This is the second and third penguin we found. If you look in the background you can see the reason for this penguins terrifying, aggressive stance. He’s got his lady sat in the back of the nest. I’ve included a second picture to include Cameron’s National Geographic-esque attempt to get a better view. My 300mm lens prevented the need for me to get quite so close.
We arrived in Cape Town after two back to back overnight flights. But, it was important that we kept moving. We could have sat around our hostel all day and been bored, then fallen asleep far too early to kick our jet-lag. So, we had a plan. We left the hostel immediately for Simons Town (via KFC for the two heathens in our entourage).
We were going to Simons Town to visit Boulders Bay. This is the location of the Western Capes penguin population. The trip was worth it for the train ride there. The tracks hug the coast and you feel like the waves could break into the trains window. Along the way we saw cormorants, seals, and surfers frolicking in the surf. It was incredible.
We arrived in Simons Town without a clue how to get to Boulders Bay. It was Sunday and the tourist information centre was closed but we kept walking. Eventually, after we’d split up to seek out sources of local information we found that it was a 15 minute walk away. We’d already twenty minutes on our weary jet-lagged legs and had little confidence in our sources time estimate. But, we persevered and it was worth it.
Upon arriving at Boulder Bay we were initially disappointed. It felt like a real tourist trap. We hit a fork in the path. To the left is where all the tour bus crowd were headed. We went right. We discovered penguins huddled under the bushes, but this was not the image I was in pursuit of. Looking down we could see the beach, with a few people sunbathing, with no penguins. However, it looked like the boulders weren’t fenced off, so we decided to do some rock hopping.
Once we got there our suspicions were confirmed and we went in search of penguins. I think we saw four in total, but it was great getting to be so close to them. Climbing over and under the rocks was good fun too. I got a lot of help from my friends in getting my gear through some pretty tight spaces. The below photo is the first penguin we saw on our exploration.
Another shot from the girls’ house in Spanish Point Bermuda. I had a lot of trouble getting onto the internet earlier and for some reason it’s just sprung to life, so I’m doing a quick upload and then heading to bed. Glad I didn’t have to miss a day already.
In this picture is the astronomical clock and the Tyn Church. I got up early so I could get a shot without any people about. This area is typically overrun with tourists waiting to see the clock spring to life every hour.
I haven’t had time to work on any photos from Prague. So, I’ve reached into my file of completed pictures. This may be my favorite photo from my entire time in Africa. When I walked over to try to take this photo her entire face was covered by a leaf. Then, she reached up and moved it just long enough for me to grab three exposures
It’s snowing here, I’m hoping it sticks but it doesn’t look too likely.
This is probably not what you’d expect my first picture from Prague to look like. However, I slept through two key points of the day – sunrise and sunset. I’m not sure what happened this morning, either my alarm didn’t go off or I just didn’t wake up for it. I went out midday and took a bunch of pictures of the Charles Bridge and the castle up on the hill. I got back to the hotel room and didn’t feel particularly inspired to work on any of them. They’re all a bit too much like the standard postcards I’m seeing everywhere here. So, I resolved to go out again later, at sunset. Then I woke up and it was dark outside. I don’t remember going to sleep.
I still went out. I’d spotted this building in the taxi on the way to my hotel, it’s just around the corner. I knew exactly what I wanted this photo to look like and needed long exposures to get it. This is composition of 5 shots at the following shutter speeds: 1 min, 2 min, 4 min, 8 min, 16 min.
Also, it’s bloody cold in Prague! Fingers crossed for sunrise tomorrow. It’s also supposed to snow on Tuesday, which I think would be great.
I’ve made it to Prague! I’m staying in a pretty cool little hotel/hostel called the Mosaic House Hotel. It’s got a very tempting bar downstairs in the lobby. I did set out with my camera earlier but it turned out to be more of a scouting trip. The sun set surprisingly early, it dipped below the horizon by 4pm. However, at 5pm it still looked like the sun had just gone down. It was quite strange. I think I’ve found some good shots and plan on going out tomorrow morning to get them before there’s so many people about.
