The North Church Steeple is easily recognized throughout Portsmouth, whether you’re traveling along one of the bridges over the Piscataqua River, heading into town from Islington Street, strolling around Prescott Park, walking the streets of the South End, or heading up/down the river in a boat (and probably hundreds of other places). I wanted to revisit some shots from one of my early days with my camera (shot April 2009). The clouds made for an interesting story during sunset.
The first shot is of the Bell Tower/Steeple of Saint John’s church at 105 Chapel Street downtown. This is the other beacon of Portsmouth, also visible from nearly anywhere in the downtown area. Along Chapel St. also sits a few tombs built into the lawn of the church’s property.
Some info on the church from the web “This church was built in 1807 as the successor to the 1732 Queen’s Chapel. The church contains 17th and 18th century antiques, including a steeple bell that came from France to Nova Scotia in the mid 1700s. Colonial soldiers took the bell as a souvenir and presented it to Queen’s Chapel in 1745. Damaged when the chapel burned in 1806, the bell was recast by Paul Revere.”
A fall scene in Portsmouth at the old Strawbery Banke museum. There’ve been some interesting ongoings at Strawbery Banke this year including a new brew fest…looking forward to seeing what sort of unique events are brought to town next year.
Much to my surprise, I could see another North Church steeple in the sky tonight – except it was opposite the bright white of the actual steeple that I’m used to, it was a dark void in some foggy light…the steeple’s shadow. I thought it was rather striking, and it keeps with this week’s trend of night photos.
In this case we’re talking about Congress Street by Sunset and Congress Street by Dusk – close enough to fit the bill for the Portsmouth By Day | Portsmouth By Night category. This is one of Portsmouth’s busiest streets as evidenced by the steady flow of cars throughout the day….and during the summer it might take about 5x as long to travel through town. It’s a good thing that Portsmouth is a picturesque place, sometimes it’s not so bad to just cruise along. Hope you like.
