A happy confession “I am addicted to HDR and now seem to carry my camera with me wherever I go”.
Question “Do I need help with my addiction?”.
Answer “No!”.
I still need to apply some of Dmitrii’s advice from his blog beautiful HDR. Go check it out.
Featured below are some of my recent random photos taken for fun and to experiment with.
All are handheld (not tripod).
There were many holidays spent at aunt Norma’s house in Zululand.
I was in my preteen and teen years at the time.
Some memories from my visit’s stick like gum:
I enjoyed the tasty jaffles so much that my aunt bought me my own jaffle maker, which I still have kept nestled away in my cupboard.
It’s now 30 years later. The jaffle maker is out…
Now to make a top-class jaffle you need super hot filling. Think of it as a “pie made of bread”.
You wouldn’t eat a lettuce and tomato pie now, would you?
So to bring the jaffle maker back to life in a respectable manner, Timol and I went for a spicy chicken curry filling.
For the spices and other ingredients, the shop of course (where there is a large selection and bargains galore) – Spice Emporium, who I see have an online facility. Read the metrobeat article here.
Albany Best of Both was our choice of bread.
The two slices of bread were buttered on either side, before a dollop of curry was placed in between (not too much otherwise it “blows” out the sides.
The really naughty part: grate and throw some cheese on the curry before making the sandwich.
Place the sandwich into the jaffle maker, squeeze it shut and attach the clip.
Remove the crusts if they don’t fall off the sides.
Place onto the hot stove.
I always turn the jaffle maker over every few minutes and open it to check progress.
The jaffle above was a little “overloaded”.
When ready (lightly browned or darker if you prefer); place the jaffle onto a plate and munch away (do let it cool down slightly first).
Thank you to aunt Norma, uncle Mike and their daughters for all the wonderful memories, looking after me like one of your own and never telling my parent’s all the naughty things I did.
Craig suggested a routine bike ride about two weeks back. I agreed. Hadn’t seen the silly fella in a while.
It was going to be a short ride from 07h30 to somewhere nearby, followed by a long relaxing juicy breakfast and then home by 11h00 latest.
I subsequently invited Neil, who rides a KTM motor cycle, to join us.
What could go wrong?
I nearly wore short pants as I usually do.
Really now, I was on a superior beautiful Kawasaki KLR 650 and the other chaps were on BMW’s, a KTM and a Yamaha.
We met at Pavilion Westville at 07h30 as planned. Routine then fell apart.
Snag 1: Neil was not there. A quick telephone call revealed that he had overslept.
I asked Craig where we were going. He said “straight to the pub across from Sakabula Golf Course near Howick”.
Neil said he would hop out of bed straight away and meet us there shortly. This is where the next snag (2) came along.
The leader of the pack (an advocate I believe) vaguely mentioned to one or two riders that we were going to detour into
a valley (sounds like ONE valley doesn’t it) along the way. I did not hear this but followed the pack like a blind sheep.
One valley became MANY valleys; lots of valleys.
The temperature started to drop…
Now a few years back, whilst driving up Sani Pass into Lesotho, I saw some motor cycle riders who were also travelling in the snow.
It was cold enough in the car and I mentioned to my companion that one must need really specialized and warm gear to travel in such conditions. I planned to do this “bike / snow thing” one day; with some PLANNING of course.
Anyway, let’s get back to our little bike ride.
The detour became one of many.
Before I knew it, we were closing in on snow-capped mountain peaks!
Whilst the temperature was 6 degrees Centigrade on the BMW bike thermometer, one needs to consider the following:
After a while my fingers (in gloves) were no longer part of my body.
We were soon in the snow-capped mountains. Freezing cold I tell you!
Perhaps we should have check the weather report below
There was a very quick pit-stop (not the best photographs – they were taken using a cellular telephone) on the roadside
Yes, we survived and had HOT coffee and brunch (juicy burger and chips) at Dulce Cafe in Hilton.
Have a look at their menu.
A lovely view of the quarry below from the Cafe (a must if you are in the area)
Our travels shown below
The routine (not) trip was roughly 386 kilometres and 5 hours 39 minutes (well not quite that long I think).
Well it was not at all well-planned but certainly turned out to be one of the most scenic and interesting rides that I have done in a long time.
Thank you Gentlemen.
Andrew Harvard Photography 