I know that when I uploaded my first few photos from Lake Korission I said we had had a lovely surprise.
And then life got busy...family wedding, family funeral, computer problems, internet problems...
But finally I'm getting time to chip away slowly at editing some more photos.
Our lovely surprise was a whole flock of flamingoes on the lagoon. We certainly hadn't seen them before, even though we'd visited at the same time of year, and neither had another couple we spoke with.
I wished I'd brought my Canon for the extra zoom, but I just had to make do with my medium telephoto for the Olympus - I didn't even bring the longer one on holiday with us. I was grateful at least to have that - the last time we went and were thrilled just to have seen several egrets, all I had was my little pocket Olympus with practically no zoom at all.
We also saw egrets again this time - you can see one in the first of the flamingo photos.
It was our first time seeing red-legged stilts apart from in France two years ago. They're quite small birds, so I really did wish for some extra zoom for them - and for a squacco heron, no shots worth sharing.
I took these gull photos on the way to work yesterday morning.
Not waving, not drowning either ~ simply bathing
I know I wouldn't have got such good photos with my Canon point-and-shoot bridge camera. I have more zoom range, yes, but not quite the same sharpness and clarity and it's definitely slower to focus.
However, I now have a sore shoulder from the weight of the big camera in my bag all day. The body with a kit telephoto lens weighs in at 1.5kg/3 lb, and then another lens is necessary because sometimes (especially in the city) you don't want a telephoto, you want (I want) a wide-angle. And if I've gone for a pro lens rather than the kit ones - well, each lens is almost as heavy as the body. That's a definite con. The lack of video is a minor one - I know that the more modern DSLRs do offer video, but mine is just too old for that.
Another definite pro is the weather-proofing and rugged construction!
The reason I'm toting all that weight around on a daily basis now and not just on outings to the park is that my little Canon picked up some dust while we were on holidays, and is in for a good clean. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised - some of the time it was just slung over my shoulder while I was on the back of the bike.
The Olympus, on the other hand, while it picked up a certain amount of sand on the outside on our visit to Lake Korission, simply required 5 minutes with a blower brush when we got back to the apartment. Because of the weight around my neck, I was actually carrying it looped over my wrist till I realised how much sand I was kicking up as we walked across the dunes.
Cue photo of C in one of his drama moments. I know he's never read Beau Geste, so his concept of Fort Zinderneuf is based on Snoopy as a Foreign Legionnaire leading his troops through the sand traps!! The hunched shoulders and air of dejection are pure drama; like me, he really enjoys this outing.
He still insists that it's shorter to return to the car-park area via the dunes than back through the juniper groves. Shorter it may be - faster I am not so sure, as it's quite hard work trekking over all the sand, and this rocky outcrop was a rarity. I think perhaps he was deterred by the number of spiders' webs spun between the junipers, which at one stage had me thinking of Mirkwood.
For our trip to Corfu town I just brought the Canon, so here are a couple of short videos of a group of singers. I'm still not sure what they were doing - they certainly weren't busking, as the lady was giving something out (mostly to the shopkeepers as opposed to tourists) from her little basket. The second video shows an onlooker who borrowed the lead singer's hat and danced along with them - after C had joined him for a duet of O Sole Mio. You can't see him, but there was a very good piano accordionist. It should be possible to click on them to view them full screen, and I hope I've set the sharing permissions correctly this time.
We're just back from two weeks in Corfu - a lovely break. 1000+ photos are going to take a bit of culling before I get round to editing the best ones, but these are from possibly my favourite place. C likes the mountains and the olive groves, but I love Lake Korission, and it was a pity that this time we were staying too far away to visit it more than once. Don't worry - it's not all sand! My favourite part is along the fringe of the lagoon and through the juniper grove. .But even on the bare sand there's plenty of life. We saw a lot of bird tracks, both large and small, and then spotted this Little Ringed Plover. I can only guess it was hunting insects, which were abundant. We also thought we saw a snake track, quite possible since we saw a dead snake. Last time we visited we saw a hare racing across - no such treat this time, but we did have another real treat when we first got to the lagoon, but sadly I had not brought my point and shoot so wasn't able to zoom in as much as I wanted too. I'll save the surprise for another post, though!
