Fog nearly hides the Golden Gate Gate bridge in the distance. The bridge spans across two towers which sit atop old ferry ports.  Ferries were the primary transportation between SF and Marin County before the bridge.

The Golden Gate Bridge in all of its glory without fog. To avoid collision with boats on foggy days, the hallmark red is used.  Many Japanese bridges use a similar color for the same reason.

My second visit to Alcatraz! It’s amazing how San Francisco’s primary tourist attraction was left to sit in ruins for many years after closing as a prison. Besides its attraction as a prison, Alcatraz has may beautiful gardens.  To make the island more like home, prison guard families would plant small gardens.  This activity was even popular amongst the inmates.  Since the terrain is rocky, soil has been imported from elsewhere.

Alcatraz Island is off in the distance as I pose by the lookouts.

Alcatraz Island is now the setting for a TV series. You can see the Pink Persian Carpet plant that covers the island.  Many plants had died due to the harsh conditions on the island.  However, the Persian Carpet was one of the plants that did thrive.

The famous crooked part of Lombard Street. This is clearly a tourist attraction.  However, there are many less well known streets that run between houses that are closed off from traffic with beautiful gardens.  It was mentioned by a tour guide that some streets are pedestrian only since they are too steep for cars.

The Painted Ladies are such beautiful homes.  They are located next to Alamo Square park with amazing views of the city.  Even without the fame from TV’s The Full House, I can imagine they would still be popular. Unfortunately, these row of homes must have privacy issues as almost all of their blinds are closed.

The sea lions near Pier 39 seem to love attention from tourists, at least when they’re not just laying around.

That’s all for San Francisco for now. You can view larger versions of these photos as well as others in my gallery.

Neiman Marcus is one of the many shopping destinations for tourists, and it provides a beautiful view of Union Square through its windows.

San Francisco’s streets are full of characters, and small shops everywhere. In each visit, I’ve found it quite enjoyable to just walk around with no particular destination in mind.

A sculpture outside the science centre in Golden Gate Park.

I caught a relaxing glimpse of a toad at the Aquarium on Fisherman’s Wharf.

San Francisco is a city known for its hills and expensive real estate. This view is very familiar to tourists looking out from the Pier 39 area. Note that street cars comprise the primary transportation method to this area, not buses or subways (though the stops for those aren’t too far away either).

These houses seem to lean when making the very steep Telegraph Hill seem straight. There’s quite a dramatic difference between the left and right sides of the houses.

The Bay Bridge, palm trees, and old buildings make another unique street view. Palm trees are not native to SF. They have been shipped from elsewhere and quite expensively too.  Each tree cost, on average, $3,000-10,000.

Coit Tower overlooks many of the city’s neighbourhoods, with the Bay Bridge again in the background. The weather looks fine here, though it was quite windy and cold during most of this visit for me. Some areas of San Francisco which I didn’t visit apparently have harsh microclimates with colder temperatures and less sunshine than other parts of the city.

Evening begins to fall as a cable car prepares for its run. Sadly, San Francisco has fewer cable cars than it used to, but it has successfully resisted attempts to remove them entirely over the years. The forward-thinking minds of decades ago noted that tourists visiting the city don’t come to ride the buses. Friedel Klussmann was the resident who led the protest to protect the cable cars as they were going to shut down.  This is just one example of locals contributing to the city.  Coit tower is another example, which was built at the request of Lillie Hitchcock Coit who left one third of her estate to the city.

My trip also took me to wine country in the Napa Valley which comprises hundreds of small wineries.

The tours covered every step of the wine making process, including wine tasting samples.

Please check back soon for more photos from my San Francisco visit.

Many old buildings in Asheville were vacant for some time, but a large presence of artisans has generated enough interest to restore and maintain many of them. This particular building is notable for actually having curved glass on the corner.

Another part of Asheville’s active downtown.

My uncle and I rented a boat on a nearby lake.

Many people enjoy the lake. The homes on the lake have boat houses with doors that look like garage doors that open to the water.

Many mountain tops at different distances are visible from Asheville.

For a few more photos, please check out my gallery.

One of the sights to see in this city is CNN. The tour was a bit short, but did include live viewing of news anchors while on the air, as well as reporters collecting news from various sources.

