Puffin swimming, presumably looking for fish.
I was excited to see my first ever puffins and photograph them while cruising the islands off the coast of Iceland. I knew my resultant travel photographs would never compete with professional nature photographers who sit on a hillside and wait for the perfect moment to capture a puffin. However, out of the many hundreds of photos taken from the moving, bouncing Zodiac boat, two photos were acceptable to show here.
For some reason, homes in coastal towns are often painted in colorful pastel colors. Weymouth, England is no exception.
Our method of exploration of these coastal towns generally consisted of shopping for something we apparently feel we needed or forgot to pack, like warmer clothes. We then search for a lunch spot in town to sample the local cuisine. Indian food is very good across the UK, so that was often at the top of our list. The local seafood was also good to find. However, please note there is no Dover sole to be found in Dover, England. No matter how good the food is on board, local cuisine away from the ship is a very welcome change.
Colorful Tobermory, Scotland
Colorful Tobermory, Scotland was a fun spot to explore after our failed bird watching expedition to the countryside. The photo above captures about one-third of the town. The arrival of our ship doubled the population of this quaint town for the day. We went into the Mishnish Hotel, the yellow building above, and had some local beverages and a half dozen oysters as part of our shore excursion. Then we ventured a few doors down for some Indian cuisine.
Thirty-two days on the Seabourn Quest, our longest cruise yet.
Our 32 day cruise began in Lisbon, Portugal. The Portuguese say Lisboa. Our cruise itinerary seemed to include every place that ended in “…land.” That would include England, Ireland, Scotland, Iceland, Greenland, many islands and finally Newfoundland. We accomplished our main goal. Get out of the August heat of Idaho. Greenland may have been my favorite.
In the winter of 2023 we went to southern Utah to escape the winter cold and provide me with yet another opportunity to improve my golf game. Neither goal was fully realized. But I did get to experience the surreal beauty of Bryce National Park under a deep cover of fresh snow.
Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise in Banff National Park.
Partly on the advice of my dad, I looked forward to our visit to the Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise in the heart of Banff National Park, Alberta Canada. What fun it would be to have a room with a balcony overlooking beautiful Lake Louse and hike in the surrounding mountains.
Green Sweat Bee
My area of focus in photography changed a few years ago toward macro photography. It seemed that photographing bugs and flowers might allow me to escape the crowds and all-too-popular iconic sites of landscape photography. An early step in this process was to build a bug stage allowing for easier placement of the bugs, lights, flashes and my camera.
This lioness may appear to be roaring, but it is an early morning yawn, as flies buzz around her face.
After leaving Uganda our photography safari led us to the Kenya savanna. Seeing the big cats in the wild, up close and personal, was to be a high point, culminating with the wondrous wildebeest crossing of the Mara River. Someone forgot to tell the wildebeest. There was no crossing. None, nada. Continue reading
The Giant Kingfisher of Kenya. I was just as surprised as this poor fish. Yes, he eventually swallowed the fish whole.
From the ugly marabou stork and the very gross hornbills to the beautiful weavers and shiny Guineafowls, Kenya has quite the variety of birds. Taking advantage of my camera which will take up to 20 frames a second, these bird photos will often be shown here as a series of photos. To not lose my audience too quickly, I’ll start off with the attractive African weaver birds before getting into the ugly and gross.
Elephant portrait
The next couple weeks were spent bouncing around Kenya exploring the savanna from the window of a Land Rover. I was the only person in our ten photographer group to not print off the correct travel documents for entry into Kenya from Uganda. Fortunately, we had gotten to the airport in time to correct this oversight. More African travel frustrations. Continue reading