Mountain Moon Set

Its fair to say that Sunrise and Sunset take the lion share of the vote for most photographed times of the day be it from a landscape photographers point of view or just a quick holiday snap.

Its also true that often from a judging perspective it is all to easy to become somewhat “numbed” to the share volume of images that get presented for competitions. At least this is what Judges have told me several times :-)

Which is why I enjoyed taking this image of “Moon set” over an alpine lake in Canterbury’s high country.

Despite the fact it was two hours before sunrise the the amount of light that was left as the Moon sank behind the far ridge was enough to illuminate the whole scene at a 30’s exposure and only ISO 1000.

I was just lucky that a particular cloud, building up over the ridge on my camera left was still catching the moonbeams (?) so provided a beautiful contrast to the heavily shaded ridge to my right.

And, the bonus is that I also got a sunrise in that morning as well…. ;-)

Green Clothed Vandals.....

Well, sort of…..

Anyone who has spent time in the alpine areas of New Zealand will be familiar with the mighty Kea, New Zealand’s and in fact the Worlds only Alpine Parrot.

Clothed in muted shades of green its only when in flight, or preening, that you get to observe the brilliant under-wing orange plumage that more resembles the colour you expect from a Parrot.

Nestor notabilis - You turn your back for just one second….

But that’s not the point of this post, oh no not at all, that info is all readily available off the net. And when you do some research you will no doubt come across that other small matter of Kea’s proclivity to vandalise any and all human made objects whenever they get the opportunity!

A quick stop at Arthur’s Pass National Park (APN) after a morning shoot ended up with a gang of Kea’s descending on my car’s roof rack’s as soon as I turned away to take a couple of snaps… As you can see from the 1st image above, Kea’s posses an extremely strong and sharp beak along with some serious foot wear..

After shooing away the gang I ended up taking a quick image of one of the miscreants posing before I left and it turned out to be an image that has now been sold a few times, meaning I get to have the last laugh on the Kea.

This time… :-)

Strike a Pose!