Bruce Williams Photography

Meetup #20 – Ice Maidens

Bruce — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 22:14:54 +0000

A chance conversation with a work colleague was what sparked the idea for this shoot.
Aleisha used to be a figure skater herself, and these days is a figure skating coach.
Having been a casual ice skater all my life, I immediately thought this would be a great theme for one of our monthly shoots.
I got in touch with the manager of the Canterbury Ice Rink and organised to hire the whole rink exclusively for a bunch of photographers to do crazy things…. like drag live power cords out onto the ice to run lights and fog machines! What could possibly go wrong?
So, come Monday 2nd January, we were all rugged up against the cold of the ice rink while it was 20+ degrees C outside at 8:00 in the evening.
After a panic attack when I thought Aleisha had let me down on finding some skaters (turned out, she HAD done as she had promised…. I just didn’t get the message!), I made a couple of calls to some other coaches at the same ice rink.
Before I knew it, we had something like 8 or 9 young figure skaters and ice dancers lined up. And boy, were they keen!
With 10 or 11 photographers in the group, we split up into two smaller groups, and split the lighting so each group could work independently of the other.
What made this THE most challenging shoot the group has ever done was the fact that the skaters were nervous about skating too close to the lights (power cords, light stands and softboxes aren’t the kind of obstacles these kids are used to seeing on the ice!). And of course, the inverse square law comes into effect pretty fast. For those unaware of the inverse square law, it basically says that if correct exposure is achieved with a light-to-subject distance of x, then each doubling of the distance will HALVE the amount of light reaching the subject.
I won’t bore you with all the numbers involved, but I can assure you, we were struggling with getting the quantity of light where we needed it.
In all honesty, at the time I had hired the lights, I wasn’t thinking of having to shoot in separate groups. In retrospect, I needed to have hired 4 lights rather than 2, so we could have had 2 lights per setup. But hey, ya live and learn!
At the end of the night, all the photographers had a great time, and so did the skaters.
As for me, I didn’t get to take many images on the night, as I was managing the skaters, making sure all the photographers were getting what they wanted, liaising with the Ice Rink manager, talking with the mums, etc etc.
We will probably do another shoot like this next year. Having tackled it once, I’m sure we can improve on it next time.

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New Zealand – day 10 (Bay of Islands, October 27)

Bruce — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 10:40:58 +0000

Oh you have got to be kidding! Last day… ALREADY? Seriously?
Ripped off.
Well, in the last 8 days, we’ve gone from the mid-winter cold and rain in Dunedin to our final port of call, the Bay of Islands, and it’s a pleasant 24 degrees Celsius.
Not sure if you could hire a car here or not. I don’t recall seeing a car hire depot anywhere. But, the point was moot, on the grounds that the cruise ship had shuttle buses running back and forth between the wharf at Waitangi, Treaty House, and the township of Paihia (pronounced “pie here”). And that whole loop only took about 15 mins at most.
After alighting at the wharf, we walked to the Treaty House via the beach, a pleasant 10 minute stroll.
The Treaty House is the house where the Maori people (or more specifically, their appointed Chiefs) signed a deal with the Colonials (essentially, the British Government) that stated that the British could colonise the land, but that the land would forever remain the property of the Maori people.
Clearly, they didn’t make the same mistake as the Australian aboriginals.
After we’d checked out the Treaty House (and the accompanying Meeting House, and the Maori war canoes), we caught the shuttle bus around to Paihia and bought ourselves some ferry tickets for the ride across to the town of Russell on the other side of the bay.
Russell is home to the Duke of Marlborough Hotel, New Zealand’s oldest drinking establishment.
We had been advised by some Kiwi friends at home that whilst in New Zealand, we absolutely had to have New Zealand fish and chips, “’cause they’re soooo much better than Aussie fish and chips”. So we made it a point, in Russell, to go and get some fresh cooked fish and chips and a bottle of L&P and go and sit by the bay and enjoy it.
What’s L&P, you ask?
Lemon and Paeroa. It’s a soft drink unique to New Zealand. Quite nice, too!
So, we had our lunch in the sun (yeah, the fish and chips were good… not the BEST I’ve ever had, but certainly up there in the top 5), dropped into the Duke for a quick cider, then reluctantly hopped back on the ferry for the ride back to Paihia, knowing that this was going to be the last trip back to the Sea Princess for this voyage.
All that is left now is 2 days straight sailing home to Sydney.
Meh.

