Capture by A photoblog

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Capture: Someone, Somewhere, In Summertime

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  • Jackie Clark, in reply to ChrisW,

    I did not know that. Wow! Thanks, Chris.

    Mt Eden, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 3136 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW,

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    A resemblance perhaps? But this one altogether too punk to be a roof inspector.

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW, in reply to Jarno van der Linden,

    Thanks Jarno - looks a great spot. I've often seen Mt Stokes from Picton, and from sailing on Queen Charlotte Sound and paddling on Pelorus. When a Wellingtonian I thought it handy enough and wouldn't it be a good to pick a spell of fine weather and sleep the night on the summit there - not just to spread the effort of climbing and descending to ease the body strain, but with that mosaic of water and land all around, what a place to see the sunset from and then dawn-sunrise!

    Such thoughts renewed, mmm, just might do something about them.

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • Nora Leggs, in reply to ChrisW,

    altogether too punk to be a roof inspector.

    That one is definitely the Night Before compared to my Morning After Bird of Paradise...

    Auckland • Since Dec 2011 • 2700 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW, in reply to Nora Leggs,

    Heh! They do make a nice set. But more than just the night before, yours looks like a lifetime on the turps, even to the rheumy eye.

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW,

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    New Year's Eve, a pumice-sand beach without footprints on the northern side of Lake Waikareiti - perched at 900 m altitude in the beech forest above Waikaremoana. Tent set up a few metres behind in the bush. The sunset colours are understated as the few clouds are fitted into the landscape, the fire muted also as I'm starting off frying pieces of bacon in its own fat, the resulting smell is picking up, and the first morepork of the evening called a minute ago.

    Yes it was very satisfying, and it didn't go downhill from there ...

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW,

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    High cloud catches the later sun, Angle-fire.
    Later, the
    Navigational stars come out,
    Pointers to the Southern Cross
    circling the pole -
    Here's to 2013!

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • JacksonP, in reply to ChrisW,

    Here’s to 2013!

    Cheers Chris. Wow, you are winning at life. I want to teleport there immediately. What a magic place.

    Auckland • Since Mar 2011 • 2450 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW, in reply to JacksonP,

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    What a magic place.

    Indeed magic and thanks, Jackson.

    First sight of 2013 through bleary eyes when I stumbled out of the tent in the morning. The signs were good the night and year before, but is that a roseate glow, or shepherds' warning?

    And second sight.

    No shepherds at Waikareiti, the rain came on the SI West Coast instead (sorry, West Coasters!), but the weather stayed fine another few days here - so the roseate glow of optimism for 2013.

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • Lilith __,

    ChrisW, what wonderful pics! Thanks for sharing.

    Dunedin • Since Jul 2010 • 3895 posts Report Reply

  • Joe Wylie,

    What Jackson & Lilith said. Stunning stuff.

    flat earth • Since Jan 2007 • 4593 posts Report Reply

  • Paul Williams, in reply to Joe Wylie,

    What Jackson & Lilith said. Stunning stuff.

    +2

    Sydney • Since Nov 2006 • 2273 posts Report Reply

  • Nora Leggs, in reply to ChrisW,

    New Year’s Eve

    Worth coming back to these pics throughout the year as refreshment. Shame we don't have scratch and sniff on Capture, but I can imagine the smell of bacon cooking in the cool evening air : )

    Auckland • Since Dec 2011 • 2700 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW,

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    Thank-you all - shall I continue with my New Year's morn then?

    Late morning, all packed up and ready to leave for the trackless bush behind me - a farewell photo of Waikareiti. If you can see an emphasis that here the bush, the lake, the sky, the beach sand, the hills, the islands - all these elements and every pair of them are unusually close in an integrated whole - then that's exactly what I was thinking.

    I'm glad the cooking fire appeals to the senses. I was reluctant to walk on the beach at first, to leave my footprints, then settled on a fire there as leaving a more quickly passing impact, and a single line to the water's edge for ... water. And in the morning I carefully walked on one end of the little beach to access and enjoy the bush edge details, but still with a not-quite-guilty sense of awareness I was changing the place. Then looking at one of my great boot-prints on the sand, I saw on its edge this lovely arrangement of beech leaves, that I had unwittingly almost destroyed - a fresh new red beech leaf and an old silver beech leaf as if artfully placed on an old red beech leaf. So I photographed them and their near-miss in their context of other debris from the bush overhead fallen onto the sand in the last rain and wind.