I also saw the World of Coca Cola, and got plenty of souvenirs! The highlight of this tour was the tasting of dozens of Coca-Cola products from around the world. Some are quite delicious, particularly the foreign Fanta flavours.

This lion at the Atlanta Zoo seems quite relaxed, almost as if posing for my photo!

Atlanta has the beautiful Botanical Gardens with lots of great sights to see inside and out. This photo here almost seems like it could be a musical instrument of some sort.

Atlanta is also known for Martin Luther King Jr. There’s a national park set up in his honour across the street from the church where he preached.

I have many more photos from Atlanta in my gallery!

The scenery was beautiful with large rock faces and trees in the valleys, seemingly clinging to nothing on the rock.

Even though we weren’t super high up in the sky, clean white snow was still around in patches. Thankfully, it wasn’t too cold as most of Alberta was pretty much into its summer by the end of July.

About 3/4 of the way, there was a lake with more mountains away in the distance.

The view from the top!

A clear trail marks the best way through the mountains on this long, but beautiful hike.

Near the beginning of the trail, a stream runs though. There were actually several streams. After over 6 hours of hiking, we were anxious to find the parking lot again on the way back, but this is what we kept seeing instead!

After the hike, we had dinner in Canmore before returning to Calgary. I look forward to more hikes again next year after Calgary’s 9-month winter is done for another year again!

A news reporter caught up with me as I was watching video tributes to Steve. You can see me in the video clip below.

Below are a few videos that I would like to share for their inspiration.

“Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world… are the ones that do.”

“Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish”

Steve Wozniak, Apple co-founder, tearfully remembers Steve Jobs.

Goodbye Steve.

A few seconds followed by a walk across a stage caps off over two years of research and hard work.

One highlight of my time in academia the media exposure received by my emotional robot control project, leading to dozens of blog posts and articles around the world, and a live television interview on Breakfast Television Calgary.

I’d finally like to also share some photos from an iLab party shortly after my defence in January.

My time in the Interactions Labs broadened my interests and changed my view of the world more than I imagined it could have. So much has changed in my life since I flew into Alberta for the first for a tour of the university in April 2008. I am grateful for the experience.

You can view a few more photos of my convocation in my gallery.

Until you are near the town, it seems like a normal highway. Then, the badlands appear, and you’re there.

This is the view of Drumheller from inside the world’s largest dinosaur.

The dinosaur bones are quite fascinating to see in person at the Royal Tyrrell Museum. It’s hard to tell from this photo, but this display was quite large. I was only as tall as the legs, if that.

This display showed a neat little bird.

Another one of Drumheller’s attractions is Little Church. It is designated as an actual place of worship that seats six at a time. At one time, it had stained glass windows and a brass bell according to the town web site.

Check out my gallery for more photos of Drumheller.

This post is my first in a series. I haven’t had much time to update my blog yet this year, but I plan to do this more frequently since I now have quite a growing backlog of photos to go through!

Our first trip outside to Calgary was of course to Banff and Lake Louise. This beautiful vista is a popular photo spot on the way to Banff.

My parents.

Beautiful downtown Banff boasts an impressive mountain backdrop.

My mom and my uncle.

The Banff Springs Hotel.

Me with my family in front of Lake Louise. There is still some ice covering the lake, but most of it is gone.

Me and my uncle.

A bird was seemingly quite eager to pose for photos. What else can you do besides relax beside Lake Louise?

View more photos in the gallery. Check back soon for more summer blog updates.

Our neighbour’s driveway is completely covered, as is their concrete wall out front. Their basement was refinished this past summer, and is almost entirely under water.

Another neighbour across the cove has water going above the living room window sill. The sun deck on the side is floating.

Other neighbours are also flooded. Like the previous, this sun deck is also floating. The contents of this cottage’s basement will likely be trash.

The front yard of my family’s cottage. Our boat house, where we store things for the winter, is half under water. Our biggest worry was that this building was going to fall off of its supports. Thankfully, this did not happen. The water is so high that you would be over your head in water if you stood where we usually sit in frotn of the water. The water line is usually several feet in front of the trees.

Water gushes with great force over the dam in St. George.

Another view of the same dam from the more picturesque side.

A few days later, the water has calmed down a bit, but mist has frozen over all of the trees. Beautiful!

View the full gallery: Charlotte County Flooding 2010