Take me to: Day 9 <-

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New Zealand – day 9 (Auckland, October 26)

Bruce — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 10:38:35 +0000

Shutters Inc listener, photography buddy and all-round nice guy, Mike Hollman (and his lovely wife Vivienne) came and picked up from the wharf in Auckland first thing in the morning.
Mike had agreed to give us a personalised tour of his hometown and its surrounds for the day.
First stop was the suburb of Devonport with its own version of Mount Victoria (what did I tell ya?), which affords the viewer an almost uninterrupted 360 degree view of Auckland. It was here that we stood above some kind of (now non-operational) secret military installation. Said installation required air vents which are shaped like little mushrooms. Someone decided that it would be a great idea to paint them as such.
After Mount Victoria, Mike and Viv took us out to Muriwai Beach to see the gannet colony. The gannets are quite a pretty aquatic bird, with their gold heads and striking blue eyes. Mike and I stood there for about 15 minutes trying to get some good shots of the birds. Not an easy task when your longest lens is a paltry 135mm! Still, I got a few images I was happy with.
Then, on our way back to the car, Mike bumped into a guy he knew, and asked him where was the best place for lunch in this area. This guy stated unequivocally that that would be Beesonline (yes, they sell bee products online… hence the name). Turns out, the guy owned 7 restaurants, hence Mike’s faith in his judgement. So, off to Beesonline we went. And I have to say, these guys need to seriously look after the chef that they have working in their kitchen. Every one of us was blown away with the amazing mix of flavours within our respective dishes. If you’re out that way, DEFINITELY have lunch there!
Then, it was a quick stop at a winery, a quick stop at a function centre (which was closed at the time, but offered some nice photo opportunities… the wooden gate, the lights, the ferns), and then back into Auckland proper where we drove up Mount Eden, another of Auckland’s now-dormant volcanoes. Again, a 360 degree view of Auckland. That’s one thing I noticed about the Kiwi’s… they don’t mind knocking down a few trees so you can get a decent view! After Mount Eden, we headed to the botanic gardens (time for a spot of tree climbing in some Moreton Bay Figs, for Max), then off to the Sky Tower. As the name suggests, this is Auckland’s answer to Sydney’s AMP Tower or Seattle’s Space Needle or any one of a thousand other such phallic monstrosities around the world. We took the elevator up to the viewing platform on the 54th? 56th? floor… can’t remember exactly. It was something like 280 metres above street level anyway. Enough that if you fell, you’d end up with a bit of a headache.
This afforded some nice overhead views of the city, but I found the glass (being as thick as it was for safety reasons) provided some really nasty colour shifts in the images. Thank god for RAW images and post-shot white balance adjustments!
A full-on day, to be sure, but a great day none the less. Even if we’d hired a car ourselves, I doubt we’d have seen as much as Mike managed to fit in for us, so Mike, thanks again, mate! By the way, when you’re done here at my site (and not before!), check out some of Mike’s work.

Take me to: Day 8 <- | -> Day 10

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New Zealand – day 8 (Tauranga, October 25)

