Actually I have been home for almost a fortnight, and I’m reminded once more how difficult it is to return to blogging once there has been a long break. I came home full of good intentions, planning to write screeds about my travels and share some of the many photographs I took, but somehow it did not happen. I even took these on the first night back, to show how content we three were to be home again.
However, better late than never, as they say….so here goes.
As you know I am a very keen photographer these days, mostly taking macro shots of insects, flowers and other interesting things around my property, which I enjoy enormously, and which have recently been made into a book. Finding I was getting a little bored with this, I decided I needed to expand my knowledge, practice and experience by taking a different sort of photograph, with different subjects in different localities, with different light, and different techniques – so I went to Tasmania for a couple of weeks with this intention. I took my car on the Spirit of Tasmania, on my own so selfishly I did not have to consider what anyone else wanted to do, with a vague idea of where I wanted to go without being in a hurry, but with a plan to include a few days with my brother and another friend in Hobart. I had a great time, deciding most mornings with a great sense of freedom, what I would do and where I would go each day, with no accommodation booked ahead, and avoiding many typical tourist spots while seeing a great deal of the country.
I traveled over 1500 kilometers, I saw sunrises and sunsets, the car went well, the weather was mostly kind, my new knee proved its worth, I did no shopping beyond a morning at Salamanca market, and did not go to any needlework or patchwork shops on the entire trip! The latter would have been unheard of a couple of years ago, in fact I used to plan trips around where such shops were situated. I stopped where I wanted to, ate when I liked, chatted to folk as the mood took me, walked miles, explored little towns, and thoroughly enjoyed the solitude of my adventure, coming home with a great sense of achievement and well over 1000 photographs (which have since been culled to about 600). Tasmania is a very beautiful place, with mountains and rivers, and endless landscapes to photograph - I shall be sharing some of them here, but also over on the photo blog, so do have a look there too.
The time away and being alone, allowed me to review and think about many things that have happened in the last year or so, to make some decisions, and consider what next in this life of mine. All most worthwhile. I returned home to a grand welcome from my dogs, family and local friends, to find everything as I left it, the grass in need of cutting, the garden overgrown with weeds, a schedule of regular activites to begin again, and a new online course (called Now You, which is about self portraiture) with which to catch up.
Life is really pretty good!
A taster……….the Huon River on a misty morning.
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