Site Title

Lavendar

Black Forest Stream

What do you do on a summers day in the bucolic German Black Forest?  Hiking?  Picnic?  Try to find a nice clock?  NO!  You go to a trial bike competition with the Bloecher family……

Gutentag

Waiting in the Rain

Up and Over

Hummmmm

Bonus picture:  This is what happens when you give Klaus Bloecher a salad….

What, No Meat?

THANKS JIM – you are a rockstar for sending these.

A friend we met on the dive trip, Rockstar Jim, sent these to me a few weeks ago and I wanted to post them here for everyone to enjoy – sea life in Palau was spectacular and these are just but a taste – no pun intended…..

Smile

Tomato Clown Fish

Grey Reef Shark

Clown fish

OK!

So our back neighbors – whom we have never seen – have been doing something to their kitchen – maybe it is an annual clean out – but the entire contents of their kitchen, linens, etc has been coming out on to their back patio for the past few days….this was the stuff that didn't make it back in before night.

Kitchen Wares

Apart from the chipmunks that have the worlds most irritating squeek (and by the way, they can go on for hours without stopping) the second most common sound is from this @#$#@ bird – who has found a perch right outside our bedroom….anyone got a bb gun?  No, actually, I couldn't bring myself to do it but man that box of ear plugs is coming in handy!!!

Red Eyed

Trying to integrate some of the lessons from my class on taking close up pics of things….the things I had on handy were flowers on our balcony….

Yellow

Pink

I was walking behind a guy headed home from work and took this…

Going Home

The first time I saw the Jackfruit tree and the ginormous spiny green fruit hanging off of them…I thought to myself WTF??  Actually, come to think of it…..that may have slipped out of my mouth.

Anyway, they looked weird but I had no idea how central they are to the culture.  Apparently, every single part can be used – flesh eaten (interestingly similar to consistency of cooked chicken when green – veggies love them), seeds can be roasted, wood used for all sorts of stuff, roots are apparently very helpful for delhi belly – nice to know when you live here and BEST of all (this is a shout out for Tiffany) IT DOES NOT STINK LIKE DURIAN!!!

Here is a picture from the tree growing right around the corner from our apartment:

"Berries" of the Jackfruit Tree

One Big Jackfruit

Ahh well, I figured that I could use some more practical experience in sharpening my photography skills so I signed up for a weekend class taught by a local guy who does amazing wildlife photography.

Side commentary first before launching into the day:  I cracked up when people pulled out their cameras…it was hilarious how each person immediately looked at the camera and then put the person they were looking at (or equipment) into a hierarchy.  I find this behavior so funny (not that I am not susceptible to it) because oftentimes there is some sort of compensation with equipment – be it mountain biking, hiking etc.  The person with the biggest or the best oftentimes has no clue what they are doing….so anyway…..

I stopped myself from writing a blog on Saturday when I came back from the class because frankly, I was completely shattered.  

First the back story:

As part of the class, we had to send in our two BEST images….after an hour or two of obsessing over which two of my 1000 plus pics I should send, debating the merits of the various top 8 with friends and Darren (yes, yes folks it should be no surprise I did this given my, well, slightly obsessive nature), I decided on two and with a big sigh hit the send button.

Now what happened:

Time was running out for the 1st day of class and the guy wanted to get through the critique of the images we had sent in - ORIGINALLY, we were each suppose to talk about our pictures, what we were trying to achieve and what we thought could be improved.  Well, as I said, running out of time, your man launched into a very pointed critique of each of the images and found plenty wrong with each – of course, some of us, ok…..I was hoping for a reaction like "WOW, what an amazing image" ego stroke, ego stroke etc.  Needless to say, not the case and I returned home to lick my wounds.

Anyway, I gathered my ego bruised photographer self for the next morning of "shooting in the field"…here is one of the images I took that I kinda like but your man thought was "excellent"….hummm ok.  

Biggest lesson of the day –  photography is like wine – there is real crap and really excellent stuff but it really comes down to what your personal tastes are.

All in all it was a good experience and built on top of what Amber had taught me about camera usage….thanks again honey!….next time though, lesson learned, I will send in some semi crappy photos and then I won't care 🙂

Working with Fstops

What an amazing place!  Palau – an archipelago in Micronesia and about a 2 hr flight from Manila – is beautiful both above and below the water – the variation of blue was phenomenal.  Friendly people, great diving and fantastic local brew. It was a fantastic vacation – we even got our Nitrox certs!

Ok, ok, so because we were there for the diving….even though we have no pictures from underwater unless some friends we made send us some….the life was fantastic.  Large sharks (grey, white tip, and black tip), massive wrasses, huge schools of yellow fin and barracuda, hawksbill turtles, moray eels, starfish, nudibranks, amazing corals and on and on! 

Here are a couple of dive sites we spent alot of time at – click because you can see underwater pics!
 - Blue Corner – great for hooking in and floating as the world goes by!
 - Blue Hole – went from 30 ft to 119ft and was super cool!

Here are some shots (forewarning – lots of pictures of the water). 

Our Bungalow On The Hill

Flowers On Our Balcony

More Blue

So Many Blues

The Main Activity

Open Channel

Walking On the Beach

First Nitrox Tank

Survivor Palau Beach

Sunset View From Balcony

Bonus Shots:  The hotel owners pet rooster "Chicky" and the Red Rooster Beer…the beer was much better!  Just Kidding people – we didn't eat "Chicky"

The Dark Was Better

Chick….Chick….Chicky