Bhutan (17/11/2010)

Hi all,

Well we finally made it to Bhutan and now I am in Trashigan.
Also the second day we had a lot of trouble getting into the plain to Calcutta. Due to havy traffic in Dehli we nearly missed our flight (they actually closed the plaindoor behind us).
The first impression of Bhutan is very good. People are very friendly, the food is hot but nice and it is very clean all around the place.
Yesterday afternoon we arrived at Trashigan were we saw the last few hours of the Trechu festival at the local Dzong (monastery). A lot of people and the monks were dancing.
Because we are now one day behind schedule we were not in the hotel we were supposed to be. It made me remember to the hotels in China I used to spend the night. Very poor conditions, but the guide promised us that it will change the better from now on.

Till later...

Bhutan 14/11/2010

Hi all,

Yesterday started all well with a fine flight to Dehli. The delay we encountered at Schiphol was overtaken by a very strong tailwind so we arrived perfectly on time in Dehli. At 2 am we arrived at the hotel where we could have only a small sleep of 3 hours.
Then it began: we were suposed to take a flight to Guwahati early in the morning but the flight was cancelled for a unknown reason. A long wait at the airport followed but no success in changing our flight. At 2 pm we went back to the hotel and now we are waiting for a flight to Calcutta (tonight at 9) and tomorrow we will go on to Guwahati and Bhutan.
The result of this all is that we are 1 day behind on our schedule and we are facing the risk that we will miss the festivals in Bhutan :-(
The tour guide and local operator are doing their utmost to keep the " damage" as low as possible.
I will keep you posted.

Bhutan November 2010 (1)

The last preparations for my trip to Bhutan are starting now. Coming Saturday I will get on the plane to New Dehli and from there I will travel by plane and bus to Bhutan. A trip I have looked out for since a long time.

Due to technical errors at Blogspot I am not able to upload a picture with my route (I will try again later this week). During my coming trip I will carry a geotag. A gadget which creates a logging of the route I will follow and afterwards I can use this logging to synchronize my pictures to these coördinates. It will solve the big problem for not knowing where a picture was taken.

Zeeland 24 - 27 september 2010

Last week I visited the Province Zeeland together with a couple of friends from the Fotoclub Almere. Together we rented a small bungalow near Bruinisse for a long weekend to visit the beuatifull beaches, nature and villages of the south-west coast of the Netherlands.
Zeeland, a province well-known for its centuries long struggle against the sea, is one of our most beautiful provinces and now a days most famous of its Deltaworks. After the flood of 1953 (during which more then 1800 people lost their lives and more then 100.000 became homeless) large bridges and dykes were build to prevent such a happening for once and for all.

So lots of pictures were made of the beautiful sunset and landscapes on Saturday. Sunday the wheather really was to bad to do anything outside. We went to the tropical Zoo of Kwabbendijke and in the evening as the wheather had cleared up a bit we went to Zierikzee for some nightfotography. I did some experiments with long shuttertimes (to see the lights of passing traffic).
Monday we finished with visiting Neeltje Jans, a former artifisic island where parts of the dykes were made for the protection against extreem high floods.

A collection of my pictures of the weekend are on my website:

www.iamnotsimple.nl

Mudflat hiking on Wadden Sea

 

Sunday September 5 we finally made it. A mudflat hike from Holwerd to Ameland which was postponed for 2 times in a row (both September 2008 and September 2009) the hikes could not be made due to bad weather conditions. You probably wonder what makes this hike so special that bad weather ends up in postponing it for a year? Well you have to book a guide and they are very often fully booked. Especially in the popular weekends up to 600 people may want to cross.

The trip itself is so special as you walk from the main land of Holland to one of the islands in the Waddenzee. A sea that almost falls dry on low tide.

Here some background info of the Waddenzee (or "het Wad" as it is called in Holland):

The Wadden Sea is an intertidal zone in the southeastern part of the North Sea. It lies between the coast of northwestern continental Europe and the range of Frisian Islands, forming a shallow body of water with tidal flats and wetlands. It is rich in biological diversity. In 2009, the Dutch and German parts of the Wadden Sea were inscribed on UNESCO's World Heritage List.[1]

The Wadden Sea stretches from Den Helder in the Netherlands in the southwest, past the great river estuaries of Germany to its northern boundary at Skallingen north of Esbjerg in Denmark along a total length of some 500 km and a total area of about 10,000 km². Within the Netherlands it is bounded from the IJsselmeer by the Afsluitdijk.

