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  • Peaks Challenge 2017

    Peaks Challenge 2017

    As discussed in my previous blog, I really hadn’t done enough training for the Peak’s Challenge Falls Creek (aka ‘the 3 Peaks’). But was I going to let a woefully inadequate training load stop me from attempting this? Hell no! After all, how bad can 13 hours on a bike be?
    Well…I think that when ‘How bad can 13 hours on the bike be?’ is a question you are legitimately asking yourself…then perhaps your state of mind isn’t all that flash to start with, and perhaps it would be a good time to start questioning the decisions you’re making. Of course, I know this in hindsight…because I now know exactly how bad 13 hours on the bike can be. But I also know just how much of a difference the people you meet along the way can make. So without further ado, here is my race report for the Peak’s Challenge 2017

    Checking in the day before

    A bit of background

    Just in case you haven’t read the previous blog, here’s the background:

    • The Peak’s Challenge is a 235km bike ride through the mountains in the Victorian Alps
    • I signed up for this last year as the final part of deal with my coach and friend Craig Percival. He was going to coach me for the ride, but tragically passed away in December of last year
    • I have done a lot of training on an indoor trainer…but not nearly enough out in the real world
    • My ride plan is to avoid getting caught up in groups that are riding too fast for me, working with people when I can so that I don’t exhaust myself riding solo…and then hope like hell that my legs will get me up that final climb.
    • I ultimately just want to finish the ride, but if I can finish inside 13 hours, then I am deemed an ‘official finisher’.

    Falls Creek to Harrietville

    This was actually pretty cruisey. I ticked off one of my goals by not crashing on either the descent from Falls Creek to Mt. Beauty, or from Tawonga Gap to German Town (nothing says success quite like binning it 20mins into a 13 hour ride!) A small part of this success my have come from me noticing that I had put my front wheel on the wrong way round and having to change it about 2 minutes before the start.

    Waiting to start…in about 5 mins I would realise that I had my front wheel on the wrong way around…je suis une genius.

    Towards the end of the descent from Towanga I got into a group of 5 who were setting a pretty good pace. As we hit German Town, they wound up the pace a bit and suddenly I was sitting just outside of comfort zone. I sat with them for about 5kms, but knew that this was exactly the mistake I had made so many times before…sticking with a group, but burning more energy that I could afford given there was over 180kms and two mountains to go. I also knew that I had been sitting on the wheels of the other 4 guys for the duration, and that slipping off the back without pulling a turn would be pretty poor form. So I rolled to the front and did about 1.5kms. If sitting in the group was on the limit of what I could sustain, then sitting out the front in whatever wind there was, was definitely beyond what I should have been doing. But up ahead I could see a larger group that were clearly travelling slower. So I decided to hold on with the group I was with, in the hope that we would catch the next group. We did, and thankfully they were sitting at a pace that let me recover all the way into Harrietville.
    I pulled into Harrietville, had something to eat and drink, and then headed back out onto the road, all within the time limit I would need to adhere to if I wanted to finish in 13 hours

    Harrietville – Dinner Plain

    Pretty much straight out of Harrietville we hit Mount Hotham, and the climbing began in earnest. I’ve never climbed Mt Hotham before, and all I’ll say is it’s about 20kms of tolerable climbing…and then about 10kms of ‘when the hell does this finish?!’ Every time I thought the summit would be just around the corner…it wasn’t…and in its place was a snaking line of cyclist disappearing into the distance.


    But once I hit the summit I began the rolling descent to Dinner Plain. As I was to find out over the rest of the day, a rolling descent means that there is just enough time spent going downhill to technically be getting closer to sea level, but there still feels like there is a lot of going uphill as well. I pulled into the lunch stop about 7 minutes down on where I needed to be, but I figured if I could just keep my lunch stop to about 10 minutes, then I would still be back on the road in time to achieve the 13 hour mark.

    Dinner Plain – Omeo

    This was tough. We had a bit of tailwind, which was really nice, but it was hot. I started to get ‘hot spots’ on my left foot, and so loosened my shoe as much as I could. But it was the element of the unknown that was the hardest to deal with. When I was climbing Mt. Hotham, even though I didn’t know the climb, I knew I would be climbing, and so I was resigned to that, with any downhill sections a bonus. But for this part of the I just didn’t know what was coming, and every small hill felt like a slap in the face.
    Then as we made the final turn into Omeo there was a literal slap in the face, with the change in direction turning a crosswind/tailwind into a headwind. I pulled into Omeo knowing that I had lost time, but figured if I could just get some food into me and have a quick rest, then I would be able to tackle the 40kms to Angler’s Rest. But no sooner had I filled up my drink bottle, than the guys manning the aid station said ‘You’ve got another 10 mins’ and then we close. On cue the Lanterne-Rouge (the last two riders) arrived, and I suddenly realised how close I was to having to retire from the ride (if you fall behind the Lanterne-Rouge riders then you have to retire).
    So I hastily jumped back on the bike, and headed off into the headwind and unknown.

