View Obscura

 Story and Photos by Ken Hulsey In 2023, I captured a delightful image of the Kansas City Southern Executive Train powered by vintage FP9 and F9B locomotives as it passed through Pineville, Louisiana at night. This photo has always been a favorite of mine, as it was one of my first successful attempts at photographing a train in action after dark.

 Story and Photos By Ken Hulsey During my lunch break, I explored the sites where the old Louisiana & Arkansas (KCS) and Southern Pacific railroad depots once stood, just south of downtown Alexandria. These sites were once bustling railroad hubs, but today only their foundations remain, the structures having been demolished. To the casual observer, the sites would appear to be nothing more than an abandoned parking lot or old car dealership - in fact, I drove by the former Southern Pacific depot numerous times without ever noticing it, until a colleague pointed it out to me.

 Photos and Story By Ken Hulsey This weekend, our granddaughter wanted to visit the newly built playground at the corner of Masonic Drive and Babe Ruth Drive. While my wife and the little one went to play, I decided to take a stroll around the old Bringhurst Field - once the home of the minor league Alexandria Aces baseball team. The once-beautiful ballpark is now just a shell, with most of the brick gone and only the metal skeleton of the old bleachers remaining.

 On Monday I was lucky enough to catch the Union Pacific Heritage Locomotive #1982. painted in Missouri Pacific colors, on the lead of a train sitting idle just north of the yard in Alexandria, Louisiana. It took some creative driving to be able to find a parking spot near enough for me to walk to a location to get these shots. Despite the extreme heat it was worth the efforts to get shots of this beautiful locomotive. 

  Terri and I have just returned from viewing a wonderful set of prints by the master of modern abstract art Pablo Picasso at the Alexandria Museum of Art. I have to admit that it was a real thrill to be able to view the works of such a renowned and influential artist up close. 

 For the past few days we have noticed that our tap water has a strong fish-like odor. The smell is so bad that we have had to buy bottled water to wash our dishes and cook our food. This may become a problem because local stores are starting to sell out. 

 This past weekend Terri and I were doing a little shopping at the Alexandria Mall when our tummies started grumbling, so we decided to stop by the food court for lunch. I was surprised to see a Mexican Food restaurant called Habanero where there used to be a rather sub-par Chinese food place used to be. Being the adventurous type, and a well-known lover of Mexican Food, I decided to give the place a try. I'm oh so happy that I did.

 The quest for some great Mexican Food in the South continues! Being a transplant from the Southwest now living in Louisiana I embarked on an epic quest to find a great plate of south of the border food in a vast region populated with more crawfish and jambalaya restaurants than you can shake an alligator tail at.  

 Last weekend my darling wife and I decided to see if we could find a good place to watch the rise of the Blue Super Moon. Since the next time that our moon will be this close to Earth again won't be until 2034 we decided to pack up our camera gear and try to get some once in a lifetime images. I wanted to try and find someplace not too far from home so I decided to try the nearby England Airpark. I knew that there was a lot of open space near Heritage Park so that's where we began our stakeout. We arrived at the park just after sundown and wandered around for a bit looking at the vintage fighter planes that are on display there. I decided to try and adjust my camera settings by taking a few shots around the park in the dark. I soon found myself trying to get a bit artsy by attempting to capture images that featured the stark contrast of light and dark. The park provides some great opportunities for this around the illuminated fountains that border the traffic circle. I'm a...

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Last night my buddy and fellow photographer Josh and I traveled down to the Indian Creek Recreation Area and took in their annual fireworks show over the water. The show was rather brief but beautiful and everyone there had a great time. Josh and I put our photography skills to the test and we both were able to capture some truly amazing images. I actually got a ton of really great shots that I'm rather proud of. I already shared several on my Facebook page and I wanted to showcase many of those here as well. If you ever get an urge to travel over to Indian Creek I highly recommend paying the area a visit. The lake is beautiful and there plenty of spaces for camping. Here are some of my photos from last night: