Bariloche is All Kinds of Beautiful
I’m a big fan of returning to places I’ve been before; especially if I wasn’t really feeling them the first time I visited them. I know, it seems backwards. Most people re-visit the places they loved. But, I’m more likely to re-visit places I didn’t feel like I gave my best attention to the first time. For one, I don’t want re-visit places I loved too often, because I don’t want my warm memories spoiled. But, I’m all for giving destinations second chances, as was the case in Bariloche. After feeling a bit under-whelmed the first time, I returned to the popular Argentinean mountain town to find out that it is all kinds of beautiful. I was in a different place when I first visited Bariloche. It was about 7 years ago. I had just finished my year working as a tour leader in South America. I had started this blog about a month before, and just broken things off with a long term girlfriend a couple weeks earlier. When I got to Barlioche, I didn’t want to explore. I wanted to let loose. I wanted taste a bit of freedom I hadn’t felt in years since being tied down by a job and girlfriend. So, I did. I got a bit crazy. I didn’t take a picture the whole time I was in town, and didn’t explore much of the area aside from the local bars. As a result, my first visit to the city wasn’t exactly the greatest travel experience I ever had. Moreover, I don’t even really remember the mountains. What I remember is heavy wind, waves on the lake so tall it looked like the sea, and that my hostel had a decent view of it all. I didn’t go hiking, I didn’t go on excursions, and I hardly saw anything during the daylight hours. But, with all the hype Barlioche gets as a tourism destination, I’ve long thought of it as a place I need to get back to. A place I need to give more effort to. I’m so glad I did. Greg (the intern) and I made the long 25 hour bus journey from Buenos Aires to Barlioche a day earlier than expected. I’m glad we did. Our first morning along the lake was just spectacular. In fact, it was then, on our first shoot of a 3 week project, that we got the best light of the whole trip. Fog on the lake, beautiful colours hitting the clouds. Some alpen glow on the mountains. It really couldn’t have been better. During our time in Barlioche, we were put up by a...
Finding Work as a Travel Photographer: ITB Round Up
I left The Philippines – quite sadly, I might add – and headed toward Berlin. I had a conference in the city called ITB. It’s essentially the biggest travel conference and trade fair on the planet. It’s massive. Like, overwhelmingly massive. And, it’s a great place to try to make contacts and for finding work as a travel photographer. It’s also a great place to network and hang out with some industry friends. So, I was actually pretty stoked about ITB this year. I had a lot of good meetings planned, and some parties with some old friends and colleagues. This is basically how it went. Meeting Old Friends One of my favourite parts of ITB in Berlin is that it’s like an annual meet up of old friends. In this industry, most of our friends are scattered around the world. So, conferences like this are where we kind of all come together once a year. Some of the others in the travel industry see each other a lot. But, since I travel so much, I tend to miss out on seeing most of them. So, after arriving to Berlin, I headed out to a Travel Massive party and had some drinks with old friends. Selfies and Business Meetings One of the things I love about daily vlogging is that it kind of forces me to do something creative each and every day. Like, in the vlog below, I was at a conference in business meetings all day, and it should have been a boring day. But, since I was forced to create something for the vlog, I had to come up with an idea for something fun to do. So, I grabbed Greg and Dave and we went around the conference halls taking selfies with all the people dressed up in their country’s outfits. It was a lot of fun. Of course, the fun was also mixed in with the business meetings. My early meetings went pretty well. Some Insight into Finding Work as a Travel Photographer Finding work as a travel photographer almost seems like a bit of a dream. And, the question I get asked all the time by people is “but, who is giving you the work?” And, the truth is, there is almost an unlimited number of people who can look to hire travel photographers. Tourism Boards Travel Companies Websites and Blogs Magazines and Newspapers Clothing Brands Etc. The truth is, almost any company in the world might benefit from having a travel angle to their imagery. And, while a lot of people are talking about travel photography being a dying art, I think...
