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Rooftop Bar at the Zamora

Another hot tip if you’re looking for cool place to hang out in St Pete’s beach Florida, try the rooftop bar at Hotel Zamora. If I’m not mistaken it’s fairly new because when I look it up on Google Maps it looks like a bare roof. But rest assured its been transformed into a swank pad with a great view of the Gulf.

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Rooftop Bar at the Zamora
Rooftop Bar at the Zamora in St Pete’s Beach Florida

I have a friend that’s getting married here shortly so I’m looking forward to coming back to hang out and taking some great photos.

It’s the kind of place I would go to if I were on vacation, only I live here so I need another excuse. The best excuse I can come up with is the day of the week called Saturday. Short of that I might even consider a staycation.

Along the back is Castile Restaurant overlooking the inter-coastal waterway. My wife and I stopped in for dinner, almost as an afterthought. We were surprised at the quality of food, presentation and service. It’s a hidden gem that we’ve just discovered.

florida gallery

Just down the street is the better-known Don Cesar hotel; it’s the pink building in the background. That’s a much bigger place with all the amenities of a large resort. But the photographer in me will choose a place with a rooftop bar over the better-known location any day. So for me, the Zamora is on the shortlist in the very near future.

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Follow Your Passion

I took this a couple of years ago at a kite festival on St Pete’s beach in Florida. This was part of an exhibition in synchronized flying. There were a couple more kites out of frame and they would all fly together in formation. The people flying these were pros that knew what they were doing. Who knew there was such a thing as professional kite fliers? Certainly not me, but you know what they say, follow your passion.

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Follow Your Passion
Follow your passion even if it means flying a kite

I’m not sure how they didn’t get the strings tangled or how they maintained their distance, but it was nothing short of precision; like the Blue Angels but a lot less risky. I’ve had a smaller version of one of these kites for years; it’s a lot of fun to fly but is anything but precise. I can appreciate how much practice must be involved. As it turns out some of these people came from other states to participate and compete.

I follow my passion for photography, as do these folks with their kites. Together there’s a symbiosis of sorts; each benefits the other. It reminds me of an event I was photographing a couple of weeks ago. There were professional athletes involved and several came up to thank me for being there to capture them. At first I was a surprised but later realized we both benefited. I fed off the energy of the athletes and some of them performed better for the camera. We elevated each other.

more kites

One of the unexpected pleasures of photography is coming in contact with people that are passionate about something. That cross-pollination creates an energy that’s greater than the sum of its parts. It doesn’t matter what it is, as long as there is passion involved. When that happens the sky’s the limit to what you can do, even if it means simply flying a kite.

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Scrub at Dusk

I took this in St Petes Beach a couple of weeks ago. The sun was coming down over the beach and there were people relaxing in hammocks just behind the dunes. I thought to get this low perspective and focus on the scrub rather than the scene. Basically I’m using the prominent part of the scene as backdrop. At times like this I try to look past the obvious and see something different in a scene. In this case I chose to focus on the dune and scrub while leaving hints of the hammocks as backdrop.

Scrub at Dusk
Scrub at dusk on St Petes beach

As a photographer I am immersed in the visual arts. As such I tend to be stimulated by visual nuances all around me. I’ve learned to allow myself to see more than the obvious. It reminds me of a simple rule for photography which is to look the other way. There’s a lot of wisdom in that because it challenges the idea that the obvious is most interesting.

Other images from Pinellas County in Florida

When the sun is at a low angle there are all sorts of compositions that present themselves differently than when the sun is high in the sky. Something as simple in a change of light is enough to create highlights that accentuate the shape and nature of things less obvious. Noticing this is a simple pleasure and just one of the many rewards I get through the practice of the art of photography.