Food was a definite “thing” on this trip. Before this journey, we were dialed in with three-four night campouts either in a tent, a rooftop tent, or canoe camping and we had it DOWN.
This experience was going to be entirely different. We now had a refrigerator that kept things cold and a tiny freezer that actually kept things frozen. It was amazing not having to manage a cooler and ice all the time. At home, we create a menu each week (thank you Mo Landrith!) and shop for those items only. This system creates very little food waste. On this trip, we had to figure out camper meals, meals with our peeps, and meals in restaurants as we went sightseeing during the day. We had to figure out what to bring that wouldn’t go bad but what was also easy to cook as we settled on just two saucepans and a frying pan.
Discovering that the freezer actually kept things frozen was life-changing. Also, at home, our routine is to basically skip breakfast Monday – Friday, have a blended salad smoothie for lunch, and a mostly meatless dinner. When we travel, making the daily juice is not happening so we came up with cold oatmeal with berries, nuts, dried fruit, and non-dairy milk. It’s our new, warm weather favorite.
For dinner, we found out we could store four one-pound bags of frozen vegetables in the freezer. With leftovers, it gives us eight meals when we add brown minute rice and a can of beans, and maybe an egg on top or some non-dairy cheese. Other than that we often had tortillas, hummus, and veggie roll-ups until we ran out of tortillas and literally couldn’t find any east of Texas.
Here’s our little stove at work warming up the beans and vegetables while cooking the rice for ten minutes. It became our favorite camp dinner. We tried to substitute quinoa but didn’t love it.
We found this on the beach of Padre Island. We took it with us and opened it with a hammer at camp in Walasco. It was good and we didn’t get sick. We were a little nervous about eating it as we had NO idea how long it had been out to sea.
We ate out, a LOT. Here we picked up some nuts from a street vendor in Progresso, Sonora.
We had our first Philipino food with Dave and Bong in Houston, Texas.
We had fish n chips and DELICIOUS mac and cheese at Katie’s Seafood in Galveston. That wasn’t necessarily new but it had been a LONG time since we’d had it.
In Louisiana things got interesting. It was recommended we eat at this grocery and deli by our Voodoo Museum tour guide in New Orleans . He wasn’t wrong. We got the gumbo and it was delicious. We ate it outside on the sidewalk, sitting against the building.
Near the Whitney Plantation, we found this cajun market and restaurant. It had alligator heads all over the place and we ordered the catfish PO-boy and shrimp gumbo. Other people ordered a platterful of very red crawfish. We skipped that delicacy.
At Dollywood, we ordered what amounted to be a $12 cup of rice with a little sausage and chicken thrown in so it sounded better on the menu. It was cooked in this giant wok. In Gatlinburg, we tried the chili cheese fries and were not disappointed. I believe they cost as much as the cup of rice.
In Weaverville, we ordered Mo’s barbecue ribs, cornbread, and mac & cheese. Yum.
In Hillsborough, we found a food truck and got some tacos.
Our friends and old neighbors, Trish Paul in Weaverville, put this delicious spread out for us one morning,
Cousin Colby impressed us with his chef skills in making these smashed potatoes to go with our roasted chicken, Ceasar salad, and garlic-me bread.
Granddaughter Akacia fed us one evening from a Hello Fresh box. It was a nice combo of burger and fries.
At the farm in Nebraska, Aunt Becky showed us how to extract honey from bee boxes. It was so interesting and delicious.
We got to bring home over 12 pounds of the stuff plus some honeycomb to chew on.
The grocery stores along the way were also an interesting experience. Once we hit the South we saw things not normally seen in our stores in Flagstaff.
I’m not sure what it’s all used for but I’m pretty sure if offered, I’d give it a try.
I hadn’t seen white asparagus before.
The food tour has come to a close. It was fun eating different local cuisine. We decided not to eat Mexican food once we left Texas but succumbed and DID have good tacos out of the food truck in North Carolina.
Next week I’m going to share some of our excursions. It’s a keyword change from my original list of nine. Excursions replaces Urban. As I said, keywording is a work in progress.
Happy shooting!
The amount of gross yet yummy food at these things is remarkable. Food is an experience in itself at the fair and the way they advertise it is SO obnoxious that one just HAS to shoot it. Nowhere else do I eat like this.
Aaaaah, the granddaughter. She grew up in front of my camera and loves to strike a pose. I prefer the candids so I snapped this posed one because of the genuine smile.
I got this one as she waved to her mom before going up in a ride I would have surely blown chunks on.
Speaking of rides, they are a great subject to practice slow shutter speeds. Night time would have been better, or at least different, with the lights. But we were there during the day so I slowed the shutter and shot this hand held. I was sure to shoot it near something standing still to really show the motion in a still frame.
