American Road Trip 1979 on Kodachrome

#USA03-31 Leaving LA's smog behind on the way to Las Vegas, 05 May 1979.
How I miss Kodachrome...

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lynnb said:
#USA02-16 rental Mustang, 02 May 1979.

Next day the tour group staying at the motel had different ideas on where to go. They wanted to catch buses but I thought a rental car would be more efficient given LA's geography and poor public transport. So I rented a Mustang for USD$17.95/day from Dollar car rental, but the others were reluctant to drive and decided to go sightseeing by bus. I asked someone to take my picture before we parted ways. I had also met a girl in a drug store checkout queue and had asked her out to dinner, so the Mustang seemed a good and necessary idea. A Mustang would've been impossibly expensive to rent back in Sydney. I'd never driven a V8 modern car before, or driven on the right hand side of the road. I wasn't going to let those small details get in the way of a good night out. I bought a street map, and I was set to go.

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And here, 44 years later, I salute your attitude. Awesome work.

I hope the date was pleasant.
 
Thanks Freakscene! And yes it was a very pleasant date. I was staying near the airport and she lived in Pasadena. All the local restaurants were booked out so we ended up at the Pomona Valley Mining Co Restaurant at San Dimas, with a great view over the lights of the San Gabriel Valley. Quite romantic. Quite a long drive! On the way back the fan belt broke leaving us stranded a few miles from her place in the early hours. Her parents kindly offered to put me up for the night. Lovely family. I'd never experienced such generosity and hospitality to a complete stranger before.
p.giannakis said:
Beautiful pictures and the colour palette of Kodachrome is classic. Pity I never tried kodachrome (I have some Velvia 50 pic thought).
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Thanks Pan. A shame you never got to try it. I found Velvia a bit too saturated for my taste (but great for landscapes). Peter (Rangefinder 35) makes great use of Velvia.
 
Richard G said:
Magenta receding down the page already. For such a huge project would you not get a Nikon Ccolscan? I miss that scanner’s software but I’m finding VueScan is good. I’m still wrestling with black and white and my best effort with that was on the Epson flatbed, but Kodachrome do very well and the colour balance is near perfect. You had a great architectural eye from early in your career. Three of the best primes, a new camera and 60 rolls of Kodachrome 25. Such discernment and conviction. We need more of the story!
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Feel like doing it with a coolscan would take forever, with the bulk slide feeder it would at automate it. The price of those has really shot up.

My father has a ton of Kodachrome that I need to get around to scanning. I will scan with a digital camera as it will do it is so much quicker though.
 
#USA03-33 Old Glory, gas stop at Terrible Herbst on the way to Las Vegas, 05 May 1979.
The sheer number (and size) of flags flown in the US was amazing to this travelling Aussie. In Australia only public buildings usually fly our national flag.
That's our van and some of my fellow travellers in the foreground.

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Staying near the airport and going to Pasadena, then San Dimas, sheesh, you got the grand tour just doing that!
Keep 'em coming!
Lovin' this tour thru your shots.

For those of you unfamiliar with the way to Vegas, that Terrible Herbst station is in Baker CA I believe, off the I-15.
 
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Please keep this thread going, take as much time as you like. I feel like I'm viewing a time portal. It's also so impressive that you kept a travel diary! Does it have entries for most/all the days? I lament that my early travel diaries are very sparse and are often about my thoughts than actual events, places, people, times.

How much do these photos and your diary evoke memories that you had otherwise forgotten?
 
Archiver said:
Please keep this thread going, take as much time as you like. I feel like I'm viewing a time portal. It's also so impressive that you kept a travel diary! Does it have entries for most/all the days? I lament that my early travel diaries are very sparse and are often about my thoughts than actual events, places, people, times.

How much do these photos and your diary evoke memories that you had otherwise forgotten?
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Thanks, I've been meaning to do this for ages and thought if I don't do it now I'll never get around to it. As Dave Lackey once said, it's later than you think. So here we are, 44 years later.

I kept a comprehensive travel diary with entries for each day of the nine weeks. The photos and diary bring the trip back to life - without them much of the trip would have gone from memory.
 
lynnb said:
#USA03-36. Approaching Calico, CA, 05 May 1979. Maybe people kept missing the turn off.
I used a polarizer for almost all my photos.

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Lynn, another excellent image. I love your signature line. I too love great light, and a roll of film loaded and ready!!! Keep your nice images coming. I enjoy seeing your work, and your looking back on pleasant times.
 
#USA04-09 Calico ghost town, CA, 05 May 1979
I admit to being disappointed in this tourist attraction, having been spoilt by Sovereign Hill in Victoria, Australia - a much larger place. This small town felt just a little too perfect with its paved main street. Maybe that's necessary given the grade and any potential downpour. They put on a good guy/bad guy gunfight complete with stunts, which seemed to entertain the few tourists there. We only had a short time there so maybe there were more things to see than we did.

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lynnb said:
#USA03-33 Old Glory, gas stop at Terrible Herbst on the way to Las Vegas, 05 May 1979.
The sheer number (and size) of flags flown in the US was amazing to this travelling Aussie. In Australia only public buildings usually fly our national flag.
That's our van and some of my fellow travellers in the foreground.

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Love this one.

I had to look up "Terrible Herbst". What a backstory and how they got the name 🙂

en.wikipedia.org

Terrible Herbst - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
 
Shab said:
What a "travel/thread" Lynn... I have never been in the "new world"... and your words and pictures are like a door to the old time of the new world... Great!!

It's incredible the travel you made... Thank you so much for sharing.
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Thanks Xabier! I'm glad you're enjoying the trip. A long way to go yet. A special adventure coming up soon.
 
Mahvelous, wonderful stuff, Lynn! I love seeing what your eyes saw this way, all these years on. In '79, I was living in Riverside, on the eastern edge of the Los Angeles basin, attending school at UC Riverside. Having grown up in New York, the magic of arriving in California and seeing these same "to me strange" California sights resonates.

Your and Pan's old slide threads is inspiring me to go dig out some of my old slide boxes and see what's there. I can hope what I find gets even close to what you two guys have displayed.

G
 
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