Last month, I went on a two-day trip to New Orleans with friends. We spent the first day at cemeteries, and then walked around the French Quarter and Garden District the next morning. In case you don’t know why cemeteries in New Orleans are special, it’s because they consist entirely of above-ground tombs — because New Orleans is below sea level, they can’t bury the dead in the ground.

This first batch of pictures is from St. Louis Cemetery #1, which is quite old and contains tombs dating back at least to the Revolutionary War. It also holds the tomb of famous Voudou priestess Marie Laveau; to this day, followers pay their respects by making markings on her tomb and leaving offerings around it.

On my way home from the hamfest yesterday, I stopped at the Harmony Park Safari, a cageless animal preserve near Huntsville. It isn’t a zoo in the conventional sense, but more of a big natural enclosure with a gravel path for your car. They don’t have the same variety of animals as a typical zoo, but that is made up for by the fact that they can move around freely and will often walk right up to your window. Some of them are quite bold, in fact — at one point I had my passenger side window open to get a picture of a camel wandering to the right of my car, and before I knew it he had his entire neck inside and was reaching for a drink that was in the center console! The ostriches were also rather persistent, using their long necks to stare at me at eye level from a foot away, or to stick their heads inside for a better look.

This was an excellent setting for photography, although I didn’t get nearly as many usable pictures as I wanted, and next time I will try to go closer to sunset, and do more continuous shooting rather than waiting for the animals to strike the perfect pose.

Harmony Park Safari doesn’t seem to have a website, but here is a link with some information and a map.

I went to the Birmingham Zoo again today, and it seems my photography skills are improving because I actually got ten images I was happy with out of around a hundred exposures. Of course, I’m also using different equipment now — today’s trip was mainly an excuse to use my DSLR and the Sigma 18-200 optically stabilized lens that finally arrived last week. Unfortunately I only lasted an hour in the heat, and I was also disappointed that the Lorikeet exhibit — where you can go inside and interact with the birds close up — was closed, but at least the reptile house was open this time. As usual, the photos are on Flickr, and you should be able to see previews below (including the earlier photos in the set).