“At the crossroad, which way to go?” sounds like it could be a line from a blues song, maybe it is. This is another shot from Rwanda, and if it looks vaguely familiar it’s because you’ve seen part of it at the top of this page. Just to the right of this shot is an orphanage that we visited. When we got there the kids came running out and greeted us. One even embraced Cameron in an enthusiastic hug. We’d brought a football for them, which they quickly went about playing with, and destroying. We’d been there about twenty minutes when we discovered that the ball had split. Fortunately, Cameron had packed the roll of duct-tape he’d insisted on bringing to Africa. He’d also insisted on bringing parachute cord, which was vindicated when it acted as a belt for me during white water rafting and a chin strap for Soniko’s hat. We got the ball patched up nice and quickly. Then, 2 minutes later, it happened again. Cameron went to work and covered the entire ball in what had to be two layers of duct tape. It’s officially indestructible.
When Cameron saw my banner above all he said was, “Why did you take a picture of a dirt road?”
I didn’t have much of an answer at the time but now I remember. I set up for this shot because I liked the contrast between the wet and dry tracks. I got all set up and a truck decided to drive up the track on the left, moving me aside and sloshing the water about as it went. I thought it was going to ruin the shot. To the contrary, the truck pushed the water up so that the wet soil met the dry at the midpoint of my frame. Excellent timing.
If this goes right, this should be posting itself while I’m on a flight to London on my way to Prague. So, I think it makes sense that I post the one photo of London I have. I took this on my way to Africa. To maximize our time in Africa we decided to do two overnight flights back to back. But, this meant we had a lot of time to kill in London. We stuck our bags in storage at Piccadilly station and spent the morning taking a walking tour starting at the Tower of London before crossing Tower Bridge and walking down the south side of the Thames. Cameron and I had spent a week in London a few years ago and stayed in a hostel near this café. It’s a cool little place. For lunch they serve paella cooked on huge frying pans on the street. For breakfast they had giant Cumberland sausages cooking on the grill served on a fresh bun.
The setting is also great. It’s actually close to London Bridge train station. It’s hectic up there, crossing the street to get to the stairs is pretty stressful on 4 hours of sleep. But, it’s worth it when you drop down in to this little oasis of calm. As a bonus we were there on a Saturday. That meant that the Borough Market was happening just around the corner. They’ve got tons of good stuff there ranging from meat and fish, to cheese, to giant piles of brownies. I’m partial to the giant piles of brownies.
I’ve added a London category for this entry so I really hope I get some time to get my camera out while I’m there.
Oh, and if you’re wondering, the four people sat at the table were my travel buddies. Three weeks in Africa and we’re still speaking to each other… just about.
This is the view in the opposite direction from the previous photo I posted. This is the Waterford winery and was our firstwine tasting stop. Just before coming here we’d been to the Spier winery to interact with the cheetahs at Cheetah Outreach. Our visit to Waterford was a great experience. The building is beautiful. It’s definitely got an upscale feel about it, which was interesting as we traipsed through in hiking boots and shirts surrounded by a much smarter looking crowd.
We decided to do the wine and chocolate pairing. This involved 6 wines, 3 of which were paired with custom-made chocolates. One of the chocolates had rock salt in it. It tastes pretty horrible on its own, but paired with the wine it was incredible.
This photo gives a good indication of why Rwanda is called the land of a thousand hills. We stopped off on our way from Gisenyi to Musanze at the twin lakes, Burera and Ruhondo. We drove up to a viewpoint and along the way came across loads of kids. Everywhere we went in Rwanda the kids would ask us for our empty water bottles and we’d been wondering what they used them for. Today, we found one use. It seemed like every single child on the way up this hill had a plastic bottle full of grasshoppers to hand. Apparently, they fry them up with chilli oil. We didn’t get an opportunity to try them prepared in this manner, but one member of our group did get to sample a grasshopper. I came back from taking a few other photos and he said, with a surprisingly concerned tone to his voice, ” So… I just ate a live grasshopper.”
As it turns out he’d asked one of the kids what they do with the grasshoppers. The kid proceeded to demonstrate how they prepare them for cooking, removing the legs and wings and then said that some people eat them live. Apparently, it tasted like a grass paste.
This photo is a combination of 7 exposures ranging from -3 to +3. The image produced by Photomatix had a lot of noise so I used Imagenomic’s Noiseware Pro to smooth out the sky and hills in the background.
