As the title says, this one was in consideration for a Tripod holes entry, because I could almost pin down right where it was taken – just, not quite. And I had other images that worked better anyway. But here’s the scoop.
It was November 2003 and I was returning to Florida on a flight from North Carolina, and we were on final approach to Melbourne International Airport, so these are the city lights of Melbourne. I knew which approach we were taking, and that blank rectangle in the middle there is pretty distinctive, so I thought I should be able to use that (and the line of the major road that stretches diagonally on the right side, almost certainly South Wickham Road,) to pin down a precise location. A rectangle without lights would likely be either an unlit parking lot, an empty field or lot, or a very large building. But despite my best efforts, I couldn’t pin it down; other areas should have been either just as blank or had more lights, things like that. So it’s only a curious abstract image not helped at all by the motion blur during the longer exposure needed to even capture the lights. It’s on slide film, by the way, so no EXIF info to check and see what the shutter speed actually was.
Less than ten minutes before this, however, I knew we were on descent though I had no idea what our altitude was, because there was nothing to be seen below us at all and it was a distinctly clear night. This had me convinced that we were approaching the airport from the east, because that would be from out over the Atlantic Ocean; Melbourne International only has east-west runways, with approach direction determined by the prevailing winds, so an approach from the west would be over the center of the state which should have provided plenty to see below. And then confusingly, I saw a small cluster of lights in the midst of total darkness, wondering if it was a fishing fleet before realizing that it was a crossroads – we were over central Florida after all (this might actually have been Deer Park.) I can’t emphasize enough how few lights there were to be seen, which really drove home the fact that much of central Florida is swampland and farms, too wet to consider making even small towns within. Sure, the coastal cities, and even most of the coastal small towns, are pretty urbanized and crowded – but get outside of them and almost immediately you’re all by yourself.
Human-wise, anyway – there are always reptiles of some kind close at hand.