Photos are meant to be shared
In the nineteenth and early twentieth century Baile Herculane was one of the fanciest spa resorts in Europe. Kings and emperors were guests here. It is still visited but the decay of the historic part of town in contrast to the contemporary spa shows how the taste of the modern world differs from what has been before.
https://hrs-ontherailsagain.blogspot.com/2024/06/on-my-way-back-from-anatolia-4.html
Living in the open or in caves, used to be for thousands of years the modus operandi, the normal thing. With the accumulation of wealth, pretty artful building was possible. Likewise, with the decline of wealth of the working class (AKA: middle class), once pretty and well livable homes fall apart and show the scars of time.
Old and Pretty: I was born in this little town, Waldenburg. With its simple medieval architecture, it survived for more than 800 years, adding artfully new onto old.
And then there are those homes that had charm years ago, before wealth and living conditions declined.
And then there are the wonderful cities, like San Francisco, where a cheap apartment starts at $1.2 millions with no limit to the top.
The town of Ostrava in Czech republic had rich coal deposits close to the surface. In the 19th century the area developed into a center of mining and steel production. After the fall of the Berlin Wall the mines and most of the steel works closed. However, the enormous coal mine, cooking and steel production plant in the southern suburb of Viscovice will be preserved as a technical monument to industrialisation.
The whole story is here:
https://hrs-ontherailsagain.blogspot.com/2024/05/on-my-way-to-anatolia-5.html
From 1939 until 1963, Alcatraz housed the most fearsome prisoners in the US. By inmates, often called “Hellcatraz” for its brutal living conditions. An unknown writer described Alcatraz as “the great garbage can of the San Francisco Bay, into which every federal prison dumped its most rotten apples.” Here, in this picture you see the Warden’s House and the Lighthouse. A house of luxury, the warden’s house often held lavish cocktail parties. In 1970, the island was occupied by Native Americans, and the Warden’s House burned down, before Red Power Activists were forcefully removed from the island. The protest group chose the name Indians of All Tribes (IAT). IAT claimed that, under the treaty of Fort Laramie between the U.S. and the Lakota, all retired, abandoned, or out of use federal land was to be returned to the indigenous peoples.
The San Joaquin Valley, you can pass through in many ways, just staying on crowded freeways, or taking the little back country roads. One of those many back country roads is Highway 33, kinda passing diagonally – from northeast to southwest. Collapsing buildings and failing farm structures are plentiful, although one after the other is eventually pushed over, when not by bulldozers, then by wind and weather.
This old barn, I have seen many times, last a couple of years ago, with the roof still intakt, but turned green with moss growing on it during the wet winter season. Finally, I came back to photograph it.
Big areas near me are covered by greenhouses. Only seldom they give up, but when they do it is usually a good chance to take some shots
