Call the Shots

The rainiest April in over 70 years here in Sydney had started to get to a few people, and wasn't really a great introduction for Sarah who'd come all the way from my hometown in Essex to discover just how wet and cold Australia; the "Red land", could be.

As much as everyone locally moans about these adverse elements, I sometimes have to remind myself that even though 16-20degrees does feel quite cold these days, I'm still far away from the days of scraping frost off car windows and skidding across frozen puddles as a child.

Certain events in Australia now seem synonymous with anniversaries and as much as Anzac Day is in place to remember those that faught brave and hard for their country, it also tells me I’ve been in Sydney for an extra year. So my 3rd Anzac Day public Holiday was spent in similar fashion to the last 2, drinking beers and playing two-up in Coogee; after-all, why break the habit? This year I scaled to the dizzy heights of $70 up from an initial $10 stake, which I promptly reduced to about $30 just as they called time on the traditional annual gambling event.

We finished up there and a bunch of us headed back to Bundock for some early evening refreshments and Guitar Hero shenanigans. The Metro was then the venue for a long awaited gig; Karnivool. Sarah came along too for an intro to Aussie rock… and in the bargain got an intro to 4 Aussie guys and an Englishman quite drunk on a random wander across the city of Sydney taking in such sites as the entrance to Star City, and a dingy Korean karaoke bar… till 3am.

Of course I was being sensible in doing this, as I knew that I had a ticket to the following days Lawn Party at Randwick Race Course. Here, our tickets would allow all you could eat and drink all afternoon whilst watching men on horseback running round in circles. Needless to say I was a little quiet going into the event with the guys and girls I was with, all dressed up for the grand occasion.

I managed to turn $10 into $100 on my first flutter… and then managed to lose the profit there $10 a time throughout the afternoon… this blog post should be a lesson to all aspiring gamblers, and no – even picking the ‘apparent’ dead-certs does not pay dividends. Bah.

A special shout out for the weather on a day that ended a couple of weeks of constant rainy conditions, reports even say some people needed sunscreen! And how’s this, we bumped into a guy that we met in our hotel whilst staying in Kashmir by accident… now it really is a small world!

Shutterspeed

The Lost Weekends, NSW

There comes a time when I struggle a little to pack stuff into my weekends, and a couple kinda past me by just recently where when I think briefly; that this happened. However as much as I didn't go to India, ride quad bikes or even just wander round the great city I live right next to, I had great weekends of a different variety.

A week rolled around that would see me make my first money directly through photography... I had already expected for some weeks that I would be shooting a wedding, but unexpectedly, I caught a corporate event during the week. Great practice and experience for an aspiring photographer. The event went pretty well and I learned a whole bunch that should stand me well for the future.

Saturday I headed over to Camden to meet Vikki and Trev for their big day and proceeded to shoot some 939 photographs for them... I had some serious fun, and some unexpected photographers hand cramp too!

The following weekend I managed to get a last minute call-up to a one day workshop at the same institution that I learned about my SLR workings... This time, the purpose was for Digital Post production, which helped me learn a fast workflow for dealing with my RAW images and of course... ethical photoshopping as I like to call it. in other words, the bits of photography you could do in a darkroom with several tanks of chemicals, enlargers and all sorts of amounts of patience. I got to shoot a professional model too for the first time, which was nice.

Hold My Hand

Sydney & The Royal National Park, NSW

Everyone dear to me in Sydney, met up at the Opera Bar (so named as it's right beneath the Opera House) on Friday night to celebrate (or mourn!) Cams departure to Melbourne. Drinks were clinked and laughs exchanged before people started to head off in their own directions.

An easy Saturday preceded my old travel pals arrival back in Sydney. We picked Nick and Lucy up from Sydney Kingsford airport, grabbed pizza and crashed out on a night where the clocks went back an hour. To take advantage of this, we headed out early the next morning South to the Royal National Park. I'd already been there before, but had yet to get out to the coast, apparantly some of the nicest parts in the park.

The four of us wandered along the chilled sands of Garie Beach and took in part of a surf comp before exploring a rock pool where thunderous waves pounded below us, rising high above the guys stood on the edges fishing. After we grabbed some snacks then headed onward to Wallamalah beach, something quite different to the one we had just seen. A peaceful lagoon backing on to what reminded me a little of the beach from 'The Beach' movie. In for what would probably be one of the final swims of the seasonal year, it was Summer extended for just another weekend. Blissful.

A cruisy drive home led to a cruisy couple of hours of doing not too much before I invited the gang over for a BBQ seeing off the weekend in perfect, if not slightly hectic style.