Travel Photos: My 7 Super Shots

There’s a fun meme going around right now via Hostel Bookers called My 7 Super Shots, where bloggers are asked to share some of their best photos in 7 different categories. After being nominated to take part by Travel Yourself, A Cook Not Mad, and Yomadic all in the same day, I figured it was time to start sifting through all my thousands travel photos.

This definitely was not easy. But here are my 7 super shots:

1. A photo that… takes my breath away:

This one was SO hard to choose. It was a toss up between this an a photo of Lake Hawea, but ultimately this photo of the Grand Canyon at sunset won because the scene in real life did indeed take my breath away, as does this memory of it.

2. A photo that… makes me laugh or smile:

This photo requires a bit of explanation. Before my sister and I left on our cross-country road trip last summer, our dad warned us to “watch out for nuts,” meaning beware of crazy people on the road. But we decided to interpret it literally at a truck stop in Indiana, and sent my dad this photo with the caption, “I’m sorry to report this, but the nuts got Melissa.” I still nearly die of laughter when I look at this photo of my sister covered in Planters peanuts.

3. A photo that… makes me dream:

This photo doesn’t make me “dream” in the sense of daydreaming about traveling to some far-off location, but rather makes me dream about many of my childhood memories. This shot was taken in Mill Creek Park in Youngstown, Ohio, not far from where I grew up. I have great memories of going to this old mill as a kid with my grandma, and tried to give the photo a dreamy feel with the use of HDR.

4. A photo that… makes me think:

I’ve admitted before that memorials and military cemeteries really get to me; they touch me on a very emotional level, and always leave me thinking about sacrifice and freedom and how damn lucky I am to be able to live my life and follow my travel dreams. It was no different when I visited the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific last year in Hawaii, where I took this photo of one of the walls of honor.

5. A photo that… makes my mouth water:

Just a simple vegetable salad, yes, but this salad from Winds Cafe in Yellow Springs, Ohio, still makes my mouth water every time I look at it. Winds only uses fresh, locally-grown ingredients in their food, and this summer salad was perhaps one of the best I’ve ever eaten. Yum.

6. A photo that… tells a story:

There are a lot of stories to be told in Christchurch, New Zealand, where the effects of a disastrous and fatal earthquake are still being felt and dealt with. I visited the city 3 months after the February 2011 quake, and took this photo in front of a ruined street. The flowers on the fence and the message of Kia Kaha (“stay strong”) written in ribbons brought tears to my eyes. Mother Nature certainly can be cruel.

7. A photo that… I am most proud of (AKA my worthy of National Geographic shot):

Again, this photo was nigh on impossible to choose. I’ve taken a lot of shots that I’ve been proud of over the past year or two, and I was really torn. In the end, though, I settled on this one, taken while hiking on the Franz Josef Glacier in New Zealand, looking out over the glacial valley.

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So now I’m supposed to nominate 5 others to participate. I’d like to see 7 Super Shots from:

• C’est Christine
• Katie Going Global
• Don’t Ever Look Back
• Brooke vs. the World
• Suzy Guese

Thanks for checking out my 7 Super Shots! Which one is your favorite?