Available Light

Photographers call the periods just before sunset and just after sunrise "the golden hour" because of the colour of light and because its strong directional nature makes for some great shots - sometimes at least. This is the golden hour in the countryside just outside Canberra in Australian Capital Territory.  I've been away, and here is a diary of the last week. Friday 31 May. Flew to Australia via Auckland. Flights around New Zealand were delayed because of bad weather, so our flights were all late. got to Melbourne about 9.30 pm, picked up our rental car and found our way to a small but perfectly formed AirB&B on the 14th floor of a building in the docklands area. Saturday 1 June . Breakfast at a wonderful cafe in Footscray, then went to some favourite places in Melbourne - St. Kilda and Prahran, before driving into the city. We had seats for the two parts of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child at the Princess Theatre. First show 2.30 pm, second 7.30 pm. A...

 We were in Melbourne for the episcopal consecration of Kate Prowd. Kate and Roger were part of our congregation at St. John's Roslyn and have remained friends over the years. We stayed in Carlton North with Clemency's cousin, Cathie, in her stunningly restored Victorian townhouse.  Then, on the Monday following, we drove round the Great Ocean Road to Adelaide.  Adelaide is my favourite Australian city. It's big enough to be comprehensive and small enough to be manageable.

To capture something of the scale of this place, my fancy camera with its assortment of lenses stays in the bag, and I set the camera on my phone to panorama mode. Its as near as I can get.  It's easy enough to make an impressive photograph of the landscape in New Zealand. We pack a lot into a little space, and we major on height. There's usually something pretty to make a nice foreground and  if you want a bit of scale, there's always a convenient line of snow capped peaks somewhere, and possibly, an obligingly still lake in which to reflect them. The archetypical  New Zealand shot is this one,  which is not mine: It's of Lake Matheson, on the West Coast. It shows Mt. Cook and Mt. Tasman, both around 12,000 feet high reflected in the little lake which is at about sea level. So, with the reflection, 24,000 feet of vertical reach and a few trees to give a sense of scale. Lovely. And this is actually what it looks like, so capturing a pretty accurate picture o...

  The sun is rising on our last morning in Sydney. Outside are the calls of tree frogs and unfamiliar birds. Inside there are some few soft, brief whimpers from Zoe as she moves in her sleep and soon there will be the padding of Naomi's feet on the stairs. My son Nick lives in Five Dock, in the part of the city known as the Inner West where he and Charmayne have a four bedroom two bathroom house about 30 minutes by car or bike or train from Nick's office in the Quay area.  We have been here almost a week, meeting our newest grandchild and celebrating Naomi's 5th birthday. There has been a picnic and a few brief trips in the car, but mostly we've been pretty domestic. There have been many contented hours when I've been left holding the baby, and many more being cast in one of Naomi's games. Clemency's roles in these dramatic productions involve the two women, separated in age by a mere 59 years, sitting side by side, placing small plastic dolls into modestly ...

I know it's been a while since I posted, and I'm sorry about that, well, sort of, but I've been away: on the West Island. Sydney is a beautiful city, especially at this time of year, what with the flowers and birds and harbour and lack of heat and everything, but the real reason for nipping over there was not the prospect of time in one of the world's great cities. It was rather, the  company of someone I had never met before, yet who has as strong a call on my time and affections as anyone else on the planet: my new grand daughter, Naomi.  Clemency and I were only gone a week, but somehow it felt like a month and for all the right reasons. For the first time in a year or more I felt I could let go of my role and forget about emails and just be. We stayed in the Australian club, which was very nice in a buttoned leather, chandelier, stripy wallpaper, tasteful paintings on the wall kind of way. They let me in, no doubt much against their better judgement, because I am ...