El Nido is Next Level Beautiful
El Nido, on Palawan Island, is the place I was most excited about seeing on my Philippines trip. I first learned of the area back when I still had my travel magazine, and an article on this “off-the-beaten-path” but “up-and-coming” destination was submitted. Of course, these days it’s far from off the tourist trail, and instead a mainstay on the backpacker trail in The Philippines. And, for very good reason. El Nido is next level beautiful. I spent almost a full week exploring El Nido and area and it blew my mind almost daily. Here’s what I got up to. A Chill Day in El Nido After some pretty hard travel over the past month, I needed a day to kind of chill out and organize things a bit in El Nido when I arrived. So, I hung out, ate some good food, and enjoyed the beach views. Of course, I also got the drone up in the air. One of the things I love about the drone is how it gives you a bird’s eye view of a location even if there’s no mountain to climb to get it. I think the drone footage really shows how spectacular this place is. El Nido Tour A Honestly, my tour A journey got off to a bit of a rough start. I’m almost positive that my crew was hungover, or still a bit drunk from the night before. The captain showed up to the boat an hour late, and that pretty much set the tone for the day. Tour A was so busy that it was hard to get the boat parked in places we were meant to visit. So, we spent a lot of time waiting around. On top of it, because we were so far from the places we were meant to visit we were told we had to rent kayaks to get to them, something no one told us before the trip started. Of course, if your boat was parked close, you could just jump out and enjoy the location. That said, the places we visited on Tour A were spectacular. The limestone landscape and the clear waters are simply incredible. I do have to say something negative again, though. To get to “the secret lagoon” we were told to walk over the coral. The coral in that spot were all dying as a result. That’s something that can’t happen. You can’t have tourists walking over corals, killing corals, just to get to a lagoon. The government needs to build an apparatus to get tourists over the corals safely, or stop allowing tourists to visit there. At...
Siquijor: Chilled Out and Adventurous
If you’ve been following along with my adventures here in The Philippines so far you’ll know that I didn’t really plan the trip out. On the way to the airport in Madrid I opened a Lonely Planet and quickly sketched a trip based on a couple cool sights I wanted to photograph. One of those places was a waterfall on Siquijor Island. Like all the other places I have visited on the trip so far, I knew nothing about Siquijor aside from the presence of this waterfall. I’d soon find out, however, that Siquijor Island is an absolute gem. And the almost perfect combination of chill and adventure. Siquijor Island Cliff Jumping I heard of a little place on the island called Salagdoong Beach where there’s an old waterpark built onto an island. And while they aren’t using the waterpark anymore, they’ve turned a couple of the platforms into places to do cliff jumping. And, if you know me, there’s nothing I like more than a little bit of adventure. So, I headed out to this Siquijor cliff jumping spot. The places is set on this nice little cove of calm water. There’s a little beach, and a bridge going out to the island with the cliff jumping spots. There was a group of Chinese tourists standing on the spot, most way too scared to jump. But, a couple did, and I managed to fly the drone as people jumped a bit. Still cut up from my motorcycle crash on Bohol, I probably shouldn’t have been cliff jumping. But, I couldn’t resist. So, I took a couple jumps myself. The cliff jumps on Siquijor Island are 8m and 10m high. So, they’re not crazy. Just a good enough height to get some adrenaline flowing, but also a fairly safe height. I was also surprised that there was a lifeguard on duty. Well done Salagdoong Beach. Cambugahay Falls The other top spot on Siquijor Island is a set of waterfalls called Cambugahay Falls. They are just this brilliant bit of bright blue water tumbling through the jungle near the town of Lazi. The falls are a popular spot, so they’re quite busy. But, they are spread out enough that you can still get away a little bit. There’s a little bit of adventure to be had at the waterfalls too. There’s a place to go cliff jumping (it’s about 5m high) right off one of the waterfalls. There’s also a rope swing into the falls. When I was at Cambugahay Falls there was a crew shooting a travel show, so it was a little bit busy, but luckily everyone kind...