Bruce — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 00:03:57 +0000

Tauranga recently made worldwide news due to the running aground on one of its close-to-shore reefs of a huge freighter.
As we were approaching the port and still a few nautical miles offshore, I was up on deck taking some shots of the sunrise. There’s one particular shot in the gallery of the sun just peaking its head over the horizon, shot around the corner at the rear of the ship. What I didn’t know at the time I took that shot was that I was looking right at the stranded freighter. It was only 5-10 mins later that we had altered our position enough to see the freighter, along with all the official ships and tugs and the like. The unfortunate aspect of this whole sorry saga is that the freighter captain was trying to take a shortcut, in order to get into Tauranga quicker.
Once we were onshore, we caught a taxi to our hire car pick up point near the airport (a good 15km away). With the car loaded, we headed southwest toward Rotorua, famous for its geysers (pronounced with an I sound, not an E sound) and hot mud springs. Cath, in her wonderfully efficient style, had researched the area ahead of time and had noted that it we had time, it would be good to make it down to Waiotapu, about another 30km south of Rotorua. Realising we had made good time, we decided to continue on. At Waiotapu, we did a 2km loop walk which took as past a whole range of different sulphur pools and geysers. One of these was called “The Artist’s Palette”, due to the plethora of brilliant colours visible on the surface. I’m confident you’ll identify it for yourself from the images! There was also “The Devil’s Pool”, a small lake so rich in sulphur that it glowed an amazing florescent lime green. Shooting on manual exposure as I have been of late, I found that at ‘correct’ exposure, my camera’s sensor simply could not cope with the intensity of the colour. It was only by shooting at about -1EV that I could get anything close to the real colour of the water. Again, you’ll have no problems identifying “The Devil’s Pool” from the images below.
After the geysers, sulphur lakes and mud pits, we headed into Rotorua for a bite to eat. We ended up at the wonderfully named ‘Fat Dog’ Cafe where I ordered a burger which would have fed a small mid-African village for about 3 days. It was however, an absolutely fantastic burger.
After our gastronomic overload, we waddled off in search of some tourist shops to pick up some souvenirs.
With that out of the way, we jumped back in the car and headed north back toward Tauranga up the west side of Lake Rotorua.
As we were driving into Tauranga, it occurred to me that we still had about 2 hours before we needed to return the hire car, so I suggested we take a drive down the coast to see if we could see anything of the stranded freighter from the beach. I guess I hadn’t really thought about it much, so it came as a bit of a surprise to find that all of the beaches were shut due to the spilled oil drifting in from the reef. As we were driving along, Cath was looking through some brochures and mentioned that there was a tourist attraction called Kiwi360, a little further south at the town of Te Puke. We had time, and nothing better to do, so we headed off. As we drove into the car park at Kiwi360, we saw a small red helicopter sitting on a landing pad. Cath commented that flights were $59 a head, which seemed quite a reasonable price. I have wanted to go in a helicopter all my life and had never to this point had the opportunity. And to top it off, this was October 25th, my birthday! I went inside and asked the lady at the desk who ran the chopper flights, how long, how much notice did we need to give, etc etc. She mentioned that the pilot lived 2 mins down the road and that she would give him a call. A minute late, she informed me that he was on his way here and would be ready to take us up in about 5 minutes! Sweet! He promptly showed up, gave us the safety drill, and took us up for a quick 10min flight over the kiwi orchards, out to the coast, south along the beach a little way (pointing out the oil slicks on the water, and noting how devastating this is going to be to Tauranga’s fishing industry for years to come), and back in over the fields and orchards to our base. It might have been a quick flight, and the reflections off the perspex windscreen rendered a lot of my images less than ideal, but it was fun nonetheless, and a great birthday present.
We tried the obligatory kiwi juice, which turned out to be quite nice, then headed back to Tauranga in search of a fuel station at which to refuel the hire car. Another cab ride, and we were back at the ship, ready to watch the pilots guide the Sea Princess out the (very narrow) channel into open water.

Take me to: Day 7 <- | -> Day 9

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New Zealand – day 7 (Napier, October 24)

Bruce — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 23:54:03 +0000

Napier is a quaint little town at the southern end of Hawkes Bay, a region known for its beautiful white wines.
Aside from the wine industry flourishing in the vicinity, Napier is also known for its embracing attitude toward its art deco architecture. This is an aspect of the town which has not only been nicely preserved, but actually encouraged to replicate. As a result, you’ll see signage for modern day businesses which reflect the art deco ethos (check out the travel agent sign on a brick wall). Also, there are meticulously restored vintage cars from just about every decade of the 20th century cruising the streets all the time. And these aren’t just show ponies. No sir, these are people’s everyday means of transport. It’s gorgeous to see.
And because Napier is not a large town, we elected to do this day on foot. And in hindsight, I’m glad we did. A lot of the nuance of the town would have been missed had we hired a car for the day.
The building known as the “New Zealand Wine Centre” is a retail wine outlet, but also doubles as a bit of a tourist info centre for those wanting to take in some knowledge of the Hawkes Bay wine industry.
Wandering though it, I had to grab some images of the store. I just loved the way they had set it all up.
The overnight cruise from Napier to Tauranga was the longest “port-hop” we had to do on this trip, and for this reason, we were advised that we needed to be back on the ship by 14:00, ready to sail by 15:00. We were initially concerned that this wouldn’t give us enough time to see Napier, but as it turned out, 5 hours of walking around town was enough!