This little thing was adorable with her little Micky Mouse ears. I can’t help but wonder if she thought she was at Disneyland.
And here they are, the dynamic trio. These three don’t get together often enough; my wife Ellen and her two beautiful daughters Evonne and Chelsea. Love these women.
I always prefer the candids.
Back to the food theme. There is just something about Fair Food that begs it to be eaten.
I also wanted to capture it in an image so here is a boat full of curly fries. The amounts are absurd and the grease could run a small vehicle fleet. Which is probably why it tastes so good.
Fair workers are also interesting to shoot. This lady had her bare hand working the tongs on the food while her gloved hand held her soda…? If you’re into photographing people you will not be disappointed with the ample opportunity at a fair.
One of my favorite images of Akacia. I think she was gearing up to get some sort of Henna Tattoo.
And then there’s the games. A pond full of sunglass wearing plastic turtles? Had to shoot ’em.
Balloons from a dart game.
The day was winding down, the child wearing out. Too much junk food and too many spinning rides meant home was not far away.
The first order of business was…coffee. We entered the dining room with this presentation on the table, Nescafe. Instant coffee. Hmmm.
Here is our crew. Front left is Ellen, my wife and awesome traveling partner, behind her is Harold (Columbia), Dafna (Argentina), Lucas (Argentina) and in the v-neck, Claudia (Miami). We really had a GREAT time getting to know these fine folks. And the guy with the plates? One of “the guys”. The gentlemen who took care of us were extraordinary. They seemed to be busy taking care of things after we went to bed and were certainly busy before we got up, preparing breakfast and the like.
Here is a typical breakfast. All three mornings we had some sort of eggs, the yummy pastry/bread things and…a hot dog. Couldn’t do the hot dog.
Following breakfast we went snorkeling. I was amazed at how clear the water was. I took the snorkeling images with my trusty Canon S120 in it’s waterproof housing. 
Then a walk around the island. The palm trees behind Ellen are at the far end of the island. They make up a bit of a palm tree forest.
In the forest the trees were closer to each other than anywhere else on the island.
The shade they created made for a lovely respite from the afternoon sun.
What amazed me most, well, beyond just the color of the water, was the ability to experience how other people live in the world. Here’s a hut with a couple of canoes. That’s it. That’s their transportation. They put them on small round logs in order to roll them into the ocean when needed.
This is the beach on the other side of the island. Look at that water color. This was not the best side to snorkel, though, because it mostly consisted of sea grass and sand. The side where our “resort” was had all kinds of rocks, corals and fish.
I just liked this one.
Then we went snorkeling again.
This straw sun had was sitting in a boat. I like how someone used their traditional mola designs to decorate the hat.
One of the homes had a solar panel. I love the mix of modern and not so modern that we found on the island and in Panama in general.
This is the other end of the island, opposite the palm tree forest. If you walk past the two huts to the right of the image you would see our compound.
We stopped by this little trinket shop not far from our hut. You could purchase shells, molas, bracelets and little carved wooden boats. I don’t think the red sippy cup was for sale.
It seemed like it was always wash day.
Seriously, pinch me.
This shows a cayuco, complete with downed sails, sitting just off shore with a neighboring island in the background. I’m guessing that the island is privately owned as you can see only two huts to the right. It wouldn’t take much to paddle over and say hi.
These birds were fun to watch. They traveled in a flock of about 35 and hung out on the sand going in and out with the waves looking for food.
The view behind our hut.
Our afternoon excursion took us to “la piscina”, the swimming pool. It wound up being a sand bar about four feet deep and crystal clear, like a pool. The sand was full of star fish, a few conch shells and an occasional sand dollar.
Claudia and Harold just hanging out in the middle of the ocean.
Lucas and Dafna doing the same.
Following the swim we were dropped off to explore a small island. It was beautiful. There were other islands nearby.
Ellen and I took this opportunity to shoot a couple of yoga shots. Here she’s holding a coconut.
While we were exploring the island the resort workers were busy gathering conch for dinner that night. Here is one of the guys getting the meat out just behind the kitchen.
There were a couple of huts on the island that acted as stores. At these stores you could purchase candy bars, soda, bottled water and …COLD BEER! The island had electricity which allowed them to have electric coolers and…COLD BEER! It was quite the treat at the end of a long day of walking, swimming, snorkeling, eating and napping. And we got to hang out with the loveliest of people!
Here’s a view of dinner with the rice, salad and conch. It was delicious.
The guys fulfilled our request for a farewell bonfire for Dafna and Lucas. They were scheduled to leave us the next morning.
