The little discussion and picture thing in the un-awesome thread was pretty cool, so I think there should be a topic devoted to photography of things about where you're from or where you've been! And you're all going to comply to my idea or I'll hunt you with sticks!

Here's Ireland! Proper Ireland.. Inis Mór, of the Aran Islands off the West Coast by Galway, where I went last summer for a few days. If anyone's ever coming here, these are the places you need to go. Not the cities. The cities are fucking shitholes full of imbeciles.. Real Ireland is out in the backlands of nowhere and out on the islands where there's some essence of what we were like all them years ago, as well as some pretty stunning natural shit. I'm not a great photographer but sher..

Here's the landscape. Its breathtakingly barren. We'd been cycling for nearly two hours from our camp and the houses in the distance there were the first we'd seen since we left.. And its a pretty tiny island..


Dún Aonghasa here, one of the largest forts from prehistoric Europe.. Something like 4 defensive walls, coupled with the 200ft cliff edge its built on.. One of 3 forts around the island..


This is the smallest Church in the world, apparently! An Teampall Bheanáin is waaaaaay up high on a hill, and holds about.. 3 or 4 people, max..


This is Poll Na bPéist (The Serpent/Worm Hole), which is one of the most staggering natural sights I've ever seen. Its just this absolutely gigantic, perfectly rectangular hole in the earth.. And when the tide is violent the waves crash against it in such a way that the water is flung way up into the air.. There's 3 other smaller, circular holes like this but we couldn't get to them cos the cliffs were treacherous..



And of course, the (very hygienic) locals!

Ah, I'll bite. Florida may not be the best place in the world, but we have our views...

Clearwater beach, 20 minutes from where I live. Absolutely worth a visit if you're in the Tampa area.



Sunset



There are others...But I dont feel like searching for them...Maybe I'll take some pics this weekend.

...Oh man. I want to go to Ireland someday. Wow. Huge, barren landscapes like that are one of my favorite things in the world. Old ruins, too. Put together, I don't think I'd want to be anywhere else. Arrgh, jealous. You lucky person!

~Josiah

I have always wanted to see Ireland as well. My home is town not even close to being as beautiful as those images.

Never been to Florida either, but several relatives of mine live in Florida- I don't keep in touch with them. I am beginning to think that the grass may be greener on the other side.

O_O

Is it seriously natural? Damn. I suspect alien activity, crop circles are for pussies, cropping the rock is teh real thing.

Pot.



Prostitutes.




I'm done.

[djskrimp]

The little discussion and picture thing in the un-awesome thread was pretty cool, so I think there should be a topic devoted to photography of things about where you're from or where you've been! And you're all going to comply to my idea or I'll hunt you with sticks!

Here's Ireland! Proper Ireland.. Inis Mór, of the Aran Islands off the West Coast by Galway, where I went last summer for a few days. If anyone's ever coming here, these are the places you need to go. Not the cities. The cities are fucking shitholes full of imbeciles.. Real Ireland is out in the backlands of nowhere and out on the islands where there's some essence of what we were like all them years ago, as well as some pretty stunning natural shit. I'm not a great photographer but sher..

Here's the landscape. Its breathtakingly barren. We'd been cycling for nearly two hours from our camp and the houses in the distance there were the first we'd seen since we left.. And its a pretty tiny island..


Dún Aonghasa here, one of the largest forts from prehistoric Europe.. Something like 4 defensive walls, coupled with the 200ft cliff edge its built on.. One of 3 forts around the island..


This is the smallest Church in the world, apparently! An Teampall Bheanáin is waaaaaay up high on a hill, and holds about.. 3 or 4 people, max..


This is Poll Na bPéist (The Serpent/Worm Hole), which is one of the most staggering natural sights I've ever seen. Its just this absolutely gigantic, perfectly rectangular hole in the earth.. And when the tide is violent the waves crash against it in such a way that the water is flung way up into the air.. There's 3 other smaller, circular holes like this but we couldn't get to them cos the cliffs were treacherous..



And of course, the (very hygienic) locals!

I was very lucky to have been able to stop in Shannon for a short time after my last deployment. BEAUTIFUL country. Took my breath away.

Anyway, I am learning how to take "proper" photographs because I plan on doing a photo essay on my beloved state of Oklahoma:

Pot.



Prostitutes.




I'm done.

Pics man! lol

Hey krimp, I'll post some Florida lightning storm pics if you want Considering Florida is basically the lightning capital of the world...

Haha - Where I live kinda sucks. But here you go:


Once of the places which hasn't been built over yet

I'm gonna go with America as a whole, since Illinois doesn't have the most I can go with, but I've done a lot of traveling around this country and seen some amazing things. I will say that the natural beauty of America is tough to beat, but I'll also go with some other things. I'll start with the skyline of my hometown:



Of course, that's missing the new Trump Hotel that's just now being finished up, which is another beautiful building, and I believe now the second tallest building on the skyline. Then of course there's the Chicago Spite, I believe set to be finished by the end of 2010, which will stand 2,000 feet tall.



Driving through these things for 2 and a half hours can be very boring.



Garden of the Gods in downstate Illinois, where it isn't so flat anymore.

NOW LEAVING ILLINOIS



Devil's Tower in Wyoming, I'm actually going to be climbing this thing during the summer of 2010. All the way to the top, already working on making sure I'm in shape for that.



