Photographing Food

On February 14, 2018 By Isobar ExpeditionsIn Recipes15 Comments

Like many people, we are always taking pictures of our food in restaurants and they usually turn out quite well, even though we just use our phones. Then we come home, recreate a recipe from someplace that we’ve traveled and take photos of the dish that we’ve created. We almost always dislike the pictures of our own dishes. We have read about different techniques from using a south facing window, how to plate the dish, color contrasts, etc., but still they just don’t seem to photograph well. Obviously, we don’t expect our food to necessarily look like it was prepared by a chef, we are only home-cooks and not classically trained.

We have heard that people don’t expect photographs of food to look perfect, like those from a magazine, and that a little messy can be just fine. No one has ever complained about our food pictures, other than ourselves, but we find that we are forever trying to improve at it. Maybe we are trying too hard, perhaps we should just sit down with our dinner and take a picture with our cell phone instead of taking them with our camera.

If anyone out there has some great advice, we would love to hear it. Just like we aren’t professional cooks, we also aren’t professional photographers, so if there are some simple tips, we would love to hear it. Maybe we are just being too hard on ourselves, but want to continuously improve what we do. Do any of you struggle with taking photographs of food or anything else?

Beating the Crowds in Yellowstone National Park

On February 6, 2018February 6, 2018 By Isobar ExpeditionsIn Travel Tips, Yellowstone21 Comments

Yellowstone National Park has such an amazing variety of scenery and wildlife that it is not surprising why people travel from around the world to visit. We have been fortunate enough to go to Yellowstone over a dozen times over the years and every visit has been as unique as the wildlife that we have seen. There have been times when trying to see the park has been a frustrating experience as the cars and RV’s turn the few roads that traverse the park into virtual parking lots. Joining the crowds at Old Faithful and the Grand Prismatic Lake can make it feel more like you are waiting in line at an amusement park rather than enjoying the beauty of one the most spectacular places on earth. Unless you enjoy people watching, there a few tips that should help you have a more enjoyable experience.

Get Off of the Roads – If you want to have a truly memorable experience, talk to the rangers and get a map of the various hiking trails that can be found throughout the park. The rangers will also be able to provide guidance as to which trails should be avoided due to bears or other predators that might be active in the area. Although everyone wants to see wild animals in their natural environment, having a close encounter with a grizzly bear is something that you definitely want to avoid. There are trails to suit almost anyone’s hiking capabilities from the very youngest to the older among us. There are even trails around some of the major attractions that will allow you to see them from angles that other tourists don’t get to see and the lack of crowds will make the experience even better. It is always amazing to us how just jumping onto the trail can transform the park from masses of people into a world of serene isolation.
Getting a Different View
All Alone on a Trail
Views without the Crowds
Go into the Park Early or Late in the Day – Many of the typical tourists that visit the park start their days around 8:00 am and leave the park in time to catch dinner outside of the park. Not only will getting up before dawn and heading into the park or staying until the sun is setting has the dual benefit of avoiding some of the crowds, but also increases the chances of seeing wildlife as the animals are more active as the sun rises and sets. Also, the earlier that you can get to some of the more popular spots, the fewer people you will have to share the experience with. After all, Old Faithful erupts approximately every hour and a half regardless of the time of day.
Brown Bear
Tranquil Pond
Elk Late in the Afternoon
Enter from the North Entrance – Obviously this depends upon where you might decide to stay, but the northern entrance from Montana is usually a little less busy than the West Yellowstone entrance or the southern entrance near Jackson Hole. Both of those entrances are in Wyoming and the southern entrance is probably the busiest. We love combining the Grand Tetons, Jackson Hole, and Yellowstone into a single visit, but perhaps not during the height of the tourist season, which leads directly to the next piece of advice.
Amazing Views
Getting Away from the Road
Grand Prismatic Lake
Go During the Off-Season – Although the only real off-season is winter, the earlier in spring or the later in autumn you are willing to go, the fewer people will be there along side of you. Personally, our favorite time to visit the park is during fall when the leaves are changing and the animals are actively preparing for winter. You need to be extra cautious when hiking in early spring or fall as the animals can be aggressive as they defend their feeding grounds at the end of the year or their newborns early in the year. As we mentioned before, always check with the rangers, regardless of the time of year, before hiking in the park. Don’t confuse the park with a zoo, these are wild animals who just happen to live in an area that is protected.
Moose in Winter
Seeing the Park Differently
Hiking in Autumn

Going to Yellowstone National Park should be on everyone’s list to visit at least once in their lives. You will need several days or preferably a week in order to see as much of the park as possible, so bring your camera, binoculars, and your patience. Hopefully these tips will help make your visit a little better, but just realize that their are a lot of other people who want to see a place with such natural beauty. You will never have the park to yourself, but there are ways to make the most of your experience.

How Do You Choose Your Next Travel Destination?

On February 2, 2018 By Isobar ExpeditionsIn Travel Tips13 Comments

Deciding where you want to spend your money and time visiting can be one of the more stressful decisions that anyone can make before traveling. There are many ways to make that decision and some of those might be determined by your personality. Some people are willing to throw a dart at a map and randomly go wherever fate might take them and other people use very rigid logic in making that decision. There are times when you pick a location because it has always been on your bucket list and there are other times when you have a fixed budget and you find a place that fits within it.

We choose our destinations based on a mix of all of those styles. We generally start with a relative date in mind and definitely have a budget in mind. From there we generally start searching airfares for a variety of locations as that is often the bulk of the expense and there aren’t always as many options. We try to go to someplace that we haven’t before and we basically start with several cities across those locations and then look for airfares using different apps. A good example of this was our first trip to South America where we looked at Peru, Columbia, Chile, but ultimately ended up choosing Bolivia.

During our time in Europe, choosing a location was far more random, but basically followed the same pattern. We would sit down for dinner on a Wednesday evening and toss out ideas of where to go that weekend and then check prices. Because we were traveling on fairly short notice, availability of transportation and hotels was usually a bigger deciding factor. If there was limited availability, it would normally drive prices up and we would decide to go someplace else.

We are currently trying to figure out our next big trip that will take place in the near future and are struggling with making a decision. Part of that is due to our own schedules and nailing down a time window and part of that is finding reasonable prices for the places that we are considering. We are leaning towards some place in Asia, but who knows if that is where we will end up traveling. This might sound insane to some people who plan things out years in advance, but for us, picking a destination can be as much a part of the adventure as the actual trip. How do you pick the places that you visit?