David Howell Travel Photography and Map Blog

Dreaming about travel. Savoring travel. Remembering travel.

Decent and kind people who you don’t share a common language with. Unexpected challenges. A smile. Patience. A comfortable seat at the window on a long train ride deep into the Alps. Curiosity with rewards. Quiet narrow country roads. Wind rustling the leaves of trees along a river whose name you can’t pronounce. Sheep bells. A muddy river in spring flood flowing out of a Mexican jungle. Birds with impossible colors….

This photograph depicts both sides of leisure.

While almost all of the passengers slept, this woman and many other crew members, were busy cleaning, cooking, and preparing for another day of leisure – for other people. For me, this image is a metaphor.

On one side of the glass, the deck is clean and ’ship-shape’, ready for very early morning strolling. On the other side of the glass, behind the scenes in a way, a woman (lower right) works hard to clean the glass….

I had been taking photographs for an hour or so as the morning brightened. I had walked all over the ship and explored the vantage points on all the decks….