Places

Sep

2024

Return to the Warrumbungles

My wife and I made the trip back up to the Warrumbungles National Park. I didn’t get enough the last time. I’d planned to do a few star shots and some more bird photography. Things didn’t quite go to plan.

Arriving in the early evening we set the tents up quickly. The plan was, to get the 500mm lens out, load it on the tripod and see if I could get any shots of a nebula or planet For the record, I’m not an astrophotographer. For me, it’s a case of playing with the settings until I get it right. There’s a lot of skill and dedicated equipment needed to get the real stellar shots (like that one?) but being such a beautiful dark sky park I figured I could still get something

All looked good on paper but it turns out I had three things worked against me.

I left my large lens at home in my other bag
I left the tripod mounting plate on my remote camera, again at home,
the moon was on its way to being a supermoon which meant the stars were nowhere near as bright as they’d been two weeks previous

Not a great start. Improvising where I could I gaffed taped my camera to my tripod and shot the landscape under the moonlight.

The lack of a large lens also limited my bird photography (as with the Astro stuff it’s half luck if I get a good shot). I had the 200mm with me so just shot and cropped where I could. there are so many little birds flitting around but I couldn’t get close enough to them to get a great shot.

In the end, I think it was all in my favour. I took it as a sign to put the camera down for a change, enjoy myself and be present. Too often I am running around looking for my next shot. We camped out at the wonderful Blackman camp, enjoyed the chilly nights and frosty mornings, did a couple of short hikes and some drives to explore the surrounding area

Mistakes were made but still…..trip number 3 to the Warrumbungles is already in planning. Hopefully, mistakes were also learned from.

Noisy Friar bird feeding on a grass tree

Superb Fairywren (Malurus cyaneus) at the Burbie Canyon walking track

Eastern grey kangaroo (Macropus giganteus) with joey

Spring Siding Observatory

Wildflowers, Warrumbungle National Park

Starry sky, Warrumbungle Dark Park

Wildflowers, Warrumbungle National Park

Last light hits the cliffs, Warrumbungles National Park

Looking towards the Warrumbungles from out west

Morning frost

Eastern grey kangaroos (Macropus giganteus)

Sunset behind Split Rock at the Warrumbungle National Park.

The Warrumbungles as viewed from the west

If you are heading west then after the Warrumbungles the land goes flat.

Mar

2024

Underwater at Narooma

It’s been a hectic month. After 5500km or thereabouts, I think I have been on the road and away more than I’ve been at home. Thredbo, Sydney, Mt Buller, Sydney, Thredbo, Narooma, Sydney, Orange and home again. I managed to sneak a couple of days of R&R into the mix while at Narooma.

I was in Narooma to shoot the Rocky Trail Superflow on the new MTB trails they have there, 2 days of racing on 4 different trails. It’s the first time they’ve had a race there and guessing by all the smiling faces it won’t be the last. The trails are fantastic or at least the couple I saw, smooth and flowy with some unique features such as the half-buried car. The trail system is big. I was surprised looking at the map just how expansive it is. I only saw a couple of the trails this time but by all accounts, Dirt Art has created another masterpiece.

Narooma has long been a favourite coastal destination of ours. The coastline is spectacular, the water is beautiful (not called the Sapphire Coast for nothing), and the marine life is fantastic. There’s a small colony of Australian and New Zealand fur seals living on the harbour break wall easily accessible from town. Sitting off the coast is Montague Island or Barunguba where a much larger colony lives. If you are visiting Narooma paying a visit to Montague Island for a dip is a must-do in my opinion. I’m already looking forward to a planned visit later in the year when the water is clearer and the seals more numerous. Plus I want to brush up on my underwater photography skills first too.

Jan

2024

Favourite 23 Images of 2023

2023 saw me driving up and down the East Coast of Australia again. I didn’t reach Queensland this year but I did get down into Victoria a couple of times. The images below are my favourite landscape and nature images picked from my favourite 200 or so that are being uploaded to the website. There are no sports images in this group. Once I have finished uploading the landscape and nature shots, I shall fire up a sports gallery.

