Christopher P Day
cpday@cpday.com
cpday@cpday.com
The Shore House has been our years-long project that has involved two houses on Long Beach Island, in Harvey Cedars, New Jersey. First was the 1960's duplex that we bought, refurbished, rented out and generally enjoyed. Then strangely, we demolished it.
The second house has been an entirely new one that we built on the site.
The Web site covers all aspects of the location, the old house, the new house and most importantly, the design and construction process. Hundreds of photos and drawings are included to show how a house is built in this often-stormy, always-sandy coastal environment. The choices of materials and finishes that complement the traditional beach community are presented. Attention is given to the various systems (plumbing, electrical, a dumbwaiter, central vacuum, computer network, drip irrigation) incorporated into the house.
No details are spared.
Daughter Jackie talked me into joining her on a trip to the southern Nicoya Peninsula on the Pacific coast of Costa Rica. This trip seemed like an episode of Survivorman on the Discovery Channel. In fact, there actually is an episode that takes place there. In it, Les Stroud (Survivorman) arrives by kayak with only three ballpoint pens and a multi-tool, but manages to survive in the wild for seven days and seven nights by eating bugs and lizards. We came considerably better equiped (our luggage pushed the weight limits of the small puddle-jumper aircraft) and we ate much better meals. We had one thing very much in common: Neither Survivorman nor we had air conditioning... and equatorial Costa Rica is hot anytime of the year.
Literature describes this area as "a land of bovines and beaches." That is certainly true, but we would hasten to add that the bovines are disturbingly skinny and that the list should go on to include "scorpions, tarantulas and vampire bats." We also encountered relatively harmless howler monkeys and oversized iguanas. The land is alive, especially at night.
Jackie reserved a cabin ("Casa Lisa at Pachamama") that was quite comfortable and certainly off the beaten path. Surrounding us were some truly spectacular surfing beaches and lots of very dusty dirt roads that we navigated with a rented 4x4. Kite surfing, which I had never seen before, offered some of the best photo opportunities. The weather was dry, the beer was cold and the food was delicious. All in all, this was great fun. Take a look.
Jayne took advantage of a chance to serve as a host on a client education tour of the eastern Mediterranean. I took advantage of being married to Jayne and went along.
My main interest in going was that this part of the world has countless opportunities for photography. Our itinerary included Athens, several of the Greek isles via yacht, western Turkey and Cairo, Egypt.
Greece was beautiful, although maybe a little too far into tourism. I was disappointed to learn that the picturesque greek fishermen hoisting nets into boats didn't actually do any fishing. They were just there for the tourists. We were about 20 years too late to see the real thing. Fortunately the Parthenon and the Acropolis of Lindos are still real and very impressive.
Turkey was surprising, being far more westernized than one might expect for a country that borders on both Iraq and Iran. It was also surprisingly in it's modernity. I saw more installed and operating solar power collectors during our brief drive through Turkey than I have seen in the entire US.
This trip included our second visit to Egypt. Jayne and I were there for two weeks in 1992 (I'll digitize our old film and get a gallery put together someday). This time we were limited to the Cairo area and the visit seemed way too short. Little has changed in 15 years. The Great Pyramids and the Sphinx are still mysterious and awesome. The city is still bustling and now even more overcrowded. The people still possess a great sense of humor in the face of very serious challenges. I would have stayed for a much longer time if I could.
Jayne's father turned 90 years old in 2007, although no one could possibly guess it. We hosted a gathering of his family for the event and captured the day in a photo gallery.
The South Salem, NY house was our first house building project after the advent of digital photography. Equipped with a state-of-the-art Olympus D-600 digital SLR (with a whopping 1.4 megapixel image sensor!), I captured the construction.