Tag Archives: travel

Narrow Street, Heidelberg

Narrow Street, Heidelberg
People stroll past a restaurant along a narrow street of Altstadt-Heidelberg

Narrow Street, Heidelberg. Heidelberg, Germany. July 10, 2013. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

People stroll past a restaurant along a narrow street of Altstadt-Heidelberg

Here is another photograph from our 2013 visit to Heidelberg, Germany. (And London, and Bavaria, and Salzburg. Can we go back, now?) We stayed within walking distance of the altstadt section of Heidelberg, the old town area along the Neckar River and near the castle, and we walked over by way of the Philosophen Weg many times, hiking up and over a small hill between where we stayed and this popular area.

Being in the old town, it is no surprise that the streets are very narrow here. In most of this section of the town there are no cars, and people walk everywhere — except for the many folks on bicycles — and restaurants spill out onto the streets.


G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | FacebookGoogle+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email


All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell or others where indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Alps, Berechtesgaden National Park

Alps, Berchtesgaden National Park
A trail passes through the Bavarian Alps of Berchtesgaden National Park, Germany

Alps, Berchtesgaden National Park. Berchtesgaden, Germany. July 18, 2013. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A trail passes through the Bavarian Alps of Berchtesgaden National Park, Germany

This was a special day on our three-week 2013 trip to England, Germany and a bit of Austria. Most of the trip, not surprisingly, was a rather urban experience. (I like those, too!) Particularly in London, the least urbanized part of the experience were brief visits to urban parks. Heidelberg perhaps had a less intensely urban feeling, though it still is very definitely a town/city environment for the most part. When we got off the train in Salzburg we were most certainly in another urbanized place, and even the beautiful area where we stayed in a Bavarian farmhouse was quite civilized — a town was a short distance away and we could walk to bakeries and even a restaurant. From the yard of the farmhouse we could look up to the alpine heights of the Watzmann, a truly alpine peak and the second highest in Germany, but it was something to look towards rather than a place to be.

This day started in a similar civilized manner: a drive to a large parking lot, purchasing tickets, and then getting on the Jennerbahn tram. The tram ride was, of course, spectacular as it took us up to a mountaintop lodge. But when we stepped out of that lodge and onto a system of trails that took us across a high ridge with views of spectacular alpine terrain and then dropped us into the top of a long high valley, this Sierra Nevada guy felt the familiar pull of mountains.


G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Silver Sandals

Silver Sandals
A person wearing silver sandals walks across wet concrete and stone, Trafalgar Square, London

Silver Sandals. London, England. July 8, 2013. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A person wearing silver sandals walks across wet concrete and stone, Trafalgar Square, London

We ended up in Trafalgar Square in the late afternoon. If I recall correctly, we were sort of between planned activities, so we just wandered around here a bit without any particular goal in mind —I think the plan was to meet up with others a bit later and head of to do something. Trafalgar is a busy place, surrounded by traffic and filled with tourists and others. This can make provide quite an opportunity for street photography, with the potential for just about anything to happen and for any sort of person to walk by.

Before long a cleaning crew showed up and went to work on a section of the square when lots of people had been congregating, using high pressure water to clean off the accumulated grime. Their method of clearing the area was fascinating. They blocked off a small section and then began spraying, gradually pushing out the boundaries, and spraying enough water to persuade those close by to move away. In the aftermath of some of this spraying, a person wearing silver sandals walked along this linear section of the square, with alternating stone, reflections, and shadows beyond.


G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | FacebookGoogle+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Salzburg, Bavarian Alps

Salzburg, Bavarian Alps
Countryside around Salzburg, Austria and the Bavarian Alps, as seen from the Hohensalzburg castle.

Salzburg, Bavarian Alps. Salzburg, Austria. July 17, 2013. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Countryside around Salzburg, Austria and the Bavarian Alps, as seen from the Hohensalzburg castle.

As I have mentioned in earlier posts, while we did not actually stay in Salzburg during our 2013 trip to London, Germany, and a tiny bit of Austria, were there on several days during our week near Berchtesgaden, Bavaria. We arrived in Salzburg by train from Heidelberg, and we left from Salzburg on the return journey. In between we made additional visit to Salzburg and the surrounding area.

On this visit we decided to walk up to and into the Salzburg Castle, sitting high above the old city. The castle is worth the visit for many reasons, but if you keep climbing… and climbing… and climbing you can eventually reach the highest accessible point, from which you have huge panoramic views in all directions. Behind me was the city itself, and stretching off in this direction was an alternative patchwork of buildings and fields and trees that appeared to reach all the way to the base of the Alps in the far distance.


G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | FacebookGoogle+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.