Photoblog: Mountains in black & white

There’s a staggering contrast in mountain landscapes, where dramatic shifts between different faces of the same vista can turn the world on its head.

In the tropical mountains of the Andes, the grassy pampas of the valleys can be pleasant, warm, sun-trapped rest-places in the humidity of the day. As night falls temperatures plummet to freeze each blade of grass like the harshest depths of winter.

Up high on the glacial peaks, the tropical sun has enough time to soften the ice and snow before freezing again in the darkness, creating spectacular fluting and brilliant white formations.

In the Himalayas, peaks rise so high they appear like clouds, and the sun can take half the day to be high enough to cast its rays into the deep valley floors.

My first and favourite mountain will always be Blencathra in England’s Lake District. I first hiked it as a child and have returned many times since. Its fells sit together like a plump, benevolent king, looking south over his lands from a throne in the north. It’s a welcoming sight, a homely one.

The neighbouring mountain Skiddaw, however, has always had the opposite effect on me. As a child the sight of it made me feel uneasy and a little afraid. Its dark peak has an unwelcoming air, while the surrounding fells spread wide around it, the scorched heather creating a forbidden land in the mind.

As irrational as this may be, my gut sense has always been one of apprehension. To this day I’ve not set foot on it.

Mountains can have an odd effect on the mind. I’ve been dumbstruck by the vastness of them, unable to articulate, or even begin to compute what my eyes are showing me. I’ve also found myself  buzzing with excitement at the sight of something so huge and wondrous that I become a kind of mountain-giddy – overwhelmed with emotion to an almost narcotic effect.

I’m left with either nothing or everything. Speechless and numbed, or giggling, shaking, even crying  all at once.

As a photographer I see a beauty and harshness to mountains and their landscapes of all shapes and sizes. The differing textures of ice, rock, scree or heather. The dark voids lacerated by brilliant beams of light. Cloud formations halted by the jagged edges of an ice-capped peak. The absolute wonder of something so huge, so marvelous, the mind can barely comprehend it.

Beinn Dearg Mhor, Skye

Cairn overlooking the Glen Sligachan, Skye

Light and shadow – Quiraing, Skye

Cortina d’Ampezzo, Dolomites, Italy.

Path leading to the ridge of Pomagagnon – Dolomites, Italy

The peak of Tullparaju fends off cloud formations high in the Cordillera Blanca, Peru

A scree covered mountainside high in the Peruvian Andes

Mountains in the clouds – Annapurna, Nepal

The first rays of daylight burst across the ‘sanctuary’ of Annapurna base camp over the shoulder of Machapuchare, Nepal

Looking across the top of Blencathra towards the crags of Gategil Fell – Lake District

 

Inca Trail – The Blizzard

“Occidente! Occidente!”  cried a tout.

“Occidente! Occidente!” cried another. It was the Peruvian equivalent of someone shouting, “West Stand! West Stand!” and waiving a pair of overpriced tickets in your face, right as you’re buying them from the ticket office…

Read on from this excerpt from “Inca Trail – A trip across the Andes and down the Amazon for a drab draw.”

Swooped on in condor country for InsurandGo

Read my contribution to the InsureandGo blog  about an adventure while backpacking.

The Man Who Named Florida – Enterprise Magazine

“Ponce De Leon is a name that crops up across the map of America, a Conquistador who originally sailed with Colombus, you can still walk or sail in the footsteps of the Spaniard who went in search of the  Fountain of Eternal Youth…” carry on reading on Enterprise Open Road.

Wild Camping – Enterprise Magazine

“There’s few better ways to get close to nature than spend a night in it. Camping out under the stars, far from civilisation with nothing but the bare essentials brings you as close as you’ll find…” to read on go to Enterprise Open Road

7 of the World’s Most Unique Bars – Enterprise Magazine

“Why go to your local when you could seek out the distant and different?” Read my latest piece on Enterprise Open Road

Plan Solo: 5 Places to Travel Alone – Enterprise Magazine

There’s a feeling I get when I’m travelling. A buzz. A rush. An overwhelming sense of excitement. It’ll come up from the depth of my being and beam from my face in an unstoppable smile. I could be staggering down a mountain in the Himalayas, perched on a rock looking for dolphins in the Mekong River or cruising along a desert highway in Rajasthan. But I’m always alone, far from home and in a strange new place.

Read more on Enterprise Open Road

Top 10: Sights In South America – Enterprise Magazine

South America is a destination like no other.

A vast continent of wonders from the unspoiled colonial architecture and spectacular pre-Colombian ruins to rainforests, deserts and the longest mountain range in the world.

