Yearly, Gauchos (Uruguayan Cowboys) and not gather in Tacuarembo, Uruguay (northern Uruguay) for a huge Gaucho Festival. An entire “camp” is set up around a medium sized lake just outside the city. The camps (in the grounds) are traditional gaucho camps and homes, displaying and demonstrating traditional living. Among other events, there are a parade and a rodeo.

More photos available in my Gaucho Festival in Tacuarembo Flickr Photo Set.

In the far northern part of Montevideo, about a 20 minute drive, is the Prado. Among the many things in the Prado area is the National Botanical Gardens. We were a little before the season for everything to be fully in bloom, but there were a variety of flowers still. There was also a Hawk prowling the grounds.

More photos in my Montevideo Prado Botanical Gardens Flickr Set.

Montevideo, of course, has a lot of beaches. It has a massive coastline, most of which is actually along a river (Rio de la Plata) rather than the ocean. The further east you go, the better the water is.

Many more pictures of waves and the beach in my Montevideo Flickr Set.

Not long after arriving in Montevideo, I had the opportunity to take a quick tour of Montevideo. We didn’t stay anywhere long, but we got a layout of town, where the historical areas were and a bit of the history related to them. Pictured here (in order): Cannons at the Cerro, Flowers at the Japanese Gardens, Plaza Zabala, and the Antel Building across the River Plate.

A variety of other pictures from the tour are in my Montevideo Tour Flickr Set.

Continuing the journey… I was near Manassas for work took a visit to the battlefield on the weekend. The short tour was fairly interesting. There was much more to the site than what we visited, but it was a scorching hot day, so we kept close to the visitor’s center.

More photos in my Manassas Battlefield Flickr Set.

One evening we went down to the Bay Bridge for some late evening/night photography. The results came out decently, I think.

More photos in my San Francisco Flickr Set.

It was late evening when I got to Central Park, so I did not take many pictures. However, Autumn in central park is a very pretty time and I’d managed to show up at the peak.

More pictures within my New York Central Park Flickr Set.

While back in the states visiting my parents, we went up to Mena, Arkansas for a walk and some photo taking. The day could not have been better and we got some really good pictures. We went up into the national park there, as well as around town. There’s an old train station museum in town that was interesting (at least from the outside, we were too late to go inside).

More photos at my Mena, Arkansas Flickr Set.

One of my visits was to Innerspace Caverns.  These are caverns that were discovered during a mjaor highway constructon project.  They’d been sealed for thousands of years until core samples found them.  There’s several tours avaialble through the day and they’re interesting.  I did the mid-level tour.

As usual, more pictures at the Innerspace Caverns Flickr Set.

On the trip through Texas we stopped at the state capitol building. It’s an interesting building to walk through and has pretty grounds.

More pictures in The Texas State Capitol flickr set.