I once saw a meme somewhere that said:

As you age, it’s ridiculous how fast bird-watching creeps up on you. You spend your whole life being 100% indifferent to birds and one day you are like “Damn, is that a yellow-rumped warbler?”
Internet Meme

And so it seems it happened to me last year. I was never 100% indifferent to birds but, out in the bush shooting the races, I’m always surrounded by birdlife. I took many photos of birds in between waiting for the competitors to pass. Seems the natural thing to do is just point the camera and shoot.

More of my favourite images can be found in the main gallery for Australia here, and more will be going up soon so be sure and keep a watch. Prints are available for all the images.

New England National Park, NSW, Australia

Eastern Yellow Robin, Eopsaltria Australis

Australasian Fur Seal (Arctocephalus forsteri)

Dead Trees, Victorian High Country, Australia

Apr

2019

A trip to the mountains

The Blue Mountains near Sydney always make for an interesting trip and a great way to escape the bustle of city life. There are some great little corners and hidden pathways, and it seems everyone who heads up loves going on adventures.

A couple of weeks ago, I bought a new 16-35mm wide-angle lens with the intention of taking more landscape photography again. I also pulled my 360 panoramic tripod head out of retirement and took it with me. Setting it up was a bit of a rush job, and it certainly needs a bit of fine-tuning, but they seem to go well together.

I also noticed the Autumn colours starting to kick in so I might have to make another trip up to the Blue Mountains to get some of those lovely oranges and yellow hues maybe even another 360-image or 2

Jun

2016

Storms and Waves

The East Coast of Australia received a battering from some big back to back storms over the last week which brought with them wild winds and heavy rain. The storms caused a fair bit of damage, especially around Collaroy/ Narrabeen here on the Northern beaches where they washed away the Collaroy beach and created the new South Narrabeen Headland. They also whipped up one of the best swells Sydney has seen for a while.

I love this type of weather, its just so full of energy, and I spent the weekend running around chasing the weather and playing in the wind. In the days after I went to the beaches around here to try and capture some of the action that was going on down there and there was plenty going on. I spent most of the time at Narrabeen but also swung by Curl Curl and Avalon. Most of the Northern Beaches were in their element.

: Morning of Day 3 of the storm swell at Narrabeen.

: Day 3 of the storm swell at Avalon.

: Day 3 of the swell at Monavale

: Morning of Day 3 of the storm swell at Narrabeen.

: The remains of South Narrabeen beach after the Storm

: Surfing action at Narrabeen during the storm swell

: Sunset hits the storm clouds over South Curl Curl

: Day 1 of the swll at Curl Curl

: Waterfalls falling off North Head being whipped up by the wind

: Waterfalls falling off North Head being whipped up by the wind

: Waterfalls started appearing where there were none before. Here are soome near Akuna Bay,

: Large waves hit the pool at Dee Why

: Large waves throw themselves against Dee Why Headland

: Large waves crash against the rocks at North Curl Curl

Dec

2015

Stromlo National round and the Brindabella Range

A spur of the moment trip to Canberra to go shoot at the National Round of the Downhill saw me paying a visit to the nearby Brindabella range. I have visited these mountains a few times now but still think I am only scratching the surface of what they have to offer.

I arrived late in the afternoon and spent the night at the top of Mt Ginini which was as far in as I could drive. Thankfully I had been unable to find my summer sleeping bag and had taken my warm on as the temperature dropped to 3C despite the fact that it was mid-summer. In the morning I rose to being enveloped in the clouds so there wasn’t any real sign of sunrise. I spent the best part of the morning driving around and enjoying the beautiful scenery. I stopped off at Mt. Franklin and walked to the site of Australia’s first ski lodge. I could quite happily have spent the whole weekends drifting around in the hills.

Although I missed most of the practice runs of the National series downhill i made it down for the main event. As is normal for Stromlo someone seemed to have turned the thermostat up. The action was great with a lot of Australia’s best racers screaming down the hill.