Elephant Walk is that magical time of year when Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey's Circus comes into town. In order to get the elephants into town they walk them (and the horses) through the Queens-Midtown Tunnel and along 34th Street to Madison Square Garden.
So, back to this year. Sara, Kate, Sean & I were going to go. But then Sara got hurt (sad) and then Sean & Kate couldn't go. So I went on my own! I decided to just take the 6 straight up and stand at 34th & Park, which provided me with a beautiful view of the Empire State Building. Got a couple of good shots of it lit up and thought it would be a great backdrop for the elephants when they came. Yeah, I didn't realize it shuts off at midnight!
The elephants were late (of course) and didn't show up until close to 1 a.m. But it gave me some time to call and chat with my sister (hi Heidi!) and listen to the group next to me who thought it would be fun to discuss, in detail, every single tidbit they had ever heard about elephants. Did you know they can rip up trees with their trunks? And they mourn their dead. And also, their teeth grow in 10 year spurts (or something - I sort of tuned out about then).
Finally. The crowd down the street is going wild, flashes are going off, the elephants are coming! And then....they're gone. It was really just about that fast. My careful staging & planning completely went out the window when I realized it was a quicky elephant train, not a slow, lumbering, sauntering train that would allow me ample time to set up a shot, click off a couple of frames and move on to the next. So no tall building backdrops, no "34th & Park" signs behind the elephants, nothing like that. Just down and dirty quick shooting.
But they were super cute and they really do walk holding the tail of the one in front of them! Yay!