Read more and see my top 10 list on Enterprise Open Road

Photo Blog: Cordillera Huayhuash, Peruvian Andes

The Cordillera Huayhuash, a 30km long mountain range in Peru’s high Andean region of Ancash. The rugged landscape and its wild and unpredictable weather conditions is crowned by the high snow covered peaks of Yerupaja, Siula Grande, Jirishanca Yerupaja Chico and Rasac, all of which reach skywards at altitudes of over 6,000m, making it the second highest mountain range in the tropics.

Each year trekkers come in groups, or alone to complete the unforgiving 160km circuit of the range, where altitudes rarely dip below 4,000m. The tough but rewarding trek follows trails and small segments of old Inca road over high pass after high pass, through an Andean wilderness where condors soar high along the ridges and peaks in search of carrion, and wild horses graze in small herds.

Unlike the its much larger sibling to the north, the Cordillera Blanca, the Huayhuash range is not a national park. Small farming communities live among the many grass covered valleys, tending to livestock put out to pasture during the drier seasons and providing occasional supplies and refreshments to the trekkers and climbers that pass through the land.

A wide valley on the western edge of the Cordillera Huayhuash.

Donkeys make their way up a high pass.

Crisaldo takes a siesta next to his horse. When I spoke to him he seemed sad. It turned out that a few weeks before several of his friends had died in an avalanche while fixing ropes for their clients on Alpamayo. Crisaldo was part of the team sent to recover the bodies. The job of horseman for a small group of trekkers was a break for him.

A train of donkeys makes it’s way across a high valley.

Wild horses roam the valleys of the Cordillera Huayhuash.

An early morning view of Yerupaja, at 6,635m it’s the highest mountain in the range.

Laguna Carhuacocha.

Yerupaja Chico enshrouded by clouds.

Francisco, 13 years old. Each day he hikes from his home in the valley up to Siula Punta, one of the highest and most gruelling passes on the circuit, where he sells bottles of Coca-Cola to the trekkers he meets.

The valley below Siula Punta.

The northern edge of the range.

A shepherd tending his flock.

Laguna Siula.

A pair of wild horses graze on frozen ground in the early morning.

Quebrada Atuscancha on the eastern edge of the range.

Jagged peaks on the western ridges.

“Trekking alone with no donkeys, gringo?” asked the old lady carrying firewood, “you’re loco!”

David appeared from nowhere to guide me through a field full of rather aggressive looking cattle. “What are you doing out here?” I asked him, “Riding my horse, watching the cows,” he replied.

The old lady at Laguna Juraucocha. She hobbled around the camping ground selling beer and soft drinks to climbers and trekkers while begging for medicine for her bad hip.

Jirishanca.

35mm Photo Blog – Marrakech & Atlas Mountains

When I visited Marrakech in November last year I expected a sun drenched North African city with a bustling and vibrant atmosphere.

I was wrong about the first part. It rained. Heavily. In fact Morocco experienced its heaviest spell of rain in over fifty years. Apart from one dry day which I spent in the Atlas Mountains, it rained the whole week. During the downpours the famous square of Jemaa El Fna cleared of people as the snake charmers, wrestlers, teeth pullers and other tourist traps ran for cover while orange juice vendors looked on in disbelief.

The rain, at times seeming relentless, gave way occasionally to drench the city and the surrounding Berber villages in the high Atlas Mountains with the warmth of the African sun. It was in these moments that I took a 1970’s Canon camera and a few rolls of film out to wander through the labyrinth of the Medina, among the thousands of souks.

The people of Marrakech tried to carry on about their businesses, hawking goods or ferrying stock among the narrow streets. But the city seemed quiet, subdued even, as the dark alleyways filled with puddles and shop owners huddled together in doorways, awaiting the next downpour of rain. In the old koranic school of the Merdersa Ben Youssef, the shallow pool of the beautiful tiled courtyard splattered with raindrops.

Up in the Berber village of Ait Amer, below the snow capped peaks of the Atlas Mountains, villagers enjoyed cups of sweet mint tea in the warmth of the returning sun.

The main square of Jemaa El Fna

A rain soaked alleyway in the Medina

Street in the Medina

A rain sloshed alleyway in the Medina

A cart heads across the Jemaa El Fna square towards the covered souks

Donkeys pull and old men push as the hive of activity among the covered streets of the souks

Two shop keepers huddle by a doorway in a lantern workshop near the heart of the souks

Rain drops fall into the pool of the Medersa Ben Youssef

The Berber village of Ait Amer in the Atlas Mountains above Marrakech

Washing dries on a line as the snowy Atlas Mountains loom over Ait Amer

A few houses sit on top of a hill in below Ait Amer

Mint tea being prepared in the traditional way in Ait Amer

The pouring of mint tea is always performed with style

The old man of a Berber household sits down for tea on his rooftop in Ait Amer in the high Atlas