Around the World in Pictures: Introduction

Welcome to Around the World in Pictures. My name is Jim Donten and I am the photographer and author of the site. I have enjoyed digital photography since my first digital camera in 2003. Since then I have accumulated a large collection of digital photos. I have also been published numerous times by the Charlotte Stone Crabs, Sarasota Reds, Cincinnati Reds and most recently the Verizon Yellow Pages 2009-2010 (inside cover and three other pages).

In addition to taking pictures, I also enjoy traveling, history and sports (mainly baseball). I enjoy visiting theme parks, nature trails and catching minor league baseball. Everywhere I go, I travel with my camera and am always trying to capture the moments through the lens.

I began using my Kodak 3.2 megapixel digital camera very heavily once we got it in 2003. Suddenly a love for photography was born. I enjoyed the ease of digital, you could take as many pictures as you wanted without the expense of film or processing. I mainly shot vacation and theme park pictures. A few years later, I upgraded to a 5.1 megapixel Sony. I will hopefully upgrade again soon once finances allow, hopefully to a Canon SLR.

I began posting my pictures online via pbase in 2007 . Since then the viewers of my have increased to over 170,000 visitors. However the pictures were lacking the stories behind them and I felt the need to tell the whole story. But not knowing how to get started and the fear of failure kept me from going further.

In 2007 I took my photography to a whole new medium, professional baseball. I have always enjoyed baseball and bringing the camera to the game began a new side of the game for me. I shot several home games of the Sarasota Reds during the 2007 & 2008 seasons. Then in 2009, the Charlotte Stone Crabs began their inaugural season about ten minutes from my house and dramatically increased the number of games I could attend.

The inaugural season of the Stone Crabs was also my introduction into writing. I began a partnership with Rays Prospects in which I provided them with coverage of the Stone Crabs via print and photos. I continued to improve my writing style and built up the confidence to start my own site.

So on Halloween 2009, I took that leap into my own site and opened up Around the World in Pictures. The site will provide an insight to the placed I have traveled to throughout the years. The reviews will include a history and travel style review that will hopefully bring the pictures to life and make it feel like you were there.

I will write a review for each place I have visited and if it’s a place that I have been to a bunch, each visit will take a closer look into a different aspect of the site. The articles will feature a similar layout with links back to the photo gallery by either clicking on the photo in the story or on the link in the last line of the story. All stories will be tagged, so you can quickly search for all articles from a certain topic (state, city, attraction, etc). I will also include my baseball game photo stories.

Beginning today, I will post all future travels as soon as I return. I will also begin posting past travels as time allows. I went through my galleries and currently have almost 200 topics to write about, not including the baseball photo stories.

All articles will be posted on the date the site was visited, not the date the article was written. So my most recent travel will always be on top, even though it may not be the most recent posted article. To make it easier to find newly added material, I created two ways to track the updates, Yahoo Group and Facebook Group. To sign up for either of theses services, click on the link in the sidebar and follow the instructions. Yahoo will send you an e-mail each time I add an article and Facebook will show a preview in the news feeds each time content is added.

So know you know the rest of the story behind the site. I hope you enjoy what you see. Please pass the word around about the site. You can contact me at jwdonten@comcast.net if you have any questions, comments or suggestions. Thanks for visiting.

Jim Donten
October 31, 2009

Florida Gulf Coast Railroad Museum

Parrish, Florida: Nestled in quiet Parrish, Florida is a museum in which you do not only view the exhibits, you ride them as well. The Florida Gulf Coast Railroad Museum was founded in 1981 and takes guests on a 1 1/2 hour excursion on six miles of railroad formerly owned by Seaboard Air Lines.

The Museum has a quite a vast collection of railway equipment. The collection revolves around their locomotives with Florida Gulf Coast 1835 (Former Army 1835) being the workhorse of the group. The locomotive collection also includes: Seaboard Air Lines 1633, Pennsylvania Railroad 8604, Florida Gulf Coast 100, Cargill 61 and BEDT 12 Porter. In addition to the locomotives, the museum has several trains cars from various classes including: Pullmans, Coaches, Baggage Cars, Freight/Cargo Cars and Cabooses.

In addition to the weekend train excursions from Parrish to the Willow Train Yard and back, the museum offers several specialty train rides. In the past, the museum sponsored the following specialty rides:

Train Robbery- a staged train robbery featuring the infamous “Hole in the Head Gang”.
Von Kessigner Express- a World War II reenactment in which you are swept into a last minute escape by the German general’s troops as they try to avoid Allied capture.
Pumpkin Patch Express- a train ride to the pumpkin patch for games, hay rides and picking of a pumpkin.
North Pole Express- a train ride to the North Pole for a visit with Santa with carolers and hot chocolate along the way.
Civil War Reenactment- transport back to the day of the Civil War and see how important the train was to the war efforts.

We visited the museum in October 2009. You can see more photos of the museum on my photo site by clicking on the photo above or visiting the Florida Gulf Coast Railroad Museum photo page.