Category:Portrait
After a great five days in Cusco, I headed a little further south to Arequipa, the capital of Peru for a brief period in the mid 19th century, and still regarded by many of its inhabitants as the country’s cultural centre. Being the birthplace of Mario Vargas Llosa, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2010, helps to re-inforce their gleeful claim to moral and cultural superiority over the coastal den of iniquity that is Lima. I found myself staying at a […]
Sony A7RII : f/4.5@800th : ISO 250 : EV +0.7 : FE 35mm f/1.4 I took the bus from Cusco to Arequipa and spent just a couple of days here. The town is definitely on the traveller’s trail, which helps to explain the presence of several police similar to these two Arequipa cops. I think they are a separate arm of the local police force and they are there to make people from out of town feel safe and may even have been officially […]
First of all, the bus journey from Santiago to Mendoza takes you through some impressive landscapes so try and get a seat upstairs near the front so you can take it all in; it’s well worth the effort of booking and reserving a day or two in advance (unlike yours truly, the last minute specialist). I’d arranged my accommodation, also at the last minute, through AirBnB and was lucky that Carolina, the host, and her parents, Camila and Enrique (whose apartment shares the same […]
My first visit to Santiago was when I was fifteen years old, on a family ski trip to the resorts of La Parva and then Portillo. Good skiing, great après-ski, amazing views, incredibly strong sun at that altitude that I remember burnt my exposed neck worse than I’ve ever been burnt before (imagine an oozing turtle-neck skin!), it was a good time to be an irresponsible teen. My visit this time was a little less exclusive, arriving bleary eyed on the […]
The Boat and the Border From Bariloche, I hopped on a boat and crossed the border into Chile, heading for Puerto Varas. Having read a few reviews before undertaking this leg of the journey, I would like to point out that the boat rides themselves, with the necessary bus intermissions to join up the lakes, are not that particularly impressive or luxurious – they do the job, nothing special. It is what nature throws up in front of you that takes the […]
After the spectacular scenery of Patagonia, I took a bus back from El Chaltén to the airport at El Calafate and flew up to Bariloche, or San Carlos de Bariloche, to give it its full title. This was going to be my last flight for a while, until I reached Peru in fact, but I had decided when back in Helsinki that it would take too much of my time to bus that far down into Patagonia and then back […]
Sony A7RII : f2.8@400th : ISO 200 : EV +0.7 : FE 55mm f/1.8 I was wandering around one of the parks in Mendoza, Argentina, and saw this gentleman sitting on a bench watching the world go by. I approached politely and he had no problem me taking his portrait. A lovely guy, from Chile originally but he had left there just over 40 years ago. We didn’t talk politics, so I don’t know why, but my maths is good enough to work […]
Sony A7RII : f/3.5@320th : ISO 100 : EV -0.3 : FE 55mm f/1.8 How about this for a portrait of a quintessential border guard. I saw him striding over when there was a queue of us waiting to cross into Chile from Argentina, somewhere between Bariloche and Puerto Varas. He said it was okay for me to take his portrait, but there was no way that expression was ever going to change. I asked him to move over to […]
Getting to El Chaltén The bus journey from El Calafate to El Chaltén only takes about three hours and I would suggest doing the journey when there’s still enough daylight around to experience the spectacular scenery, with the mountains starting as a small detail on the horizon until they fill the frame and tower over you. ‘Imposing’ would be a suitable word to describe them and I’m glad that there are people out there who love to climb these immense peaks but […]
There is one major reason why so many people come to El Calafate and that is to see the Pepito Moreno glacier, a truly spectacular natural wonder. I arrived at my accommodation, the South B&B, and was met at the front desk by the owners Javier and Andrea. The rapport between the two of them is a typical brother and sister relationship, they never agree on anything and take great pleasure in approaching any situation from opposing points of view. We were all laughing like crazy within […]