The islands in the Wadden Sea are called the Wadden Sea Islands or Frisian Islands, named after the Frisians. However, on the westernmost Dutch island, Texel, the Frisian language has not been spoken for centuries. The Danish Wadden Sea Islands have never been inhabited by Frisians. The outlying German island of Heligoland, although ethnically one of the Frisian Islands, is not situated in the Wadden Sea.

The word wad is Dutch for "mud flat" (Low German and German: Watt, Danish: Vade). The area is typified by extensive tidal mud flats, deeper tidal trenches (tidal creeks) and the islands that are contained within this, a region continually contested by land and sea. The landscape has been formed for a great part by storm tides in the 10th to 14th centuries, overflowing and carrying away former peat land behind the coastal dunes. The present islands are a remnant of the former coastal dunes.

The islands are marked by dunes and wide, sandy beaches towards the North Sea and a low, tidal coast towards the Wadden Sea. The impact of waves and currents, carrying away sediments, is slowly changing the layout of the islands. For example, the islands of Vlieland and Ameland have moved eastwards through the centuries, having lost land on one side and grown on the other.

The Wadden Sea is famous for the rich flora and fauna, especially birds. Hundred of thousands of waders (shorebirds), ducks, and geese use the area as a migration stopover or wintering site, and it is also rich habitat for gulls and terns. Today, a great part of the Wadden Sea is protected in cooperation of all three countries; see Wadden Sea National Parks for the protected areas within the German borders.

The governments of the Netherlands, Denmark and Germany have been working together since 1978 on the protection and conservation of the Wadden Sea. Co-operation covers management, monitoring and research, as well as political matters. Furthermore, in 1982, a Joint Declaration on the Protection of the Wadden Sea was agreed upon to co-ordinate activities and measures for the protection of the Wadden Sea. In 1997, a Trilateral Wadden Sea Plan was adopted.

The Wadden Sea was designated a Ramsar wetland of international importance on May 14, 1987.

In June 2009, it was placed on the World Heritage list by UNESCO

Many of the islands have been popular seaside resorts since the 19th century. Mudflat hiking (Dutch: Wadlopen), i.e., walking on the sandy flats at low tide, has become popular in the Wadden Sea. It is also a popular region for pleasure boating.

 

Then now about the trip itself: Starting from Holwerd (a very tiny village) in the north of Holland, when the tide is getting low you can walk on the bottom of the sea and make a cross-over to Ameland (one of the islands of het Wad). The first part (about 2 km) through the heavy mud, which make your feet suck in it up till your ankles and then you have an easy walk of 8 km on the sandbanks of the sea. These sandbanks are separated by channels which have to be waded. During the wading the water may rise up till your waist (depends how tall you are J ) and this is also the reason that every participant has to carry a backpack with of course food and drinks but also a complete set of dry clothes. After almost 3 hours we reached the coast of Ameland where we took a short rest and then had to cross the island to the clean water of the Northsea. Here we were able to wash up and change our clothes.

At this point we could chose to let us ride to Nes (a town on Ameland) where the ferry to the main land leaves. However, I decided to make another walk on the beach and made another walk of 2 hours to Nes (with 2 stops for drinks at local bars, one at the seaside and one in Nes). About half an hour left to get the last ferry of the day. Good timing though!

 

My pictures can of course be found at: www.iamnotsimple.nl

 

 

 

 

 

Blaricum moor

Saturday August 28 just a few hours before sunset I visited the moor of Blaricum. Although the wheather of last week was very poor, with lots of rain, this Saturday was rather dry. With the sun setting and a rather cloudy sky a perfect evening to make some photo's of the moor. The heath in full bloom, the contrast of the setting sun and some Scottish cows walking by. Well have a look at the following url:

http://www.iamnotsimple.nl/#4.0

A few pictures have been modified a little, just to create some more contrast in the clouds.
Enjoy!

Launching a website......

Today I launched my website where I am going to publish pictures I made in the past and the pictures I am going to make in the near future. The site can be found using the folloowing URL: www.iamnotsimple.nl
The reason I chose this url is quite simple: I just thought "arjan's photogallery" was a bit boring.
The album now presented on the site is made of pictures I made for a project of the Fotoclub Almere of which I am a member since september last year. The project I participated was to create a serie of 5 pictures with subject "Light". I worked with 4 other members of the club and each of us had to make 1 photo for the serie of 5. The final serie we made will be shown at an exhibition in Almere City Hall during the month July.

As I am not sure yet about the looks of the site a lot of maintenence will be done on it in the coming period, but i will take care that at leat one album will always be visible to the visitors.

have fun,
Arjan