Yashica 2018

          It's been a bit of a crazy year, the old Yashica doesn't get used much when I get busy. Still whenever I do get around to getting it out and eventually getting the film processed, it reminds me over and over that it's my all time favourite camera. It's about 66 years old now and still produces the same quality pictures every time. Getting it processed has always been tough. There is a little family owned shop in London that will still process the black and white 120mm film by hand that i've been using for years but it's not always easy to get down there. I'm just about halfway through another roll now, going to try to get it out more often. Anyways here are some photos from 2018.

The Big Doink

            So I got myself another Ironhead. While lurking on Kijiji early November as I went through my regular searches a Sportster pops up. Not just any Sportster, a reasonably priced 1974 Ironhead chopper. Complete with extended springer, Invader wheels and even a king-queen seat. If this isn’t good enough for ya, it turned up not even 10 minutes away. The add was very vague and the pictures were blurry, but I knew I had to take a look. Spoke briefly with a nice older lady on the phone and arranged to meet the next day. I arrived after work and she told me the brief history that she knew of the bike. She explained that it was her late husbands bike, and that when he retired was going to be one of his projects. She also told me that the bike has been sitting as it looked for nearly 15 years, the entire time they have had it and that he had never gotten around to even trying to start it. So I get in the cold garage and peel back the tarp that’s covering her up and there she is, and is she ever crusty. She had to be about 9 feet long. What the pictures in the add were hiding,  I soon discovered. The entire thing was covered in rust and crust. The neck was raked, tank had a leak at some point, the front brake was a death trap, had tons of custom “mods”, coil was somehow split nearly in half and carb was toasted. The wiring consisted of one fuse and 20-30 butt connectors attaching multi coloured wires all together. The rear fender struts also custom, had clearly broken at some point and had been repaired with a big chunky arc weld. Basically it was going to need a full tear down. The good things were the rake job didn't look all that bad, numbers were still there and the motor. The motor looked great, no black wrinkle paint on the case, no crazy aluminum weld repairs, the compression even dry tested good. After some negotiating, the bike would be going home with me. So there I was buying my third Sportster, and I was pumped to have something to work on over the winter. Chris Ness my good friend and neighbour was ready at the first sound of my phone call to come give me a hand loading it up and before I knew it, she in the garage and up on the lift. After a more thorough assessment I found even more “custom” made stuff and parts that had to go. I started right then and there to strip her down. Here’s some photos of how she looked when I got her, and some of the fun/creative/custom things that someone did to her throughout her life. I’ve determined she probably hasn’t been started for close to two decades, so with some love, lots of work and even more luck she’ll be purring by summer. She’s nicknamed The Big Doink, coming in at 9 feet long with a 16+ over front end and a crazy tall stance, she’ll hopefully be bouncing around the neighbourhood soon. I'll try to post some progress updates as I get to her.

Third Annual Ride To Camp Lost Roll

         Recently iv'e been going through all my film negatives and prints to try to get some kind of handle on organizing them. I've been trying to get them in some kind of chronological order and have had to use the blog archives to date some of the photos with no dates or descriptions. It's a ton of work but so worth it when I'm finished. Anyways while going through the photos I discovered that the third annual ride to camp photos were never posted. In the same album is when Lee, Drew and I first made it to the spot we've been returning to ever since. There are even a few of a ride through Collingwood. These photos would be from June 2014, had a great turn out that year. Lets get some more bikes in the woods this year!

Frustrations

Developing film has been a very heavy topic these days between Jordan and I. Currently our film has been developed through shoppers drug mart however the quality of the product just hasn't been cutting it. I recently just received a roll back with some pictures I was very excited about and was then let down upon opening them. A careless job had been done yet again, however when I put the disc in my computer they were perfect, so I decided I would share what I thought was bunch of botched prints.

Surfs Up

When I was growing up family vacations were camping and lots of it, we were an outdoors family and enjoyed being in the bush. We didn't have a lot of extra money so travelling the world and going to other countries was something I never experienced growing up. I had never been on a plane, never been in the ocean and certainly had not been out of the country let alone the province of Ontario. I made the decision that I was taking off and headed to Costa Rica for two weeks. Carly and I had a wild time exploring this amazing place, surfing for the majority of the trip but also travelling to the jungle and jumping of some killer waterfalls. I also made the switch to some new film, this roll was shot on 160 Kodak Porta. I was really happy with the change, the quality is excellent and the colours really pop with this new stuff.