In 2011 we took a trip to the Peak District to see some of the UK’s most spectacularly beautiful countryside. While we were there, we also made a stop at the amazing Chatsworth House where we took a self-guided tour of the house and the grounds. Chatsworth is one of the most famous houses in England (having been used in a variety of television shows and movies you’ve probably heard of), and while the entire house is incredible, I was especially wowed by this breathtaking library.

On our visit to Scotland in 2012, we made a stop by the Dochfour estate near Inverness to take a look around. The weather was sunny with bright blue skies, something that I think is pretty unusual for Scotland. I’m sure the locals were loving it, but I did wish for a few clouds to help add some drama to my photos. The sunsets were also harsh and a bit hazy, so I needed to get a little creative. Finding this wonderful forest was just the ticket, and it gave me a great way to put some pop in my photos.

Visiting Scotland in 2012, I loved the combination of old and new. I especially liked this view of Inverness Castle, shrouded in scaffolding, rising above the modern buildings with their shops and apartments below. In the foreground, the incredible Young Street Bridge radiates bright pink energy that welcomes you to an Inverness that is probably very different today than in 1836 when the castle was last rebuilt (or 1057 when it was first built).

I originally took and posted this photo in 2009 before I started geotagging my photos, so I’m not completely certain where we were when I captured this. However, I know we were somewhere on Iceland’s extraordinary Snaefellsnes Peninsula on the west coast. Iceland is such an incredible place to visit, and at this time of year we were able to experience these incredibly long and spectacular golden hour sunsets that lit up the world and made everything look fantastic.

My day in Paris had started off typically enough. The air traffic controllers were on strike, just not the ones controlling my United flight landing at CDG. The rail conductors were also on strike, but fortunately for me the Ubers at the airport were running just fine. I arrived at the office on a sunny morning without incident (despite ominous reports of riots in some far flung arrondissement), worked for a few hours, and then checked into my hotel for a quick shower and nap. It was during my shower that my jet lagged brain realized the weather had profoundly changed when I heard the din of loud raindrops on the roof of the hotel above me – loud enough to drown out the sound of the shower I was taking.