Indiana Jones IV - The Stars Of The Show

Indiana Jones/Harrison Ford is a passenger for this chase scene. Shia Labeouf is driving and plays the role of Indiana's son. Shia was recently in Disturbia and plays a leading role in the soon to be released Transformers movie. Here is Steven Spielberg on top of the camera truck during a practice run for this scene. Harrison sat beside Spielberg during the practice run

Indiana Jones IV - Gadgetry & Gizmos

Here are some examples of the vehicles they will be using for the chase scenes along Chapel Street.
This is a Mitsubishi Lancer kitted out with a crane camera on the roof. The vehicles are painted black so they are less visible in scene reflections. The car is a high spec machine to handle difficult and fast maneuvers and the equipment inside and out looks extremely expensive. The film camera on the rig is covered when it's not being used. You can also see that there is a Nikon D200 digital SLR camera for taking still shots. The whole rig is controlled by a passenger with a remote control. The driver is surrounded by digital readouts, switches and cables. The car has a full steel roll cage and bucket seats with five point harnesses.Here's an Escalade that I did not see them using yet. The Ducati was used yesterday during some chase scenes. The chase involves a motorcycle so this is used to simulate the riders eye view as the bike leans into corners.

Indiana Jones IV - More Cars On Set

Indiana Jones IV - 1950's New Haven

The 1950's vehicles have been gathering on the streets. They will mainly be used for backdrop and to park in front of things that the crew can't move, like phone boxes and electrical transformers. This guy was touring the movie set on his Segway.

Laser Show

There was a pretty lame laser show in new haven last night. It basically consisted of a laser projector on top of a parking garage spinning beams down the street.

Indiana Jones IV - There's no Pawn Shop on Chapel Street

Today a pawn shop appeared on Chapel street offering cash for guns, gold an diamonds. A little strange until you realize that Chapel Street is being transformed to feature in the next Indiana Jones movie. The store that became the pawn shop actually sells baby clothes. Just about all the storefronts along 2 blocks have been changed to look like a street from the 1950's, even down to the clothes that the mannequins are wearing. Several weeks ago I had noticed that the first floor of our office was being used as a workshop. It turns out they have been building the fake storefronts. This week has drawn many tourists and news crews with cameras. Filming starts on Thursday and runs for 3 days. I'll be keeping an eye out for Harrison Ford (Indy), Steven Spielberg (director of ET and Jaws fame) and George Lucas (writer and producer of Star Wars fame).I don't know who this guy is but he decided to dress like Indiana Jones . It got him on to the news at least.

Macedonia Brook Camping

Jen bought a nice new tent and we tested it out on Saturday night camping at Macedonia Brook State park in the north-west corner of Connecticut. We've been there a couple of times before and liked how remote it was. We had to book in advance to ensure we got a site. We gathered plenty of firewood and sat down to eat a dinner of sausages and beans in front of the campfire. Jen also managed to burn her arm on the fire pit ring - ouch!
As you can see we had our kayaks with us. To follow up on the camping, on Sunday we met up with some friends and went for a 6 mile canoe/kayak trip down the Housatonic river. The weather was perfect and everyone had a great time.

Tariffville Gorge

On Saturday morning I went on the first actual whitewater trip with the CT AMC. We headed up about an hour north of New Haven to Tariffville Gorge. The gorge is a popular spot for whitewater kayaking as it's pretty safe with class III water. There were a total of 8 paddlers that came along with our group and me met others on the river. There were several good rapids that we spent plenty of time playing in. Towards the end of the trip there was quite a large drop of about 10 feet over a broken dam. All but one of us made it over the dam without coming out of our boats. Overall it was a great day of paddling. I capsized quite a few times in the rough stuff but was able to roll up safely each time. I still have sore muscles from the trip.
Here are some of the other paddlers:

New Subaru Legacy 2.5i SE

It's just 2 days old and theres already 200 miles on the new car. After a lot of research I decided on the 5-speed Legacy 2.5i Special Edition. The Quartz silver is a new color for Subaru this year and looks great. Standard features include permanent symmetrical all wheel drive, power moonroof, and 17" five spoke alloy wheels with yokohama tires. So far it's a fun drive and there's plenty of power from the subaru boxer engine. Now Jen just needs to learn to drive a manual shift car.

Puerto Rican Festival

It turns out that it was the Puerto Rican festival today in New Haven. We got caught up in the traffic on the way back from the camping trip. It took us about half an hour to make it through downtown when it should only have taken five minutes. Thousands of people had gathered on the green for the music and dancing. It was a sea of red, white and blue.

Kettletown State Park

More camping, campfires, and kayaking. We decided to stay a little closer to home this weekend. Kettletown State park is about 45 minutes north-west of new haven, on the Housatonic River. This camp site is less secluded than we would like, but we managed. We expected storms so we had our tarp up for extra protection.
We kayaked a little on Saturday and Sunday. Saturday was a short trip because of the black clouds and thunder. We thought we would get out of the water before the storm hit.
On the river's edge we noticed a bird box that appeared to have a snake's tail hanging out of it. It turns out that it was a snake, working it's way in. The pictures below were taken a while later. Judging by the small feather in it's mouth I doubt that there were any survivors.

Here's a picture of the Stevenson Dam that we drove over on the way home today. The reservoir created in the Housatonic behind it is called lake Zoar.