The rain magnet

Posted on August 8th, 2015

The only rain cloud over whole Europe, was exactly above me.
Yes that’s true, I found it again. After driving two and a half hour until I reached the top of the Gotthard pass, it beguns to rain. And with a check on the rain radar app, I had the certainty, it was the only one, a small one just a bit larger than the spot which marks my position on the map.
Darn, I thought I could walk to a lake and take photos of a clear night sky and now it rains. But wait! It’s only a small cloud and therefore it is a chance the rain will stop soon, because the cloud is passed by.
I waited a half an hour and yes it stops to rain. The clouds where still there but I thought I have a good chance that the clouds will disappear too. And so I started hiking while the clouds covered the most part of the sky and walked into the darkness full of hope…

Sunlight at night

Posted on August 5th, 2015

The light of the “midnight sun” guided me home.
Every interesting excursion is coming to an end and so ended my journey to the Rhone glacier. On my way back to my car I shot a last panorama with two images down to the Valais valley and directly into the sun, pardon the moon.
It was one day before the fullmoon and the moon light was so bright I could walk without any additional light, but I didn’t it for my safety The nice thing about bright moonlight nights are, you can shoot with a low ISO setting and you will get smooth and noiseless images.
Let us close the story of my adventure at the Rhone glacier with this image and see what the next excursion brings.

Furkablick

Posted on August 3rd, 2015

You should have the view to the Furkapass.
This suggests the name of the hotel, but I’m watching in the other direction and so I can’t see the Furkapass.
I’m now on my way back home, after I spent the half night in the middle of the alps at the impressive Rhone glacier. And like usually I couldn’t resist having more stops to take more images. This beautiful clear night is inviting me to take more images.
And so you can not see now the Furkapass, where I come from, but because the air is so clear, we can see far away at the horizon the Oberalppass to the Surselva in the Kanton Graubuenden.

The Rhone glacier

Posted on Juli 31st, 2015

The Rhone glacier seen from a stony slope.
All the rubble you see, is moved by the large glacier in ancient time. Now it is shrinking and a few years ago the tongue was covering also the part where now the glacier lake is. On the other side of the valley, you can clearly see, where the border of the glacier was.
But it is still really impressiv and even up here I could here a constant swoosh of the water coming out of the glacier. Thanks to the fullmoon, I could see the whole landscape by my eyes and the camera was also not stressed by high ISOs.
At the lower border of the image you can see strange white stuff. This isn’t snow, these are a special canvas to save the glacier. I don’t think this will work, but let them try it. I like glaciers and next time I try to get more closer to a glacier.

Life between rubble

Posted on Juli 29th, 2015

A small little garden between a large field of stones.
I was walking along the marked hiking path and somewhere I must lost the signs and then I was surrounded by stones on a steep slope. Well this was a bit over my limits and I thought, this is way more difficult than a normal hiking trail. So I walked back and I saw a way going down and I followed it. This trail was was a good piece easier. And after a while I thought, okay, this is enough climbing now, I will stay here to take my photos.
I planted my backpack to the ground and explored the nearer surroundings. What should I say, I found a ladder and a yellow-blue sign. I was now on a via ferrata! Okay, that explains the stony way and next time I should better watch for the hiking signs
Can you guess, what you can’t see on the blurry part of the image?

Brake

Posted on Juli 27th, 2015

Some people use their brakes too often, good for the photographer…
After I was driving twice over, because the hiking trail was still covered with snowand well hidden, I took another way from a higher point. And as I was walking to my favored shooting point, I saw down to the valley and I could see the whole pass road. Good for me, there was a car already started to drive down to Gletsch.
Hurry up, mounting my tripod and setting my camera for 30 seconds shots, pressed the shutter and waited. It tooked 10 minutes until the car was down in the valley and I had a bunch of photos. Well now I had only to blend all images together to get a nice light stream.

The cooling down

Posted on Juli 25th, 2015

Enjoying the last sunrays of the day, is just the beginning of the adventure….
It was hot and I was glad to enter my climated car to drive for the next two hours up to the mountains. As late as always I missed a good part of the sunset. Sometimes I saw behind a mountain an interesting light or a peak illuminated by the sun. But deep in the valley and between high mountains, it was not the best view for a photo.
And so I was driving, without any stop, all the way up to the Furkapass. I was coming around the last corner, when I could see down to the other side of the mountain pass. Wow, how cool is this? If I was there a few minutes earlier, I wouldn’t stop, because the light wouldn’t be that great.
I stopped the car and jumped out, holy crap! I was standing there with my short pants, it was around 30°C when I was started, and there was a cold wind blowing me nearly away. Before I could shoot an image I had to put on my long pants, and a jacket, what a difference to the rest of Europe, where the people were sweating to death. But hey, this was a very welcome cooling down.

First things first

Posted on Juli 22nd, 2015

What happend the last three weeks?
Until two years of bad weather, suddenly the summer was back. After I realised it, I planned my evenings in a new way. When other peoples were drinking an evening beer and watching tv the feeds lying high, was Mr. Fear already on the road to the mounains. Two hours until I reached a high position, then hiking up to two hours, making photos, walking back and took the way back home. Normaly it ended in the early morning hours, when the sun was coming back again.
You may think this is exhausting, yes it was, but it was also like little hollidays. I left my daily neighbourhood behind me and enjoyed the high mountains surrounded me. And while all the other peoples tried to sleep and sweating, I could enjoy the cool and fresh alpine breeze. And even when I was back at home, was the heat no more so bad.
The big thing was, the heat wave was not ending and so I was going again and again, who knows when the next time comes, with such good conditions….

Wrong way

Posted on Juli 20th, 2015

Sometimes the wrong way isn’t the bad way…
After I was walking about 20 minutes or so, along the panoramic route to the Oberaar glacier, I saw a piece of reddish, far away in the sky. It was a nice surprise, because although the weather forecast had said, there shouldn’t be any clouds, the whole sky was covered with them. I took the chance to shoot one shot before the sunlight was gone and the clouds covered the rest of sky.
Then I put my camera back and took my map out of my pants and had a look, how long I still has to walk on the road, until the steep trail is beginning, where I will climb up to the Sidelhorn. OH NO! I already missed it, darn! Now I had to walk back to find the right way and I was already late, as you can see, because the sun was setting right now.
But there is no other way as to walk back…

A last view

Posted on Juli 18th, 2015

With this image we say goodbye to the Val Bondasca.
It was an exhausting weekend, but with many interesting views and photos. I wish there were less clouds especially in the night where I couldn’t see any stars but I liked the journey anyway.
I write this text while I’m very tired. I was coming back in the morning at six o’clock after a long night of making starscapes. In fact this is also the reason for the few posts in the last three weeks. We had such a stable weather situation, I had to go as often as possible for night shootings into the mountains. But the good thing is, now you can expect many new starscape photos in the next few weeks.