The forecast predicted fog and below zero temperatures in the Rhön Mountains, and a quick look at the Schwarzes Moor Parking webcam confirmed white conditions – yeah! Off we went right after breakfast…
Of course, in good old German fashion, the Schwarzes Moor Nature Trail is closed in winter (Nov 15 – Mar 15) to protect us stupid citizens from ourselves as we could slip in winter conditions… but hey, all around is beautiful nature, too, especially under those conditions! We had all this to ourselves, not a single other soul in sight… What a wonderful day we had – we didn’t mind the small icy particles in the air driven by the ice cold wind at all! I was just glad that my OM-1 and the 12-100 are all I need, and they are perfectly safe in this weather. Towards the end of our walk I did switch to the Pana-Leica 9mm for a few photographs when we found a quiet corner in the forest to change the lens 😉 Afterwards driving down the mountains the white area disappeared and we were back in typical German grey winter… but found great comfort when having a tasty meal in a well-known Rhön-Trout Restaurant near Gersfeld (Forellenhof Wahl in Altenfeld, open Friday, Saturday, Sunday 11-20)…
For more photographs (and in bigger resolution) please visit the „Schwarzes Moor“ gallery…
For many years now we have been visiting the Rhön Mountains, which are only a 1 hour drive from our home. A little higher up near the Hochrhönstrasse, a road that takes you right across the center high region of the Rhön, there is the „Red Moor“ / Rotes Moor – a rised bog that develops over thousands of years, and which has for many years been exploited (like everywhere in Germany and Europe), drained out to harvest peat and gain dry land for farming. Fortunately this trend has been stopped a few decades ago, and a few moors have been saved, re-naturalized and turned into protected nature reserves. Like the Red Moor. (Nearby a little higher up is also the Black Moor).
Now we have been there many times, in various seasons, but two weeks ago the weather forecast indicated early snow in the Rhön mountains, and the webcams confirmed it, so I quickly grabbed my camera gear and went there in the middle of the week for a few hours of morning nature walking and photography…
For more photographs (in different seasons and in bigger resolution) please visit the „Rotes Moor“ gallery…
South of Frankfurt near Stockstadt am Rhein there is an old winding section of the Rhein river where the Rhein was straitened many years ago… this now cut-off remaining Rhein loop is now a protected nature area where you can go for hours of walking or … photographing. Of course, this is not wilderness by any means, after all it sits right in the very populated Rhein-Main area, but still a bit of nature mostly left to its own development for many years now. You can still clearly see areas like the open plains in the middle of the loop that used to be used for farming, or meadows with fruit trees… and you mostly walk around the loop (on the inside) on a raised bank (almost invisible hidden as your walking path in a forest) that protects the plain in the center from high waters of the Rhein loop (at least that used to be its function)… We have been there a few times now, but have yet to see it in winter, with fog or snow…
For more photographs (in bigger resolution) please visit the „Out for a Walk“ galleries in the different seasons…
(Preface: This is more a travel blog including pictures of our trip… for purely landscape photos in bigger resolution format please go the Japan 2024 gallery…)
Finally… back to Japan – my „second home“ … this time after a long (corona) break again for a Ki-Aikido Worldcamp (in Osaka). But first – 8 days of beautiful Japan, its nature, landscapes, town and small villages, and its people. As you can see from the first picture, I didn’t travel alone but with two of my Aikido students. And we had a wonderful time! Sophia, being a videographer and photographer, was taking lots of photographs herself, but of course with a completely different way of seeing (for her it was the 5th visit to Japan, including a longer stay of half a year)… Andrea, who is a (mostly painting) artist and teashop owner, came to Japan for the first time – and she was having a blast! She looked (and most probably felt) like Alice in Wonderland … First, we went to the beautiful mountain town of Takayama:
With a one-day visit to the mountain village of Shirakawago, where we had the great fortune to witness the autumn matsuri (festival) at the local shrine:
On day 4, we drove (with our little rental mini-mini van) deeper into the Japanese Alps for two days of hiking into the Kamikochi area. For that you have to leave your car at one of the big parking lots just outside the areas‘ gates, and travel inside by bus service. We got of at Taishoike bus stop, to hike the rest of the way (11km) up the Azusa River valley.. on the way we saw Taishiro pond and marsh, the famous Kappa-bashi bridge, and beautiful woods alongside the river until we reached our Mountain lodge Tokusawa-en, which we had pre-booked many months before (autumn in Kamikochi is high-season, places book out quickly and are rather pricey, but it includes Japanese breakfast and dinner, and onsen)…
On the third day we hiked back, this time mostly on the other side of the river, to see the to-of-this-world Myojin pond, as well as a landscape that was more different on this side of the river than one might expect…
After taking the bus back out to the parking lot in the afternoon, we still had a 2-hours drive ahead of us though the Alps to its southern parts in the Kiso mountain area, to the old Nakasendo road town of Magome, where we had booked a beautiful old ryokan, including dinner of course like it used to be in the old days… (everything closes at 5 pm including all places for eating.. ) Whoever is still in town after dark (tourists I mean) is staying in a ryokan, and there you get dinner 🙂 Next day we hiked the old Nakasendo road, at least a small portion of it, which leads you over a mountain pass down to the next town of Tsumago. From there we took the (last) bus back to Magome..
