Hytte 48 our weekend home in Fidjeland and Milkyway

Superb Milkyway Season so far ...

My first high altitude aurora on Lysesheia at 940m elevation

As far as Norwegian mountain standards are concerned, 940m elevation isnt exactly stupendous in height but considered high enough around Rogaland. In these parts 1400+m is probably considered high altitude.

Nevertheless, it's the closest high elevation location with a parking lot less tha 10m from our chosen shooting location. Pretty high enough ... no trekking uphill is involved in any sense of the word.

The aurora came around just after 1am rather unexpectedly as we were excitedly photography Milkway as it made it's appearance in and out of the passing clouds. Our main objective was to capture Milkyway in it's glorious autumn finery. And we captured Aurora to boot ... what more can you asked for?

We were so stoked with the occurence that we went out again the following night ... big ear to ear grin!

Lauwersmeer with the kids 29th Jun-6th July

Third trip to Holland ... this time with the children. We stayed at Landal Esonstad  just across the bay from Suyderoogh. This time a 4 bedroom bungalow facing the little lake with it's own resident waterbirds.

It's nice when you have the kids around in a big house, it just doesnt feel so empty. Suyderoogh cabin had 3 rooms and it's feels so empty when you are the only person in the house. Both has it's plusses and drawbacks ...

It's still birdwatching as the main agenda, but in addition we planned to also just hangout and visit nearby interesting places. Amsterdam was on the cards but it didn't pan out too well on account of some demonstrations the same week on account of a police brutality incident earlier in the week in the city.

Aisya and Ali were equipped with a camera each, Ali on the EOS100D and Aisya on the Nikon P310 compact. I brought the 24, 300 and 600. And I hardly use the 300 except for the Aquazoo trip, almost always dragging out the 600 instead. The scope stayed home this time.

Stormy nite at Esonstad from our porch.

My first downy chicks Common Coot.

Ruff, almost out of season mane.

Godwit

My 1st juvvy Great Crested Grebe.

Cute baby lemur and an even cuter auburn haired sweaty 6 footer female keeper.

Our first Binturong ever ... unfortunately in a zoo in Holland.

Ali spotted this leucistic Mallard at Aquazoo, Leeuwarden.

Quite a commotion (by the  3 of us and 15 zoo staff) when this fella fell into the water. Nobody knew whether it knows how to swim!

Ali's shot

Aisya's shot with EOS100D+400mm

Ali's shot

Ali's shot

Ali's shot

Ali's shot

It was still Ramadhan the week we visited, since our schedule wasn't too heavy we fasted as per normal fasting month. Morning sahure before 3 am and iftar around 9pm. Every few days we'd go grocesry shopping for our daily needs. We ventured out to downtown Leuwarden one balmy day and with the impromptu help of two generous Muslim brothers (one from Saudi and another from Egypt) we met on a street corner, we were driven to the door of the one and only halal butcher shop (Turkish) perhaps in the whole of Friesland!

We also celebrated Aisya's 13th birthday while on this trip. We celebrated with a birthday cake, chips, cookies, candies and soft drinks after iftar. Took us a couple of days to finish the cake between the three of us. Mommy joined the celebration via Skype.

It was a pleasant, happy slow week to end the school term. Would've been much more fun if Mommy had been able to tag along. Maybe next trip.

Words by Nazeri Abghani (c) 2015
Images by Nazeri Abghani, Ali MdNazeri and Aisya MdNazeri
July 2015

Birding Trip to Lauwersmeer, NL 13-17th May 2015

The first visit back to the Netherlands was during Easter week as an introduction trip with the family. Not much birding got done, only driving around the countryside refamiliarising myself with the roads, landscape and feel of the land. Made a second trip middle of May by myself to birdwatch and pick out sites for big wader counts  ... Waddensea of course, Lauwersmeer as a base seemed an obvious choice.

Though the May trip was a short visit it was over several days including a weekend ... Wednesday - Sunday, ample time to cover the important hides near Lauwermeer, watch swarms of migrating Waddensea waders, ride around the polderscapes and a peep to Termunten. And of course everything else in between.

The hide by Ezumazijl was a nice surprise in May ... lekking Ruff (Philomachus pugnax) with front rwo seats and tonnes of Redshanks (maybe Spotted somewhere in between). Most mornings the hide was empty especially during the early part of the morning. The flat polders were a treasure trove of raptors.

Nice views of early players of the Spring migration run along the coast from Wierum to Moddegat till Lauwersoog ...

I took along perhaps too much gear this first focus-on-birding trip ... digiscoping gear for videos with the EOS100D, brackets and scope as well as several lenses for both birds and landscape. Kinda tiresome lugging all those along esp the Kowa scope and tripods!

For future trips ... the digiscope setup would probably be dropped for a Nikon P900 to shave off weight. The camera setup remains but the landscape may change to a smaller mirrorless get up.

In anycase, was I was happy with the images collected during the trip. Only wished I had woken up earlier for the swarmes crossing the Waddensea every morning and shot images of the lekking Ruff instead of making videos. The German birders had it right ... long lenses and images only.

The pictures:

It's nice to be back on old stomping grounds and rediscovering it in a way at a much slower pace in a more focussed mode. I could've done more in the years before but two little ones proved you can only do that in fits and starts. It's more fluid now that the kids are bigger ... which means more birding time the way it should've been.

Images and words: Nazeri Abghani (c) 2015