Growing up, my knowledge of New Zealand was limited to basic geography and the All Blacks! Living in London in the mid 90s I had met quite a few people from New Zealand on my travels. Funnily enough, the concept of ever travelling to New Zealand never really got onto my bucket list until a friend traveled there to see in Y2K. As my passion for photography has grown over the years and since moving to Australia in 2007, my desire to visit this amazing country developed into a need. When Tyson and Clara invited me to accompany them to NZ for Clara's 40th birthday, I jumped at the opportunity to spend some more time with them and their little Alba. This was to be a three week trip...2 in New Zealand and one in Tasmania. Bryan Stalder from Bryan Stalder Photography would join me for the second week and Julia Zeltzer for the last week in Tasmania.
Posts over the next few days will tell this story.
As the sun rose in the morning this is the view that greeted us from our room at the Oaks looking over Lake Wakatipu.
Canon 5Dmiii, 100-400L II IS @ 104mm, ISO125, f/6.3, 1/500s
Frankton across lake Wakatipu. Again, from our apartment at the Oaks, Queenstown
Canon 5Dmiii, 100-400L II IS @ 200mm, ISO125, f/6.3, 1/320s
A walk through Queenstown Botanical Gardens was both magical and freezing in the rain. My favourite were the Sequoia but I couldn't get a good shot of them.
Canon 5Dmiii, 100mm Macro @ 100mm, ISO200, f/4.5, 1/125s
Tyson and Alba waited patiently as I photographed the flowers...well, at least Tyson did :)
Canon 5Dmiii, 100mm Macro @ 100mm, ISO200, f/4.5, 1/125s
We tried to climb Queenstown Hill but the snow was so heavy and the view so limited we decided to stop at the basket.
Canon 5Dmiii, 24-105L IS @ 24mm, ISO200, f/5.6, 1/50s
Tyson, me and Alba...happy but happy to be turning round at this point too
iPhone 6S
The view from the carpark at the start of the climb up Queenstown Hill
Canon 5Dmiii, 100-400L II IS @ 100mm, ISO400, f/5.6, 1/200s (Stitched Panorama)
Reflection at the end of a brilliant first day. I am so excited :).
Canon 5Dmiii, 24-105L IS @ 24mm, ISO50, f/11, 20s