Take me to: Day 6 <- | -> Day 8

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New Zealand – day 6 (Wellington, October 23)

Bruce — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 23:29:22 +0000

We pulled into port early on the 23rd, had breakky, and disembarked as soon as we could.
Cath had organised a hire car, but we already knew that the car hire place was not close to the wharf at which we had docked.
However, when we asked one of the friendly tourism people welcoming us to Wellington, she took us over to a security guy who said he would get one of the other security guys to drive us to the car hire place if we were happy to wait a minute.
Naturally, we waited, and sure enough, couple of minutes later, this security guy rolls up in a little people mover/minibus and drives us over to the car hire pickup point.
Once we had our wheels, we decided to head northwest out of the city. We were at this point, toying with the idea of trying to do the loop consisting of Wellington > Featherston > Masterton > Palmerston North > back down the west coast to Wellington.
All up, this would have been about a 350km (220 mile) round trip. We decided that no, it was pushing it a bit far. Sure, we could have done the distance, but there wouldn’t have been any time to stop and take photos along the way.
So instead, we headed out to Featherston over a single lane mountain pass (would have been an awesome bike road in dry weather), then headed south around Lake Wairarapa, then back up to Featherston and back into Wellington.
Saw some lovely countryside along the way.
Once back in Wellington, we went and spent a couple of hours in the Te Papa Museum, followed by some Max-time in the park on the foreshore.
Finally, a quick trip up Mount Victoria (is there a town in New Zealand which DOESN’T have a Mount Victoria?) for a stunning view of the city, then refill the car, and return to the wharf.
Again, another day where we were glad we had hired a car and been able to drive ourselves around and see the things we wanted to see, on our own schedule.

Take me to: Day 5 <- | -> Day 7

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New Zealand – day 5 (Akaroa, October 22)

Bruce — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 06:23:12 +0000

Akaroa is another town which has been built on a river a couple of kilometres inland from the sea. This gives it a much more sheltered climate than it would have enjoyed on the coast.
I didn’t find out why there was such a strong French influence in Akaroa, but it was highly evident none the less.
We were in Akaroa 2 days before the Rugby World Cup final game between France and New Zealand. It was slightly humorous to see so many instances of flags and signs that professed support for both the All Blacks (New Zealand’s national rugby team) and the French team.
As our second port of call, Akaroa was gorgeous. There was a beautiful little lighthouse not far from the centre of town which had originally been built out on the coast. In the early 80′s, it had been scheduled for demolition, but a local with a touch of sentimentality had offered the council $1 for it. He was given ownership of the lighthouse, and over the next couple of months, dismantled it, moved it, and reassembled it in the town. These days, a mere $5 will gain you admission upon which you will have your ear chewed off by a couple of old timers who will tell you all about its history. And unlike Lanarch Castle, you are not only allowed but encouraged to take as many photos as you like. My kind of tourist attraction!
We then wandered through the town itself, looking at some of the French-inspired shops and architecture, before heading back to the ship.

Take me to: Day 4 <- | ->Day 6

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New Zealand – day 4 (Dunedin, October 21)

