While working in my archive, I felt like these two images went well together. So, I did a quick diptych in Adobe Lightroom.

On the left, 5,000 revelers take to San Diego’s Mission Bay during Floatopia. On the right, a fundraising dinner at a home on Country Club Drive in La Jolla.

J Parson watches emergency crews work at the scene of a car accident outside of Girard, Kansas.

The past year my dad, J Parson, pushed his music career ever higher with the release of his fifth CD — his first with a full band accompaniment — and gigs across the country. It still seems funny to me, even several years since he got serious about his cowboy songs. I still only see Dad. But, I’ve also come to appreciate that his style — boots, hats, sunglasses, guitars — is distinctive and not to be taken as commonplace among dads in general.

I’ve collected my favorite images of my dad from the past year or so, viewable below.

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Best of January 2011 – Images by Will Parson

If you’re having trouble viewing the slideshow, click here!

A corrupted view of Vancouver, British Columbia, overlooking English Bay.

An interesting thing happened after driving back into the United States from Vancouver, British Columbia in July. Something that would have been a nightmare had I been on assignment.

At some point, while transferring files, my new and apparently malcontent card reader decided to gnaw on some of my RAW format image files. I was left in a quandary, needless to say, but remaining calm I searched the internet for solutions and came across File Juicer. This nifty little program quickly turned by useless .CR2 files into slurry and sifted out the embedded jpegs.

Though some were in worse shape than others, I was able to get usable images of every scene I photographed from a full day’s take. And it so happens that some of my favorite images were the corrupted ones.

Spectators watch the 2010 Celebration of Light contest, where teams from different countries compete with firework shows set to music on Vancouver

A corrupted view of Lynn Canyon Park in North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

A corrupted view of Lynn Canyon Park in North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

A corrupted view of Lynn Canyon Park in North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

And here are some uncorrupted ones for good measure.

Spectators watch the 2010 Celebration of Light contest, where teams from different countries compete with firework shows set to music on Vancouver

Capilano Salmon Hatchery near Capilano Lake, North Vancouver, British Columbia.

See more images from my corrupted view of Vancouver in my archive gallery: Touring the West – Vancouver.

This fishing derby came a day after these photos of the Little Balkans Festival. It took place at Lakeside Park, and though the “lake” is quite scenic it is really just an artificial pond.

Sophie Allison Chapman competes in the Little Balkans Days fishing derby, Sep. 5, 2010.

It’s been two months since my last post from my summer travels in the American West. Having finished a separate spat of travels between then and now, and seeing how I left off previously in Montana, I’ll pick back up in Glacier National Park.

I haven’t lived anywhere that truly gets cold in the winter. Yet, even in the middle of July, while staying in the warmest campground in Glacier, the chill crept in and dominated my coastal-minded sensibilites.

In that vein, I present these excerpts from my journal:

“After pitching our tent we judged the local climate and put on real shoes instead of trying to hike in our 5-finger Vibrams.”

“With Mt. Brown Lookout coming into view I spotted a pathetic little snow drift, just a few feet long, that had avoided melting all July.”

“… dinner was miso soup mixed with tuna and peas — the soup intended to further warm our miserably damp bodies.”

My first weekend in Southeast Kansas coincided with the annual festival known as Little Balkans Days, held in Pittsburg to commemorate the region’s history as a melting pot of European immigrants back at the start of coal mining in the 1860s. I didn’t catch many of the events, like the traditional singers or the quilt show, but I did catch a baby contest and a petting zoo, the latter being very popular with the kiddies.

A week ago I drove halfway across the country, to the land where Superman was raised. Travel through Southeast Kansas and aside from endless green fields and crops you’ll find roadside attractions like the Yellow Brick Road in Sedan or the house from Little House on the Prairie, echoing Kansas’ role as a cinematic emblem of Americana. In this corner of the state for the next several weeks I’ll be exploring what it means to live in the Midwest.

Historically, the local industries have centered around mining and agriculture. Foreigners flowing directly into the region from Ellis Island in the 1860s resulted in Southeast Kansas getting nicknamed the Little Balkans. Across the road from our house is a fried chicken restaurant and a church. So it’s not so much that I wondered why the city of Pittsburg, Kansas — roughly 25 miles from Joplin, Missouri — has only one mosque. It came as a surprise that they had any at all.

I contacted the Islamic Society of Southeast Kansas to arrange a visit, and as chance would have it the next morning I made it there for an 8 A.M. feast on Eid ul-Fitr, the holiday marking the end of Ramadan. Inside I was welcomed by Syed Yacoob Ahmed, a tall Indian man who quickly shook my hand then bounded back to the front of the room to lead a prayer and deliver a sermon.

Later Syed told me how he had decided to leave India to study in America, applied to CSU Los Angeles and Pittsburg State — only learning later that Pitt State wasn’t in Pennsylvania. He got into both schools but decided to go to Pittsburg, which is a much more affordable town. After college he found a job locally, got married, and has been there ever since.

Pittsburg Masjid was founded in 1999 on the site of a former bakery a few miles outside the main drag. Its congregation used to span northeast Oklahoma and Southwest Missouri until a newer Mosque was built in Joplin, 25 miles across the state line. A good amount of worshippers are students, representing the diversity a university has brought the small town.

I also noted a few families, whose children who received toys after a delicious communal meal which I washed down with an apple juice box.

A hen is perched in the barn of my family's Girard, Kansas home.

I’m in the small town of Girard, in the southeast corner of Kansas, not too far from the Missouri border. I’ve been documenting the surrounding areas since driving here from San Diego a week ago, but with a ton of photos in my backlog I thought I’d share a teaser.

Reckless the horse lives with a small herd of cattle.

It pays to seek out the interesting folks you can find on the road. Pulling into the small town of Whitehall, Montana, I spied a bicycle weighed down with cross-country packs, resting outside the town’s cafe. Liz and I decided to stop for lunch and ordered a couple burgers from a harried waitress while absorbing the stares of tables full of locals. We found our seats, and I panned the room for the owner of the bike.

I found a tanned woman with gray hair, wearing spandex. I walked over and asked if she’d like to sit with us, and she courteously accepted. Through our conversation I found out she was on the tail end of a solo trip from Virginia to Idaho. Her name was Jan, and she had more adventure stories than would fit into one lunch. For one, if I remember right, she had ridden a train through Mongolia while pregnant. After finishing her burger and tall chocolate milkshake she gave me her card, which had a link to her blog.

Before she left, Jan also mentioned visiting nearby Lewis and Clark Caverns, which we had completely overlooked while planning our trip. The state park was only a few miles away. It was lucky that we ran into Jan, because otherwise we wouldn’t have backtracked and spent the afternoon crawling through stalagmites hundreds of feet under Montana.

Touring the West – Lewis and Clark Caverns – Images by Will Parson