    Then in the photo detail enlarged, I saw a beautifully round grain of sand artfully placed on the leaf too. It's unlike all the other grains of pumice. I'm a geologist - they are from big eruptions of Taupo 1800 and 3500 years ago, washed out of the soils of the bush slopes adjoining, whereas that smaller pearly white round grain is of quartz, washed off the surface of a sandstone boulder exposed on the lakeshore, a boulder that is part of the hummocky debris of an enormous landslide from 18,000 years ago, where the original sandstone itself was around 10 million years old, but this grain of sand within it was far older, having been through several earlier geological cycles to round it so well. How did it land on those delicate leaves? I rather think it had just sprung a few millimetres from the sand disturbed by the edge of my boot. So any trace of not-quite-guilt was gone - I have seen a world in a grain of sand, and enhanced my understanding of what happens when a leaf falls in a forest with and without someone around to hear it.

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • Jos,

    Wow!

    Please go on...

    Whakatane • Since Jan 2012 • 877 posts Report Reply

  • Danielle,

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    Another splash. I have a bad feeling I could become obsessed by doing this. "Which shape will it make NOW?"

    Charo World. Cuchi-cuchi!… • Since Nov 2006 • 3828 posts Report Reply

  • Sofie Bribiesca, in reply to ChrisW,

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    I have seen a world in a grain of sand, and enhanced my understanding of what happens when a leaf falls in a forest with and without someone around to hear it.

    Innit. Perfect weather to fly. :)

    here and there. • Since Nov 2007 • 6796 posts Report Reply

  • Nora Leggs,

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    Or to lie around on the floor trying to keep cool

    Auckland • Since Dec 2011 • 2700 posts Report Reply

  • JacksonP, in reply to ChrisW,

    ChrisW, I'm commissioning you to write the 'Capture Book of Zen'. You seem to have knocked out chapter one already.

    Great photos. Great story.

    Cheers.

    PS Danielle, see of you can make a water pony. ;-)

    Auckland • Since Mar 2011 • 2450 posts Report Reply

  • DexterX,

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    The fact that Mount Eden has no grazing - I wonder whether one summer it will go up in flames, however, in the meantime it is fun.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 1224 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW, in reply to JacksonP,

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    And time for a chapter break - good to see some others! So for something different from me - this is not a crime scene, but still the aftermath of violence, recorded late this afternoon.

    It was pretty warm in Gisborne today, light winds and 33+degs in good shade at my place, no doubt markedly hotter in direct sun on the concrete path by the plum tree. Said tree produces beautiful big dark juicy tasty plums, and has excelled itself this year - much direct eating, supplying 5 neighbours etc with bagfuls, numerous bottles stewed and stashed, the birds getting their share and still the plums fall in excess of consumption. This one rolled out from the shade of the tree onto concrete, whose edging shows my lack of application to the suburban lawnmaster's creed. No bird had pecked its skin. So as it stewed whole in the sun the pressure built up until - well there is the evidence of a violent explosion, guts propelled afar, the skin collapsed back on itself.

    Did it make a sound? I'm disappointed I wasn't there to hear it blow.

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

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    Beautiful shots, ChrisW.

    I did my best to avoid leaving a footprint on this beach, not that it would matter, it's wiped clean every 12 hours.

    I've always loved the primordial aspect of this spot. It has difficult access on both sides, and sheer and eroding cliffs, so no one has plonked a bach on it. The rocky waterline discourages boats.

    The sea washes right up to the cliff face, the bush above cascades down, birds flutter and nest overhead. Nature sitting exposed on top of raw geology.

    Land battered by sea, and pink algae forming in a hole resembling a throat.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

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    Nearby, to further emphasize the precarious hold of humanity on earth, this monstrosity seems almost ill-fated to me, considering I've observed all of the catastrophes below it over a 30 year period, the tree was once upright, the enormous boulder on the beach was what made that cave in the face, the cracks have all widened.

    But it won't be long before something like the "Stairway to Heaven" (which at the bottom end is simply a rocky crag) is added, I expect. I think that ridge was pines before. Now it's riparian rights gone mad - the house is only about 100m along the road from the council access to the actual beach, and in the other direction to Fisherman's Point.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

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    But nothing can really top the scar made by this, in which the owners were so determined to get their sea access that they caused the entire face to slip away, and have spent the last 5 years building retaining walls to keep their house out of the ocean.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

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    A Kereru in a Karaka tree
    2 Sky Decoders...
    3 Tui songs
    4 Pohutukawas
    5 Shags a shitting

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

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