Bruce — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 06:06:07 +0000

We awoke to find the ship already docked at Port Chalmers, a small town of a couple of thousand people about 15km (10 miles) from Dunedin.
Although Dunedin itself is on the river, it is inaccessible for a ship the size of the Sea Princess. Hence our docking at Port Chalmers.
We disembarked to conditions that seemed typical of an English winter, quite fitting given that the landscape in this part of the country is an almost perfect replica of the mother country.
The temperature was in single figures Celsius (around 45-50F), light rain, and heavily overcast.
Cath had booked us a hire car, but that was waiting for us in Dunedin, not Port Chalmers.
That meant having to flag down a taxi, but we couldn’t really do that until we found ourselves some local currency.
We found an ATM in the main street, pulled out some cash, and hailed a cab.
The cabbie was a friendly bloke who gave us some local insights into what to go and have a look at once we had picked up our car.
After picking up our car, we decided that before we’d head off exploring, we should find a telco from whom we could pick up some pre-paid SIM cards for our phones. Mike Hollman, whom we would eventually hook up with once we got to Auckland, had suggested going with either Telecom NZ or Vodaphone. We found a Telecom store first, but were advised by the helpful young girl there that because of the radio frequencies of our handsets, a Telecom SIM would be no good to us and that we should go with Vodaphone. Wow…. honesty in retail. There’s a novel concept!
So, having acquired our Vodaphone SIM cards, we grabbed a bite of lunch and headed off on our first real bit of New Zealand exploration.
We headed south for about 10km to Lanarch Castle, one of those tourist magnets that was mentioned by every source of tourist info… the ship’s info sheet on Dunedin, by Mike, by the cab driver, by the hire car staff… must be worth a look then.
Again, as you can see from the pictures, this really left you feeling like you had magically teleported to the north of England.
The gardens were beautiful, but the wintery conditions didn’t inspire one to stay and enjoy them quite as much as we might have under sunnier conditions.
And unfortunately, this was one of those tourist attractions that charges an arm and a leg for the privilege of walking through the building, but then denies you the right to video or photograph the interior. Hate that. I skipped Hurst Castle in California because of this, and had I been travelling alone this time, I’d have skipped Lanarch Castle for the same reason. Call me a sceptic, but I don’t buy the “it’s for safety reasons” argument. More like “it’s for profit reasons”.
Anyway, after that, we headed out to the albatross colony which is right at the end of the peninsula along which we were driving.
We got out there and the conditions were even less hospitable than they had been at Lanarch Castle. We could now add 50km/hr winds to the rain, the low cloud cover and the cold. Not being equipped for these almost Antarctic conditions, I grabbed a couple of quick shots to prove that we’d been there, before we all piled back in the car and headed back into Dunedin.
We got back into town and decided that we still had an hour to kill before we needed to hand the hire car back, so we took a drive around Dunedin itself.
This of course had to include a drive past, and a few quick shots of, the Dunedin train station. A building which holds the distinction of the ‘most photographed building on the south island’. Doesn’t take much imagination to see why.
I don’t know how San Fransicans will feel about this, but Dunedin claims to have the steepest street in the world… Baldwin Street. I didn’t shoot any photos of it, but I did shoot some video. When I have edited the video together, I’ll post it on youtube. Unlike San Francisco’s Lombard Street which is a series of hairpin turns, Dunedin’s Baldwin Street is dead straight. I did see a guy drive up it, but unfortunately, I didn’t have the video camera recording at that point in time. He gave it a bootful at the bottom of the hill and managed to make it to the top. I wasn’t prepared to try it! Last thing I needed was to lose traction in the rain and slide out of control in a hire car with a $3000 excess!
We then filled the tank, dropped off the car, and jumped on the bus back to Port Chalmers. Cath and Max headed straight back to the ship, while I headed off on foot around the town to see if there was anything worth shooting.
I had noticed a church up on the hill when we’d disembarked that morning that I was interested in checking out.
What struck me as an unusual choice of artwork was the inverted pentagram stained glass window.
I’m sure there was a reason for such a choice, but Hollywood has certainly portrayed this symbol as being associated with far darker arts than Christianity.
Oh well, that’s one for the theologians to ponder. Me? I’ll just shoot it and move on.
After we cast off from Port Chalmers, we were escorted by the river pilot out to the open water. We had been sailing for about half an hour or so when I happened to look out a window at the failing light and see that we had done a 180 degree turn. I was headed back to the cabin to tell Cath we had turned around when the Captain’s voice came over the PA system again, saying that yes, as some passengers had noticed, the ship had in fact turned around and was heading back toward the river mouth. The reason was that one of the passengers had become ‘critically’ ill (I think I heard somewhere that he’d suffered a heart attack) and needed to be transferred to hospital in Dunedin. As Port Chalmers had no medical facilities of any kind, the passenger had to be moved onto the river pilot’s boat along with the ship’s doctor. The Sea Princess had to then hold steady while the passenger was transferred to Port Chalmers (where an ambulance was now waiting to carry him to Dunedin), and then for our doctor to be ferried back out to the Sea Princess, before we could again head off on our next leg to the very French town of Akaroa.

Take me to: Days 0-3 <- | -> Day 5

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New Zealand – days 0-3 (at sea, October 17-20)

Bruce — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 05:54:21 +0000

A quick side note before I start: I’m still in the process of documenting the trip, so you may find that the links to the following day (which will appear at the end of each day’s post) may not be active straight away. If that’s the case, it means you’ve caught up to me! OK, here we go…

Cath, Max and I boarded the Sea Princess in Sydney, bound for the Fiordlands National Park at the southern tip of New Zealand’s south island.
And before you crucify me for my spelling, please allow me to quote the Wikipedia article:

Indeed, the name “Fiordland” comes from a variant spelling of the Scandinavian word for this type of steep valley, “fjord”.

