We made a few rookie errors. Namely tyre pressure, and a pretty late start to the mission. When they say midday sun removes most dune shadows they’re telling the truth. This means for some sudden stops at the top of some hairy drops.
We both got stuck a couple times, and lost. Not knowing what was around the next corner. It was great, sometimes nervy fun though, and I look forward to more practice soon.
Last week I went on a very windy photo mission with Andy Schar. We drove around Chapman’s Peak, which is one of my favourite drives in Cape Town (previous photos).
Loved the rich color contrast
All the white swirling horses
Andy hiding from the wind
Tomfoolery with Yolandi
Side note: I’m using VSCO presets for Lightroom. Love the film color grades and flexibility you have to modify them. I’m also test driving the new Lightroom to WordPress.com plugin. If you have Jetpack installed it works perfectly with self-hosted WordPress sites.
I don’t know who was more keen to get a “safari car”. Max, my nearly 5 year old, or me.
Max developed a very rare talent, at a very early age. He has the remarkable ability to identify a “safari car”, otherwise known as a Land Rover Defender, if it even enters his distant periphery.
For Max a safari car represents adventure. Something he and I want to chase more intentionally this year.
These past 6 months have been a whirlwind. A work trip to Germany and then Canada. A very noisy, messy house renovation. And 3 months of “colic”, that was fortunately followed by another 3 months getting to know a gentle, happy, smiling little Malakai.
In November 2014, from Cape Town to San Francisco, I was miraculously upgraded to fly first class. For free. On not one, but two long haul flights via Dubai. A total of over 20 hours in a flying palace. It was an incredibly surreal and scarily opulent experience.
It was my first (and only) time flying Emirates business class, that I only just managed to justify pocketing – celebrating a crazy few months at WooThemes. Presumably Emirates were keen to impress and win some business travellers over, with a surplus of first class seats available. Only at check-in did I realise I had been upgraded.
I wish I’d documented the flight better, but only managed a handful of pictures.
A year and a half later my favorite vlogger, Casey Neistat, got the same VIP Emirates treatment and did a fantastic job of documenting the experience. The video has gone completely viral with over 20 million views in 7 days. I think Emirates can justify Casey’s upgrade a lot better than mine….
I still can’t believe I took that flight and can only imagine how much that ticket would cost today. (An absurdly, unjustifiable amount…)
The craziness of the Automattic Grand Meetup is now behind us. An action packed week of workshops, classes, town halls, flash talks, team building activities and tasty meals over good conversation with new work colleagues.
It really is a surreal week. Throughout it you are completely overwhelmed by the scale of it all – borderline burned out by the constantly busy schedule. Burnout likely influenced by the 30 hour commute to Canada and a 9 hour time difference… Looking back at it you realise how special and unique this diverse team, distributed company and unforgettable experience is.
I lugged about 10kgs of camera equipment from Cape Town to Whistler, Canada for the trip. Very excited about being in such a photogenic part of the world. I ended up taking a measly amount of photos 🙁 Below are a few of them.
This week I’m at the Automattic Grand Meetup in Whistler, Canada. We are nearly 500 co-workers from all corners of the world congregating for one week of the year in one place.
Today I’m at the top of Whistler mountain working on a WooCommerce town hall presentation and discussing a 3 year plan for our division. Just a regular day at our remote office…
(Free internet at the top of the mountain, 10 times faster than my home internet…)
I’ve never been a big bird watcher, but sitting in a wild garden watching an assortment of birds feeding off the local fynbos is quite therapeutic. And wildly colourful.
We spent last weekend in Hermanus – a seaside town our family love to escape to as often as possible. It’s also the place we got married, and a town known for it’s incredible whale sightings.
I rented a Canon EF 11-24mm f/4L USM lens and enjoyed spending a few hours one evening trying to capture the coastline and starry skies. Hermanus is often misty and there was a lot of cloud cover for the most part of the weekend. Night skies are a challenging subject matter and I still have a lot to learn, but I’m enjoying the process and eerie outings.