Old Faithful erupts



The Painted Desert in Arizona



Without barely moving, it's the Petrified Forest in pretty much the same spot in Arizona.



The Grand Canyon in Arizona. Unless you've actually been there, you can't even start to fathom how awesome this thing is.



Montezuma's Castle in Arizona.



One more Arizona landmark, the meteor crater in Arizona.



A beautiful shot of the Rocky Mountains.



The older, more rounded Appalachian Mountains.



The Cascade Mountain Range.



Finally, the Sierra Nevada range.



Merrimac Caverns, outside of St. Louis in Missouri.



Mammoth Cave, a great setting for a black metal photo shoot!



Bryce Canyon in Utah.



The Badlands in South Dakota.



This should give you an idea of how huge the trees are in the great Redwood Forest.

BACK TO ILLINOIS



The Mississippi from beautiful Galena, IL



I could write a whole essay about this picture. This is Monks Mound in Cahokia, IL. When it was built it is widely believed to have been the largest pyramid ever built, and is still recognized by many as this. There are a number of mounds in Cahokia, built by an ancient civilization, believed to be about as old as the ancient Hebrew tribes. Some Mormons actually believe that these were built by members of what they call the Lost Tribes of Israel. Whoever they were, they were an ancient culture. The civilization actually lasted quite some time though, believed to have lasted up to 1050 AD, which would mean that they lasted for thousands of years, and they were believed to be very advanced. Anyway, all you can really see here is about the top two thirds or so, as far as size goes, as to what was built under this ground.




Alright, that's it for now. I didn't include Mount Rushmore or the Crazyhorse mountains mainly due to that I really don't consider them to be natural, and I feel that they're a desecration of those mountains. Still, I didn't even really get beyond scratching the surface of all the beautiful things this country has to offer.

Wow. Dude you're right. I forgot how awesome America is!

Mainly because I havent left Florida in around 2-3 years (thanks miserable job, i love you too....)

I tried to include a few lesser known attractions, like the most underrated caves in all the world with the Merrimac Caverns, and I wanted to get the point across more with some of those like the Redwood Forest and Grand Canyon. I still remember the first time I saw each of those and how blown away I was, I wish I could give that feeling to some of those posters on here who are no as close to it as I am. I do tend to mentally be closer to the international community, but my love for the natural beauty that we have here is insane, and I also love a great skyline. I forgot to mention that the Hancock building wasn't there in that one picture I showed of the Chicago skyline, and I gotta say, as far as entire skylines go, I can't think of a better one throughout the entire world than the Chicago one. Many cities have one or two great buildings, but the Chicago skyline now has 4 awesome buildings (Trump, Sears, Aon, and Hancock), and once the Chicago Spire is finished, that'll make it five, with the Chicago Spire being the tallest at 2,000 feet (about 609 meters), the Sears Tower at 1,451 (442 Meters), Trump International at 1,362 feet (415 meters), Aon (1,136, 346 meters), and Hancock at 1,127 (344 meters).

The Illinois stuff was basically there to hope that some would realize that Illinois isn't as boring of a state (outside of Chicago) than most people thing. The southern part of the state is actuallly somewhat mountainous, and there are things like the Garden of the Gods that actually rival the badlands, even if it's not quite as cool. The Cahokia mounds are what really tops it off for me. A civilization so ancient that may have been the greatest civilization of its time that just suddenly disappeared. Legend has it that they made a special deal to give up pretty much all their young under 16 years of age at a certain point to a bunch of aliens for the secrets of how to survive, and that's why they just suddenly diappeared, because it was a very fast decline for that civilization (only 250 years), and I do wonder if that's what Plato talked about with Atlantis.

Either way, rather it be politricks or whatever the hell is going on, in the 48 mainland states alone we have such a beautiful country in America. Canada is pretty amazing as well, although I haven't been there, I've have plenty of testimonials that have made me want to visit. Either way though, America is seriously so beautiful, and even though our political atmosphere here hasn't been the most desirable over the last 8 years, that part is fine now, and you can still go from the redwoods to the painted desert/petrified forest, to Devil's Tower to any of the great Illinois destinations, to Olympic Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia, to the great beaches throughout the east coast, and every inch in between somewhere has something worth your time. I consider myself to be well globified, and I actually have never left the 48 mainland states myself. I do plan on going on an international trip, or perhaps joining the peace corps (very strong consideration), and I hope to see the beauty that the rest of the world has to offer. Wow, for someone with such a violent and dark sense of humor I'm sounding a lot like a hippie. Oh well, I still want to see a bunch of humans ground up like cows before me, just so I'm not a hippie....oh yeah, that feels better now...

Since there's a few people from England on this site I thought I'd concentrate on the more local area where I live.

This is a picture of the Bargate, right in the centre of Southampton.



There's quite a few remnants of the old city walls still dotted around the place, and they've found some Roman ruins as well - though that's not very picturesque yet! Southampton's close to the New Forest which is gorgeous, especially when viewed from a pub garden.....



Most of Southampton's pretty built up, but you wouldn't know it from this picture.



And here's a picture of a local working windmill...on an unusually hot day for England too.



And there's the sea of course,

Seeing as its actually snowing in england, ill share pictures of the rare event
The amazing view? Outside my window






I have a big front window