Because of the multitude of precautions we took I choose not to bring a tripod or a medium format camera this time. I knew we were going to have to hike, cross rivers, etc, so I took my dads old plastic pocket camera, an Olympus XA. I suspect that the viewfinder electronics have fried themselves so I cannot tell what shutter speed it is on, although the internal meter is accurate enough to still take pictures. I’m looking for alternatives to a compact camera, I’ve been dreaming of owning a Leica M4-P which has the 28mm frame lines (one of my favorite lens), but I do like the look of the Leica M2. I want a M mount film camera to use my Zeiss Rangefinder’s on that are not seeing any use these days. I did have a Leica M4 in the past but sold it to help move across country, rangefinders are more difficult to use and at the time I couldn’t anticipate depth of field, with my Nikon F2 that I use now, I can do that, the lenses are cheaper so I’m not worried about loosing or dropping a $1,000 lens. Anyways, this camera had not been used in about 20 years. I know this because I found film in it that I developed which my dad had taken when my sister and I were both very little. The negatives actually turned out - somewhat grainy and color shifted, but I was entirely surprised when I saw the negatives since I had no idea what it could be. I swore I used the camera in the past- however I did pick up this same camera at a thrift store in Glendora for $10, I must have used that one. I later sold that camera to Fullerton Camera’s for $75 but kept my dads.

This trip was with @maiaandrea and @adventuringwithtrevor on a cloudy Sunday. I remember seeing this place on Sam and Colby’s channel a while ago. Trevor and I had linked up about a month ago to explore the Elan School up in Poland, Maine. Maia and I had met at a hotel briefly in Austin last year. In a crossroads of timing, we all linked up again on this Superbowl Sunday. Trevor was in PA going to school and Maia was visiting NYC, I was shooting a wedding in Long Island, and all decided to explore the abandon Nevele Hotel. I did not watch anything to prepare us, nor had I really remembered anything from the Sam and Colby video so everything was new and exciting finding all the ski’s, papers and various artifacts left behind. This was the best day and made my New York trip worth it.