The itinerary called for 3 nights and 2 days of cruising (Monday night to Wednesday night inclusive) the open waters of the Tasman Sea, with an arrival at Fiordlands on Thursday morning.
However, as luck and the weather gods would have it, we struck high winds and ‘rough’ seas on our first two days out of Sydney. At lunch time on Wednesday, the Captain announced that because of the conditions we were sailing in, we had not made the kind of speeds the itinerary had anticipated, and as such, we would have to skip the Fiordlands National Park and sail directly on to what was supposed to be our second port of call, Dunedin.
I put ‘rough’ in quotes because I didn’t really think the conditions we were in were rough at all. Maybe I’m just one of the fortunate ones… one of those for whom sea sickness doesn’t kick in until you have to physically keep your hand on your wine glass to stop it from sliding off your table. The gentle rolling of the ship that we were experiencing seemed to me to be the bare minimum of what one should expect when sailing the open ocean. But, be that as it may, the Captain (who probably felt much the same as I did) conceded that these were ‘rough’ conditions and that we couldn’t go any faster.
As a consequence, we didn’t get to sail through Milford Sound and the rest of the Fiordlands National Park…. an area that seasoned sailors consider some of the most picturesque waterways of the southern hemisphere.
While having a chat with one of the deck hands on Wednesday afternoon, he mentioned that about one in three cruises ends up having to skip the FNP because of weather conditions. Great.
Oh well, make that 4 nights and 3 days of open water cruising then. Dunedin, here we come.
As you can see, only one photo from these four days. A really nice ‘Tequila Sunrise’-inspired sunset shot.
About 15 minutes before I took this shot, I said to Cath, “We’re gonna see an amazing sunset tonight. Look at the haze over the water.” And sure enough…

Take me to: -> Day 4

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Meetup #18 – Barrington Tops

Bruce — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 08:29:35 +0000

This weekend saw the Sydney Photographer’s Meetup group heading waaay out of town for their first overnight photography expedition.
The location was Camp Cobark at Barrington Tops.
Sure, we could have done horse riding closer to Sydney, but there’s something about getting right out into the bush, away from the city lights, away from the traffic, away from the noise, and hanging out with awesome country folk like Alan Shultz (owner and operator of Camp Cobark) and Glenn and Chrissy (husband and wife who kept us company and cooked our meals).
I can’t say enough good things about the whole operation.
Alan takes horsemanship very seriously and won’t let anyone near one of his horses until they heard his safey drill.
The catering was fantastic, too. There’s something about food cooked over an open fire which just leaves ovens and microwaves for dead!
We arrived at the Camp Cobark base (location of the offices, bunkhouse and horse yards) around noon, heard Alan’s safety talk, then mounted up and headed off on a three hour ride around the hills and valleys surrounding Alan’s property. To say the views were amazing would be a gross understatement.
We arrived at the campsite around 5:00pm and started putting up tents, while Glenn unsaddled the horses and let them loose in a small paddock for the night.
Then, while Chrissy began preparing our dinner, we all wandered around taking photos… the hills, the camp, the Cobark River (which flowed past our campsite, about 50 metres away), the sunset).
Dinner consisted of bbq’d steaks, boiled veges, pasta salad, coleslaw… and a couple of bottles of red (of course)!
Once the sun had gone down, I happened to notice this amazing corona around the moon. It was huge. In order to give it some reference point in terms of size, I was able to grab a shot with the fence posts around the camp in the shot. I used my torch (flashlight) to ‘lightpaint’ the fence while the shot was exposing, which gave me a shot I’m quite happy with.
An interesting comment regarding the corona, Glenn mentioned that whenever they see those rings around the moon, it is a harbinger of BIG rain. And he reckons the last time he saw one this big was back in ’78 when they received 24 inches of water (that’s around 75cm) in just 22 hours!
The morning chorus of native birds woke us around 5:30. There was some fog hanging around across the valley, but the smell of bacon and eggs cooking over an open fire persuaded us to stay close to the camp and shoot from there, rather than to venture too far afield.
After breakky, we pulled the tents down, packed up our gear, saddled up and headed off an another 3 hour ride.
After the previous afternoon’s ride, where we had all ridden with DSLR’s around our necks, most of us were content to let the cameras go back to the base camp in the 4WD’s so we could ride unencumbered. I personally didn’t feel that I missed out on any photographic opportunities because of this, as I’d already shot a heap of stuff I was happy with. I think everyone else felt much the same way.
We got back to the base around 11:00, packed our cars and headed off home.
For anyone looking for some horse riding in an awesome country location with mind-boggling scenery, I couldn’t recommend Camp Cobark highly enough.
Thanks for everything, Alan!

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