Dave Hartley

Laysan Albatross on Midway Atoll

I uploaded an initial batch of photographs from my recent trip to Midway Atoll. You can access them through my Galleries page or directly via this link.

Here is a YouTube link to two Laysan Albatross doing their dance on Midway Atoll.

Here is a YouTube link to a whole field of Laysan Albatross on Midway Atoll.

Here is a YouTube link to two Black-footed Albatross doing their dance on Midway Atoll.

Pelican 1550 with Nikon D3 and D2x

Sometimes when traveling via air, it’s necessary to put your equipment in checked luggage. This all depends on which airline you are traveling with and their carry on restrictions. One of the most trusted storage options are Pelican cases.   Choosing which case is suitable for your needs is often a hard choice. One of the best options is to take your equipment down to your local camera store and try them out. It’s amazing how a case which on paper seems large suddenly shrinks in size when you start putting your gear in. I find the padded dividers work best for me as it allows me to reconfigure the case as needed.

One of the key things to consider is the internal height of the case. This is especially important if you have one of the “pro” bodies that have an integrated vertical grip. A large number of cases that on paper look fine will not work when you try to put a Nikon D3/D3x in them. The reason being is their interior height is much too short, making it impossible to shut the case lid! The photo shows a Pelican 1550 case with a D3 on the left and a D2x on the right; this case has an interior height of 7.62″. You can see that this case is the minimum height that allows you to store the camera upright. Cases such as the 1450 and 1500 do not have sufficient interior height (6″ and 6.93″ respectively). You would have to lay the camera down flat with these cases, hence consuming precious space.

A king Penguin and Antarctic Fur Seal with the M/V Ushuaia

Last week on Thursday 4th December, the MV Ushuaia grounded in the Antarctic Peninsula. Luckily, nobody was hurt and all the passengers have been taken safely off the ship. Full details can be found at the IAATO website  (see the press release section). We sailed on the M/V Ushuaia on our trip to the Falkland Islands, South Georgia Island and Antarctica back in January 2008. The ship has a great crew and we wish them well. One of the photographs I took on that trip is shown on the left, with the M/V Ushuaia on the horizon with a King Penguin and Antarctic Fur seal in the foreground.

This is an account of our worst journey in the world, not the worst which I’ll mention at the end.

On Friday, January 4th of this year, we were scheduled to fly out of San Francisco. Our first flight would be to Dallas, then the same day we would fly Dallas to Buenos Aires, arriving in Argentina early on the 5th. We would then cross the city to the domestic airport and catch a flight to Ushuaia, which is at the bottom of Argentina, and is where the ship was leaving for our trip to the Falkland Islands, South Georgia, and

Sailing to Antarctic and Sub-Antarctic destinations involves spending days en route. For trips that involve going to multiple locations, these days of “down time” could be spent catching up on sleep or editing photos. However, even though the oceans are vast open spaces, there are still a lot of opportunities to photograph. The skies can contain numerous birds, many of which follow ships. Many hours can be spent photographing Black-Browed Albatross, Southern Giant Petrels and Wandering Albatross as they effortlessly fly past. The photograph shows a Wandering Albatross. Wandering Albatross are the largest flying birds, with wingspans reaching 2.5 to 3.5m. The photo was taken at the following coordinates which you can paste into Google Earth:

52 26.778S 049 29.911W

It’s not a great picture but what caught my eye was the flash of red. Looking at the image on a computer, the bird had a red tag with the number L97. My wife also had photographs showing the tag identification so we talked to Chris Edwards who was the Expedition leader. Chris has spent quite a bit of time in Antarctica and his son, Ewan, is stationed at Bird Island, which has a population of Wandering Albatross. We gave Chris copies of the photograph and the GPS location and he forwarded them to his son. Here is the information on the bird:

“The bird was ringed in 1990 on Bird Island, presumably as a chick. It departed and returned during the 1994-1999 summers as a non-breeder. It bred in 2000 but not since then, possibly because its mate had not returned.”

That’s pretty amazing that we can see a bird in the middle of no-where and then find out quite a bit about its history.

For the month of January this year, we sailed on the M/V Ushuaia traveling to the Falkland Islands, South Georgia, and the Antarctic Peninsula. It was a eventful and wonderful trip with many great photo opportunities. I’ll discuss the trip, and the photography in more detail over the coming months. There are so many things you can photograph on this type of trip but sometimes magical moments can be easily missed.

In this example, we had just spent six days in various locations on South Georgia. The photographic highlights are the King Penguin colonies and the Wondering Albatross on Prion Island. We had just sailed down Drygalski Fjord and were heading to the south east tip of the island on our way to the Antarctic peninsula. The lenticular cloud formations above the rugged mountains were spectacular, as we sailed past an iceberg. I was on the starboard side of the ship taking photographs of the scenery and suddenly realized I was by myself. I wondered where everybody was. Were they in the bar (yes), were they taking a nap (yes), where was everybody?

Well, a bunch of the passengers were on the port side, looking at the rainbow that had formed. Icebergs on the horizon drifted by. Even the people inside the ship’s bar were looking out of the windows, enjoying the view and a drink!

In the distance, to the right of the rainbow, we could see a larger iceberg slowly drifting towards us. It seemed like a long time before it finally came into view and crossed the path of the rainbow.

Numerous photographs were taken. My favorite was the one shown below, with the rainbow coming from the iceberg. There is also a Black-browed Albatross flying past the rainbow where it touches the iceberg (too small to see on this blog photo). This is my Southern Ocean interpretation of the famous Galen Rowell photograph “Rainbow over the Potala Palace”. So, the well known moral of this story is “if it looks good in front of you, look behind!”

We recently returned from a great two week trip to Belize. A last minute booking, with the decision to go being made after an afternoon discussion with our friend Enrique who had already booked to go along with his wife Margaret. The first week of the trip was spent in the jungle where we photographed Black Howler Monkeys, a rescued Jaguar, and the archaeological sites of Altun Ha and Xunantunich. The second week was split between Long Caye/Halfmoon Caye and Caye Caulker. We spent four nights staying on Long Caye, spending our days on the nearby Halfmoon Caye which is owned by the Belize Audubon society. This is a great place to photograph Red footed Boobies and Frigate birds. The last few days were on Caye Caulker where we planned to see the Manatees in Swallow Caye Wildlife Sanctuary. Unfortunately, the first Atlantic storm of the 2008 season (Tropical Storm Arthur) formed, which halted all the boat trips going out to the wildlife sanctuary. So, the last few days were spent eating, drinking and playing cards. The full force of the storm hit the day before we were due to leave. We had made it back to Belize City and stayed in the Great House hotel (a very nice place). We had torrential rain and constant thunder throughout the night. The next day, the roads were flooded, bridges were out and unfortunately some people were drowned in the south of the country. Belize is a great country to visit, with lots of diverse subjects to shoot; we’ll be returning some time in the future. Some of the photos of the trip can be seen here .