Chocolate Hills and The Wonders of Bohol
I planned for 5 days on Bohol because of The Chocolate Hills. In fact, my entire reason to coming to Bohol was for The Chocolate Hills. But, as I did some research before arriving, I found that there were actually quite a few cool places worth shooting and exploring. So, I set aside quite a bit of time. In the end, I probably could have done it all in 3 or 4 days, but it was nice having the extra day at the end since I crashed my motorcycle – more on that later. The Tarsiers of Bohol If you know me, you know that I love primates. I mean, I love all animals, but primates in particular are just fascinating to me. So, when I heard that there were a couple tarsier sanctuaries on Bohol, I got a little excited. Tarsiers are one of the smallest primates on the world. And, they are extremely delicate animals. Not only are they tiny, but the nocturnal animals do not deal with stress well at all. For example, in captivity, and even in sanctuaries where they are plagued by noise and flash cameras, they will actually commit suicide. Crazy right? In Bohol, there are two main sanctuaries. If you come here, be sure to go to The Philippine Tarsier Sanctuary rather than the other one. Not only is it far more ethical than the other one (from what I’ve read) but the crowds are far more sparse. You only get about 15 minutes wandering through the forest looking at the tarsiers, but that’s really all you need. The little primates look a little bit like Yoda, and might be the cutest animal in the world. The Chocolate Hills Based on the imagery I saw of the Chocolate Hills before coming here, this was going to be a brilliant place to shoot. After visiting the tarsiers on my first day in Bohol, I headed up here to location scout it. It became pretty clear to me that there really are only a couple shots to be had, and only one or two locations to capture the Chocolate Hills. It’s not a bad thing. It just means that I wouldn’t have to work as hard to get my shots. The next day, I left my hotel out near Alona Beach at 4am to try to get to the Chocolate Hills for sunrise. Unfortunately for me, I ran out of gas on the way there and had to wait until a gas station opened at 530am to fuel up. Fortunately for me, the hills were completely fogged in when I got there. I met...
Epic Photo Location: The Banaue Rice Terraces
Of all the places in the Philippines, I think it was Banaue that I was most looking forward to. The images of the landscapes and rice terraces are all over the social media and marketing for The Philippines. I couldn’t wait to get my lens on them, and head out and explore them as well. But, as the jeepney I caught from Sagada rolled towards town it poured rain. At times, I’m sure the driver couldn’t see more than 10 meters in front of him because of the fog. But, somehow the ride was still a lot of fun. I should have known it would be a bit of foreshadowing for my next couple days in Banaue. The forecast was showers, with a chance of occasional brilliance. Wandering the Villages around Banaue With heavy fog in the air my first morning in Banaue, I slept in a little bit. Later in the morning, I headed out to do a village trek in the area. I started with a visit to a village called Tam-an. Just outside of Banaue, this little village is perched on a hill’s edge with incredible views of the valley. I stopped there, pulled out the drone, and took a flight to get an overview of the area. It was fun, not only because the views were beautiful, but because the drone served as such a nice ice-breaker into conversations with the locals. They all came out to chat. Then, I pushed on towards the village of Poitan. However, I managed to get totally lost on the way there and found myself wandering aimlessly through some rice terraces. By the time I found the trail down to Poitan, I was covered in mud all the way to my waist. Again, the hike down to Poitan was stunning. It cut across some rice terraces, but also carved along the cliff-side lending to some beautiful views of the area. By the afternoon, the rain rolled back in and cut into my dreams of shooting photos from the classic view of the rice terraces. No Batad, Bad Brendan! I had plans of catching a ride out to an area called Batad. The terraces out that way are meant to be the most beautiful in all The Philippines. However, it poured rain the whole day. And, if I’m being honest with you, I probably should have just fought through it anyways. Of course, the weather could have been better that way – although, to be fair to myself, it probably wasn’t. I hiked up to the viewpoint for sunrise, but struck out. Then, in the afternoon, I hiked up again...