined marbles, golden light fixtures, yellow, green, and blue paint. Standing in the great central court, one looks up the three stories of the magnificent rotunda to a dome whose outer rim is painted with the signs of the zodiac and whose center is an eye of stained glass worthy of Tiffany. One feels—as one does in the rotunda at the heart of the Capitol in Washington—the dignity of government and the permanence of law."