Headed out to Cuba last Monday, got back on pretty much a red eye flight Tuesday morning at 4 am.  Was a pretty long flight back, being tucked in a little space.  I believe the flight was a solid 6 hours, going there was about 5 hours 40 minutes.

Spent 7 days at a 5 star resort which would normally be about a 4 in Mexico, I think mostly because the US doesn’t have any influence on the country.  Beaches are a lot better then Mexico with flatter, warmer and clearer water.  You also don’t have Mexicans bugging ya every few minutes to buy shit.

We headed into the Capital of Cuba, Havana for a day trip.  Saw how a lot of Cubans lived and what they lived in.  Some very interesting structures as well as a lot of variety of vehicles.  Many 50′s Americana cars, Chinese buses and Russian sports cars with very old Spanish architecture.

Didn’t do too much of the culture stuff since we stayed at an all inclusive but it was still quiet an eye opener see how these people lived.

Grabbing some of my favorite shots, I’ll add more probably to flickr later on.

Havana city from the top of a hotel

City 15k from our resort. Ran there...running was tough in 26 degree heat

Havana market in the capital of Cuba

Beach by our resort

Here are some shots from last  weekend.  Headed over to the island last week and found some good spots.  Pretty happy with a few shots, enjoy.

Interesting vending machine

Chinatown in Victoria

This was a week before Halloween at Value Village...luck I guess no one was in the image.

Busy everywhere but the baby cloths

little alley in the between chinatown

Just after the skinny alley

Some shots from friday night.  Fun time, good turn out and all around great event.  Some great feed back and thanks for all who attended. Can’t wait for our next show.

Thought I would share some of what I saw on the way into Vancouver this morning.  It was about 6:30.  Some pretty good light just after some rainin.  I’m needing to use the camera more…

Month Long show is up til the 30th of September. We are hoping to do an opening reception on the 18th starting a 9pm, so if you haven’t been to see whats up on the walls –come out and check it out. Here are shots of whats up!

Headed up to Penticton Once again this weekend, this time for the ironman.  Had a friend in it last year and watch him conquer that bitch.  He skipped this year but him and I and a few others went up to watch and sign up this year.  Great weather, good time, and pretty pumped up for next year.  Camped in the line up over night so we could make sure we would get our spot.

600 dollars for 3.8kms of swimmin, 180kms of bikin, and the old 42.2kms of runnin.  The worse 600 dollars I ever spent.  I plan on doing some fund raising with this stupid adventure and bloggin as much interesting info as possible.

Unfortunately this year one man die in the events 27 year history.  A 60 plus man died of a heart attack just after the swim.  I am seriously thinking about using the heart and lung foundation as my charity of choice, but I am  open to suggestions as well.

Trying to get everything loaded up and ready.  Having some fun getting everything ready.  Few shots of whats going down.  Studio is getting a little full.  Tuesday is going to come fast.

Placing some imagery together for the upcoming show for the month of  September, and had a bit of a slow down.  Ended up shipping a few images off to the press tonight.  See how everything matches up and how well the colors look hopefully tomorrow night.  I am doing something similar to what I did for the show in Calgary but with a little different technique and a few more steps.  :: link ::

Here are the  images I am currently working with and hopefully by friday I’ll have a pretty good idea of an end result.  I’ll show all the steps once everything is put together.

Last week while I was in Seattle I headed to the Rock and Roll museum, the building alone is quite interesting.  Admission was 14.50 and I would say it’s worth going, especially if you are a Jim Hendrix fan.  They had a huge amount of Jimmy things from over the years,  I didn’t realize that he was from Seattle.  Plenty of facts, images, clothing and  smashed up guitars.

Two things that really stuck out for me was the large guaitar sculputure, with the second being how well they had their interactive displays layed out.  You could spend a solid few days combing over all the information that they had.  Along  with the music history and displays they also carry other displays.  When we were there they were getting ready for a large science fiction display with a lot of star trek crap as well as a third section for the kids carrying Muppet “stuff”.

Right close to the space needle

I love this photo. I like taking photos of people taking photos....

huge video display...you don't need to pay to see it.

the white cello was a nice touch on the sculpture

Yours truely and four other artists are hitting up The Fall Gallery @ 644 Seymour St, in the heart of Vancouver, BC for the month of September.  Stop in if your in or around the downtown core.  I’ll have all new work with some sneak peaks later on next week.

Finally got my butt down to the second beach pool in Stanley Park on Saturday, the thing closes labour day weekend.  I’ve been meaning to get down there all summer but stuff keeps getting in the way.  I got there right at opening so I could have the pool to myself.   Opens at 10am and closes just before dark , 50 meter laps with three pretty wide lanes.  Make sure you take your tinted googs.

Breast Cancer walk was the same morning.  Took some quick shots before I jumped in the pool.

Cancer Walk

From the Path

shallow end

...

So while I was down in Oregon I was able to get a few training sessions in.  I always enjoy looking for new  places to run, but more importantly places to run with good scenery.  So on the Saturday afternoon I ended up running a good route that I scouted in the morning.  This run had everything, hills, beach, trail, and sketchy roads.

I strapped my backpack on with my camera and head out right from the camp site at Sandlake.  I headed East, back to the main road and then jumped on the 101 hwy.  This was a nice flat section which was about 2 miles.  Once I got to the 101 is was all up hill.  I’ve been doing a lot of hill training in the last two weeks but this was a lot more then what I wanted to do!.

The looped running route

So it was a straight up  hike to the top of Cape Lookout.  This area of the run was a welcome cool down.  Cape Lookout usually has a lot of cloud and moisture hanging around it,  Saturday was no different.  The camp site had hot sun while the top of cape lookout was cloudy and felt like it was raining.  I finally reached to top after about an hour and 40 mintues.  At the top of Cape Lookout there were three trails.  I want to explore them all but only one was able to make in a loop run and jet me back to the site.  South Point trail was a 1.8mile straight down hike back.  I think it took me about 20 minutes or so to get down.

about 3 qauters down

About Half way down, Cape Lookout to the right

Looking South...Sandlake is to the right

End of the trail. This sign was at the bottom of the trail.

Took my shoes off and ran the 3.11 miles  along the beach.  Great run.  More shots here.

Some surfering going down at the bottom of the trail

Half way down the beach.

Tide was out-lots of room to run.

3 hours round trip-with photo stops.

We got in Thursday night and hit Artlife Friday afternoon to hit the walls with our Art.  Things turned out really well, and the space was amazing for our little show.  I still have to get show images up but here are some shots of what we had to deal with as well as some of the set up to get the show ready.

Store Front Friday Afternoon

The Space before we started hanging.

My Shit on the Wall

Getting things in Place...

Artlife is located  at 1312 1st SW Calgary Alberta Canada.  Website is here.