My Favorite Road Trip Photos Of 2024

I used to travel a lot for work. In 2018 I slowed that down a bit. Then the virus came and I pretty much quit traveling altogether. This year I got out a big more and explored the areas around the places that we travelled. In fact a few trips were planned to get there a little slower, but stopping along the way to make photos. I love exploring, and this year I started to get back into that a little. Below are a few of my favorite photos from my trips out of the Greater Lafayette area.

This is not your typical road trip photo. This year to be in totality we drove down to Thorntown, Indiana to see the solar eclipse. As the moon was fully in front of the sun I made this photo showing some of the solar flares coming out from around the moon. It is one of my favorite photos of the year. It was worth a road trip for sure.

This is a photo that I lucked into. Across the street from this old service station was a Pizza King. As I was making my photos I kept looking at this building. At first I thought that I would need better light. I wondered how a black and white edit like this would look, and I made the photo knowing that I would be processing it that way. This high key look was low key the way to go.

This is from a quick trip up Indiana 43 to see this sign in the town of Chalmers. In 2023 I made a photo on a crummy day with bad light. I didn’t have the best angle in my mind either. Last year I decided to go up there and make this photo during blue hour. I thought that it could be a cool one. The sun hadn’t been out all day, but it gave us a little look at it as it was going down. It helped me make this photo a little better I thought. I am very happy with how this one turned out.

Last year I unexpectedly spent a few days in LaPorte, Indiana. I grew up in LaPorte and spent a lot of my life there. It is weird how fast things change. A lot of the town seems the same, but a lot has changed as well. Here I saw a guy changing the color of paint on a building on Lincolnway early in the morning. I made a photo of it because of that change that it showed.

The story of most of my road trips this past spring and summer start with softball. On my way home from a softball game here I lucked into the town of Wolcott during sunset. This building and mural were perfect to put up against that sunset. This is what traveling is all about. Exploring and finding things that you didn’t know about when you started the trip.

When I first drove past this liquor store in Danville, Illinois I knew that it would be a photo. When I came back by the light was perfect to make a photo of it. The yellow and red building popped with the light being a bit more even. This is part of what makes traveling cool. I normally do not stop to make photos of a liquor store. When it looks this cool though why not?

This is an amazing stretch of road. You have this barn, then a covered bridge, and then a little further down the road a great barn. I had just left Covington, Indiana after a softball tournament. I wanted to see the covered bridge so I took a slight detour just south of Veedersberg. I saw the Mound barn to start. I decided to photograph it on my way back through. I made photos of the Cades Mill Bridge, and then decided to see what was down around the corner. It turned out to be this cool barn with the table and chairs out in front of it. In a short span of road I made three photos that I really liked. This is why you go out and make photos.

This post office in West Lebanon, Indiana just looked cool to me. Add in the setting sun giving me a little lens flare, and you have a photo that I really like. This year I was out trying to make photos like this while on the road. Some towns have a post office that has a very familiar look to it. Others like this one have a distinct look to them.

Most of these photos come from either heading to a softball tournament or coming home from one. I made this while entering Columbia City on my way home from a tournament. The old truck and cool building were just too much not to stop and make a photo of them. My trip home lasted a little longer than it should have, but I had a great time doing it.

On that same trip home I saw that in Andrews there was a place to eat named Kermit’s. They didn’t have froglegs, but they did have a nice photo waiting for me.

This year it seemed like many of the ways home from the softball tournaments went right through many county seats. I saw a lot of new courthouses this year. This one looked great, and it had some history to it. The legend is that those four lights at the top of the courthouse made this the first city lit by electricity. With some rain clouds passing through and the sun out it also helped me make a nice photo.

This was a fun place to revisit. Many years ago I visited the town of Winona Lake for a bike weekend there. I had both my fat and skinny tire bikes with me, and I had a blast riding around the area. I had some fun memories of that trip, and while in town for a softball tournament I took advantage of a rainy morning to get out and see some of it again. This is the Billy Sunday house. Billy was a good ballplayer that quit the big leagues to take up preaching. It turned out that he was pretty good at that too.

This is a cool little place that I found in Kentland, Indiana. It was an old time drive in diner. The bus hanging out must made this photo a little bit cooler. I could have had lunch at some chain, but this seemed much cooler.

While at that Covington softball tournament we stayed in Danville, Illinois. When we are out of town I always try and find a cool old ice cream place to grab something at. The Dairy Barn was just that place. It was one of a few cool little places like this that we found this year.

I will admit that I didn’t know that Earl Park, Indiana existed until this year. I pulled off the highway to check it out. I found a ton of great photos in this little town. This one might be my favorite though. You have a little bit of all things American all in one photo.

Much like the above photo I had not heard of Rock Creek or Rockfield, Indiana. I saw it on the GPS while driving and decided to see what was there. I loved this old fire department garage. The late light of the day just made this a nice photo.

While in LaPorte I was able to visit my uncle and his amazing property. As we were leaving I saw the scene that is above. It was the perfect time of day to make a photo. I really like how this turned out. It is a great way to remember a nice night with friends and family.

My last road trip photo of the year was made in Carmel. We had just left an appointment, and were going to head home. I saw this Carnegie Library and new that I could make a couple of photos pretty quickly.

Another eclipse photo from our trip to Thorntown. This was an amazing experience so I am sure that these photos will just keep showing up on my year end lists. I spent most of totality enjoying it with the kids, but I really had fun documenting it as well.

We end with a photo that I didn’t want to make. The day after my father passed away I knew that I wanted to make a photo of the sunset. Part of that was just to do something and use a different part of my brain. The other reason was that ten years prior I had made a sunset photo at this same lake house when my uncle passed. My dad loved that photo and I sent him a print that hung on the wall in his room. I put a lot of pressure on myself to make something really nice here, and a lot of elements came together to make sure that I could make a good photo.

This was a fun year getting out and exploring a bit more. This year hopefully I can branch out even farther to bring more photos to the blog. I have lots of little side projects now that will help me get to some new places. This list is really fun for me. It has lots of little photos made in small towns. This might not be for everyone, but I really have started to enjoy finding these small photos.