Star Wars trek: Bay Area and Marin County - March 2001


Star Wars stories

It's widely known that Lucas considers himself to be more of an independent filmmaker and prefers to live and work up north in the Bay Area and Marin County. A lot of events from his life have happened in this area. And it is only a 2-hour drive from where he was born in Modesto. I tried to find some of the bigger ones but I was only searching in the area for a day. Someone who actually lives out there would probably have a better time finding the more obscure locations and I have included all of my notes in case you want to try.

Read more.
See all pictures.
See satelite photos.

Continue Reading

Star Wars trek: Modesto - March 2001


Star Wars stories

It seemed to be my mission in 2001 to track down all things Lucas and that wouldn't be complete without first visiting where it all began, Modesto, California. I actually went to High School nearby in Hilmar and lived 20 minutes away in Turlock for several years but never bothered tracking any of these spots down until after I moved away. My parents were still in the area so it seemed perfect to pay them a visit and ride around a little looking for these places.

Read more.
See all pictures.

Continue Reading

Jeroen's Guide To Como


Star Wars stories
Jeroen Swanborn sent in a great report on the Lake Como area that is now available. Thirteen seperate filming and behind-the-scenes locations are covered. There were a couple of posts in the forum recently about these scenes, so hopefully this will answer everyones questions. Jeroen, thank you very much for sending this in and sharing your adventure with us.

Jeroen's Guide To Como Part 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Colin's Finse trip - March 2006


Star Wars stories
My first interest in visiting in visiting Finse was probably a remark by Damien on the first Trip To Tatooine back in 2003. At the hotel Marhala on the Isle of Jerba he casually remarked that after the trip he was off to Norway to visit Finse. I have to admit that impressed me a little to just take off to Norway like that. Of course I had seen the tiny amount about Finse on the ToysRGus traveller web site, but it had never occurred to me to make the trip. I imagined it was just a snowfield, very uninspiring and nothing compared to Tunisia, plus I wasn't that familiar with the film. Then I remembered an earlier feature in the Star Wars Insider magazine, the writer made the actual locations seem difficult to find as if you needed insider knowledge about where the filming actually took place. Plus the photos were taken during the snow melt, so it looked a little less like Hoth. I still needed something more to make me want to go.

Continue Reading

Colin's Canyon Quiz


Star Wars stories
How well do you know the location known as Star Wars Canyon? Test your observation skills in this mini photo-quiz.

Star Wars Canyon has been visited numerous times by Lucas, Spielberg et al and has been seen on movie screens around the world. But what does it look like in one large panoramic view and can you recognize your favourite scenes from a different angle?

Originally this was written as a Christmas Quiz for my Star Wars friends, but I have been persuaded to throw it open to the wider fan community. This quiz is based on observations on a number of visits to the canyon at Sidi Bouhlel over an 8 year period. I’m not claiming this as an exhaustive list as there are probably one or two scenes that have escaped my attention, maybe you could leave some feedback about those.

Continue Reading

SWFO's Western U.S. Quest


Websites Archive
This site was originally published by Carl Cunningham at:
http://www.starwarsfan.org/bluemilk/roadtrips/the_trip_pt1/

Here is a version that was archived before it went down, click here.

I'd like to say thanks to Colin Kenworthy for scouring through web-archive.org to recover the html for this site and also for saving all of the Death Valley images long ago while the site was still up.

All of the images in the Modesto and Muir Woods galleries are missing so if anyone happens to have them, please let me know.

Star Wars trek: Los Angeles - 2000 and 2001


Star Wars stories
In 2000 and 2001 I tried tracking down various locations in the Los Angeles area that had anything to do with Star Wars. Over the previous couple of years I had read several books on George Lucas and the making of the movies. In each I highlighted references to specific locations when they were mentioned. This was my attempt to try to find all of those places.

Read More

Fox Studios pictures
Los Angeles pictures
USC pictures

Continue Reading