Through the eyes of a travelling photographer
Celebrating a birthday the day before, decided Biggin Hill, Kent, was the place to be. A variety of aircraft both old and new made up the exciting air displays over the large crowd.
Best vantage point?
P51D Mustang and Spitfire
RAF Typhoon / Eurofighter
The Chislehurst caves, are a labyrinth of hand dug passageways, totalling 22 miles in length. Parts of the cave system are thought to be over 4000 years old, and once housed 15,000 people during World War II as an air raid shelter. More recently, concerts were peformed by Pink Floyd, David Bowie, Jimi Hendrix and other big acts for the acoustic qualities, until health and safety put a stop to such performances.
Due to the low light, ISO 6400 used on all these shots, with the Canon 1D Mk III
Something you shouldn’t be doing by live explosives
Showing detail of hand dug caves
A recent addition -Carvings done by a female NZ artist
Temple of Doom?
Zoom effect
What’s up doll?
Gollum
Whilst travelling, and moving around a lot, I’ve been using an Acer notebook for photo editing, but recently the mouse died on me, and was forced to use the touchpad recently – which is incredibly hard to use photoshop with. So set my sights on the Logitech VX Nano and was delivered this week from Amazon.co.uk. The USB wireless transmitter is incredibly small, and can stay permanently plugged in, without causing interference.
The daffodils flowering in London are a dead giveaway, that spring has arrived. Spent the afternoon walking around London with my friend, Katie – taking in the various sights of St James’s Park, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey and South Bank.
Bumblee bee finding the largest of flowers
Katie, framing a shot
Sun lighting up the row of Daffodils in St James’s Park
Westminster Abbey
Crossing Westminster Bridge, to South Bank
After a long 14 hour night flight from Sydney to Dubai the final leg, Dubai to London was a lot more interesting. Conditions in the morning departure were pretty bad with low visibility as winds stir up the desert sands, and haze lingered around. Flying Emirates, Boeing 777-300ER, A6-EBJ.
Desert civilisation below
Motorway viewed from above
Aerial view of Istanbul, Turkey with Ataturk airport in foreground
Entering the Alps over Austria
Making one of her last trips this year, the HMS Queen Elizabeth 2 will soon become a floating hotel in Dubai. Thousands of spectators were there to witness the departure, as she sounded a blazing horn heard across much of Auckland. Surprisingly the Queen Elizabeth 2 is forty years old, however in pristine condition. The Queen Mary 2 recently replaced the QE2 as the flagship vessel of Cunard.
Took another drive out to the rugged West coast beach of Muriwai in stormy conditions
Managed to get wet in the process of taking this shot, with large waves crashing over!
After shooting the wedding in Napier, drove back to Auckland and decided to unwind at Muriwai, above the rugged coastline below from the gannet colony lookout. Being limited to just a 105mm lens, made bird photography rather difficult, but still managed to get a few snaps when they were closer. Further tested the new Sigma 12-24 ultra wide angle, which gave some good results.
Three seperate exposures/shutter speeds to create this view looking North
Stormy skies
After almost eight months away from home, the final destination was approaching. After missing the connecting flight, had to wait for the next available flight several hours later. The flight from Sydney to Auckland was a brisk 2 hours 20min flying over Piha, Oratia & Henderson (my home towns over the past 20 years) before seeing a spectacular view of Auckland city and the Hauraki Gulf.
The view towards Bondi beach
Clear waters of the Tasman Sea, and Sydney City views
Auckland’s Harbour Bridge, Sky Tower, Princes Wharf (with a large cruise liner) and North shore
Motuihe Island, in the Hauraki Gulf, where I’ve spent days planting trees
The next twelves days in New Zealand will be a rush, catching up with friends and family, shooting a wedding, before heading back to London.
The leg from Bangkok to Sydney on the British Airways 747-400 was very tiring. Was initially told the plane is twenty minutes late, and would miss my connecting flight from Sydney to Auckland. Subsequently, the flight left Bangkok two hours late. To make matters worse, the in flight entertainment systems weren’t working either!
Descending through Northern Sydney
Shadow of the BA 747-400
After landing in Sydney was lucky to see the large A380 taking off from Sydney to Singapore.
Flying high above the Thai peninsula, in a Thai Air Asia A320 (HS-ABB), stood witness to a fantastic sunset. With all my recent and upcoming flights, planned them by requesting particular window seats dependant on the flight direction and time of the day. In this case, sitting on the left hand seat behind the wing heading from Phuket to Bangkok (Northwards), had a perfect view of the sunset and cloud formations. Shortly afterwards, was priveledged to get some cockpit photos – a rarity in these days with high security worldwide.
Low tide meant a tricky 200metre walk out to knee deep water, to get some photos of the long tail boats. This is the Northern bay where the tsunami of over 6 metres devastated the low lying area, Boxing Day 2004.
Took a morning gut wrenching walk up to the main lookout over Phi Phi Don, which was made worse by the searing heat.
The main habited part of Phi Phi is surrounded by two bays, Loh Dalam Bay in the North, and Ton Sai Bay from the South.
Phi Phi Leh on the far left, and Loh Dalam Bay on far right
Loh Dalam Bay, where the force of the 2004 tsunami struck from
Testing the new Sigma 12-24mm wide angle lens
The sunset tour boat gave two options to visit Maya Bay –
Swim and climb through the cave from the other side, or take the boat in and kayak or longtail boat onto the shore. I chose to kayak through the shallow low tide waters. The scenery is still stunning, however there’s no life left within the water. Overcrowded, too many old dirty longtail boats leaking oil/fuel into the once pristine water.
Approaching Maya Bay from the South
Entering Maya Bay, as a Thailand flag flutters on bow of the boat
Looking into Maya Bay
The haze distorting the setting sun
Being the peak of the tourist season, the 4 hour sunset cruise, including snorkelling and kayaking had gone up from 350 to 500 Baht since 7 months ago, when I was last in Thailand.
The trip was well worth the NZ$20, with the impressive sights of sheer cliffs and some of the warmest water you’ll ever encounter.
Viking Cave – Locals harvesting the expensive Bird Nest’s Soup
Clear water bay, perfect for snorkelling and kayaking
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