With our time in Wellington nearing its end Tiffany and I have been trying to get out as much as we can and last weekend went camping on Lake Wairarapa. We had planned to camp farther south beyond the lake but didn't realize the campground we had in mind could only be accessed by crossing two fjords. After finding....
Read More
I know I've been posting a lot of night sky images lately to my 500px and Instagram but I just can't get enough of this dark New Zealand sky. It truly is like nothing else I've seen. Below are a few of my best astro-images and one that is a long term project I started back in February. I thought it warranted a blog post as I will include some fun facts you may not know about the night sky.
Read More
Now that 2014 draws to a close, I decided to look back on all the things I've done and places I've been this last 12 months and post my personal 20 favorite images I've taken. It has been a pretty good year as I've visited 5 countries not including a layover in Australia.
Read More
As I haven't posted much recently I figured I should probably update those of you who are still reading my blog as well as offer some of my thoughts on travel.
I've been in New Zealand since the beginning of August and after spending just over a month traveling the North Island WHICH WAS AMAZING we arrived in Wellington. Since then, it's been up and down trying to find a good job. I'll admit I nearly gave up and was ready to head home which would have been stupid as I would've started the job hunt just the same. In the down time we've explored parts of Wellington and spent many afternoons reading books by Michio Kaku along the waterfront parks.
Read More
ince my last blog post, there has been so much that has happened I'm not sure what to write about. As I said at the end of the last post we moved on from Adams Permaculture farm with Stray Bus, with plans to go straight to Wellington, but we didn't make it very far. The first stop Stray made was at Kohutapu lodge near...
Read More
While planning our upcoming trip to New Zealand and doing lots of research I came across a part that said I would need: Chest X-ray Certificate INZ 1096. The reason for this is is if you've spent 3 months in total over the last 5 years in a country where there is a high risk for tuberculosis, you MUST send an updated chest x-ray proving you are free of TB. To view a list of the countries click here. Seeing as i've spent nearly 8 I needed the certificate.
Read More
Its been a while since the last post and so much has happened since. When we left Bangkok we had planned to stay in Patong or Kata beach for at least a week before looking at apartments. On the bus ride down I figured i'd look onilne and get a head start and ended up finding a place in Rawai beach. I'm so glad I looked as i found a great space on the southern tip of the island at a really good price. We are about 1000ft from the beach away from the tourist madness that Patong and Kata/Karon beaches have. We've got a balcony overlooking a farm and even a motorbike to cruise around the island with. We even have a kitchen with a kettle and electric stove so we can try our hand at cooking some pad thai.
Read More
When we decided to go to Thailand, we had quite a few ways of getting there. The fastest was flying from Luang Prabang, Laos on a one hour flight for a whopping $150 per person. The second was to take another (probably) horrible bus through the mountains to Vientiane, then from there to Bangkok, then all the way back up Thailand to Chiang Mai which was our destination. The third option was to hire a slow boat which would take two full days on the Mekong river which is one of the biggest in Asia. It spans nearly 3000 miles long from southern China all the way past Cambodia and Thailand.
Read More
When we decided to leave Cambodia, the gentleman we bought a ticket from in Siem Reap said it would only take 24 hours on a bus to get to Vientiane, Lao. (Laos if your from the western world) The distance we traveled was about 1000km by minivan, VIP bus, and tuk tuk. In the end it took nearly 55 hours to get to our destination. In between Siem Reap and Lao we had a very unpleasant ride with 19 other tourists (and our luggage) plus the drivers family crammed into an old Mercedes 12 seater van. It was horribly awesome.
Read More
To start out our trip, we left on the 9pm train from Flagstaff, Arizona to Union Station (LA) California. We had a great send off at the Lumberyard (my favorite restaurant) and I want to give a big thanks to everyone who made it! It really made our day. You all are awesome! After boarding the train we spent nearly 15 minutes finding a seat before we set off. It was dark and surprisingly quiet compared to past trains. Every hour on the hour I woke up to the nearly full moonlight on the countryside whizzing past. I didn't get much sleep but it was a beautiful sight.
Read More
In this blog post i'm going to show you why I shoot RAW instead of JPEG and the differences between both. There is no easy way to say whether RAW or JPEG is better for you. In the end, you have to think about your workflow and what you want out of the final image. If you want to tinker with your image to get that perfect exposure that you see on magazine covers or gallery walls then raw is for you. If you want to bracket many exposures and layer them into an HDR to achieve that ethereal look, then you guessed it, RAW.
Read More
To follow up on the previous post, this will outline much of the survival/backpacking gear i'll be bringing along.
Here is my Jack Wolfskin 120liter backpack next to the Think Tank bag. All together it weighs around 45lbs which is half of the weight of just my main backpack last time.
Read More
In fall 2011 I went to S.E. Asia on a one way ticket with my good friend Eric. That choice to leave everything behind and venture out farther than I had ever before completely changed my life. It made me realize that a comfortable job, a guaranteed paycheck, and all these other comforts were not what I wanted out of my life. At least not my 20's. I wanted adventure. True adventure. The kind that not many people seem to be familiar with anymore. The kind where...
Read More