April 07th, 2025

Despite the cover photo (and isn't it a doozey!) this is not a Photo Safari Report.  Nope, Photo Safari Reports are exclusively reserved for when Joy and I set out, cameras in hand, together.  This was something else altogether.

Tim and I had the genuine pleasure of spending one morning this weekend with another photography minded couple who we had never met before in person.  I belong to a photography group online and I "met" the couple there.  As much as you can really get to know someone online, I enjoyed them and took the opportunity, when offered, to meet them in person this past weekend. I know, I know, general consensus is that is always a bad idea. Especially when their photography is something I greatly admire.   

They, especially the hubby of the couple, are seriously dedicated photographers and they travel all over the world taking the most amazing photographs.  The fact that such experienced, interesting, successful photographers were interested in meeting us at all was flattering in the extreme. I have long been an admirer of their work and now, perhaps, (I was hoping) to have the opportunity to learn at the hands of yet another photography master (Joy being the other one).  for some people it's singers, actors or athletes, for me it's artists and photographers.

Not only did I learn, but I was encouraged and even praised by someone I greatly admire,  The biggest surprise was that I was also relaxed into an easy comradery with these people.  Tim and I both enjoyed their company tremendously.  It was that rare feeling that was as if we had known them forever.  To our surprise, they expressed the exact same thing.  Awesome. Love when that happens.

Here are some of the photos that I took.  Hope you enjoy!

One of my favourites was this young bird who hadn't quite figured out how his wings worked yet. He was adorable, awkwardly attempting to flap around the nest while his parents calmly looked on:

Another favourite moment was watching this bird fighting with a vine while attempting to gather yet more nesting material.  PS the vine fought back:

There were quite a few nests, some with tiny baby birds in them, all being lovingly tended:

An impressive variety of birds were in the area. Here are just a few of them:

Managed to capture a few flowers too:

And even a few randos:

They say, "never meet your heroes" but  in this case, it worked out perfectly.