On day 8 we had to leave the Japanese Alps already and made a stop-over at the biwa lake town of Hikone, where we visited its castle and garden… despite rather wet weather conditions… Then driving back to Osaka, to drop off our rental car… for 4 days in the big city… (where we also had our 3-day Ki-Aikido Worldcamp, and were meeting many old and new friends)
After the camp we still had 4 days left… so we went to the old capital: Kyoto (joined by my student Peter for one day)..
Kyoto is worth a visit anytime, but certainly in autumn! Here are some photos from Arashiyama, with Tenryu-ji temple, the famous bamboo forest, and a beautiful Katsura river valley/gorge. One of my favorite shrines in Kyoto is Kitano Tenman-gu (where you also find a great „flea“market in front of the south gate every 4th Friday of the month, if you arrive before 5pm, that is 😉
The last day in Kyoto was devoted fully to a trip to the old town of Nara (which was the capital of Japan until 1240 years ago before Kyoto became the capital).
What a trip! Knowing I would have no time for wildlife photography, I left my Olympus 100-400 at home, and took only the minimal gear of the OM-1 with 12-100 almost glued to it, only occasionally switched for the Pana-Leica 8-18. Plus the Kase magnetic filters, of course – of which I really only needed the polarizer, the ND filters are nowadays of no much use for me, since the OM-1 has built-in electronic ND up to ND64, which is, together with the 7+ stops of image stabilization, perfect even for waterfall shots handheld. The lightweight travel tripod I took along (thankfully my Fotopro X-Aircross 3 Carbon weighs in under 1 kg) I used only once – for the night photos in Magome town. Reminder to self: Next time only OM-1, 12-100, Polarizer, spare batteries, charger, not even sure I need the 8-18 ? Maybe I will switch that soon for the smaller and even lighter new Loawa 6mm F2 MFT… ? „All“ of that fits beautifully into the bottom compartment of my Mindshift Rotation 22L Rucksack. The slide-around feature works perfectly for quick access to all your stuff, without taking off the backpack! And the top compartment is big enough for some clothing for a 2-day hike to a mountain hut… what more could I ask for?
Sooo… when will I be back in Japan? I don’t know. I will go back, probably many more times, but I would like to visit in some other seasons, too. Winter would be great, maybe in Hokkaido, we have yet to see cherry blossoms in Japan… and Kyushu is also still on my list…
It’s been a while since we returned from our Scotland trip in June this year… but only now I found the inspiration to revisit the photographs and edit a few of them in black & white. I knew quite a few would lend themselves to black & white because of the moody and/or contrasty conditions we found ourselves in quite often – but I had taken none of these specifically in or for black & white. I was enjoying this trip so much, found myself really connecting to the landscape and the land… But on future outings I do plan to set my camera to black & white more often and deliberately photograph in black & white.
Also, I was still getting a feel for my new camera system I had just switched to shortly before. I am now enjoying a much lighted travel backpack with the Olympus OM-1, coupled with the wonderful 12-100/F4 lens… this set is literally only half the weight of what I used to carry (last fall in Shikoku I still had my Leica SL-2S with the 24-70/F2.8 lens). Looking at the photographs, I see nothing missing, but holding and using the new camera is simply a joy (as well as the reduced weight, as mentioned before). Of course I also had with me a rather lightweight wide angle zoom (8-18 Panasonic-Leica). My Olympus 100-400 is really only for wildlife (being a full frame equivalent of 200-800mm) and could stay in the car most of the time, as the 12-100 has plenty of reach for landscapes (being a 200mm equivalent)… Also my tripod was only used in the dimmest of conditions, and could stay in the car most of the time as well, as the camera’s IBIS of 7+ stops is really awesome (coupled with the lenses IS)…
Below are just some pictures, for more please visit the Scotland gallery…
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