    Omeo – Angler’s Rest

    Shit got real. The wind was hot and in your face. The road was unrelenting, and my confidence was shot knowing how close I was to the cut-off. I found two other guys who were riding a bit faster than I was and asked if they wanted to roll some turns. They were up for it and so we just rotated turns, with one guy sitting in the wind, while the other two tucked in behind him. I know that I wasn’t really pulling my weight, and so when they started to drop me I just fell back. They looked back at one stage and started to slow down, but I waved them on. I was done. I knew that there was no way I was going to do 13 hours…and in reality, there was no way I was going make it to the climb up Falls Creek. Which actually really pissed me off, because I knew that I could make up some time on that final climb. I’m not a strong rider, but I’m a pretty good climber. Now I wasn’t even going to pit myself against the climb because I wasn’t going to make the cutoff at Angler’s Rest.

    It’s a funny thing with these sorts of events. Ultimately I do them because I want to see how I respond to that moment of absolute despondence. When I think I can’t go on because it’s all too hard. In that moment of darkness, how will I respond? But the simple truth is, it’s not a single moment. It’s a series of moments. In this case it was about and hour and a half of moments where I just had to keep pedalling. I knew that I was cooked. But there had been 3 ambulances go past on this section of road alone, so I was still having a better day than some others. I decided that I wasn’t going to retire from the race until I was asked to. So I would ride on for as long as I could. Not exactly a gallant defeat…but perhaps a less ignominious one.
    I will admit that I spent a lot time pondering what Craig would have said if I had failed to finish the ride. I concluded that he would have tolerated it, provided I had left nothing in the tank. Even though I was spent, I knew I was still holding a tiny bit in reserve to get me up that final climb. So when the Lanterne-Rouge riders swept past with about 8 riders sitting with them and they said ‘Jump on’, I knew that I had to go. I had been trundling along at about 16km/h and they were sitting on closer to 25km/h, but I knew that if there was a time to burn my matches…this was it. I sat with them for the last 5kms into Angler’s Rest, and arrived with enough time to eat my last sandwich (home made peanut-butter with a lolly-snake inside…adversity is indeed the mother of invention).
    One thing that had kept me going for the last couple of hours was the promise of a can of Coke at Angler’s Rest. No less than 4 people had told me how amazing this hit of sugar and caffeine was. Sadly the mythical ‘best can of Coke of my life’ didn’t happen because they had sold out…so I had to settle for the ‘best can of Lift of my life’.
    I heard the announcement that we had 5 minutes to leave Angler’s Rest and then 30 mins to ride 10kms to WTF Corner (the start of the climb to Falls Creek). That sounded eminently doable, and so I set off again.

    WTF Corner to Trapyard Gap

    I made the time cutoff for WTF and started the climb. If you haven’t seen the first part of the climb of the back of Falls Creek, it is insane. It kicks off insanely steep…and then pretty much holds that for about 12kms. I was only about 400m into the climb when I started seeing people walking. After about 2kms the number of people walking far outnumbered the people riding and there were an increasing number of people sitting by the side of the road either swearing at their cramping legs or with their head in their hands. By the time I got 10kms into the climb it was like a scene from a war movie. There were about 6 ambulances that went past, sag wagons full of dejected looking people rolled through, bikes were left by the side of the road, those who were still walking had 100 Mile stares, and the people sitting by the side of road looked shattered.


    I knew I was making good time and that I was now a really good chance to make it in before the Lanterne-Rouge…and maybe even within the 13 hour time limit. I had promised myself that I wouldn’t stop until I got to Trapyard Gap. I wasn’t riding much quicker than walking pace…but there was principle at stake! Then a marshall stopped by the side of the road and offered me a can of Coke. There was a moment of hesitation…but I quickly dismounted and drank what was indeed ‘the best can of Coke of my life’. Then rode on to Trapyard Gap.

    Trapyard Gap – Falls Creek

    In a day of swinging momentum, I felt the momentum swing back my way. We had 23kms to go, 10kms of which were climbing, then the remainder was ‘rolling’ to the finish…and we had an hour and half to get it done to make the 13 hour official finish time. This was actually doable.
    The Lanterne-Rouge riders rolled in and I had a quick chat. My mate Bill who was one of the Lanterne-Rouge riders told me to put my vest on as it would get pretty cold from here on in. As someone who had spent the last 6 hours suffering in the heat, I found that hard to believe…but I put it on anyway and then rolled out for the last part of the day.

    If I reflect on the day I can see that the best parts of the day were defined by the groups I was with; the group from German Town to Harrietville, the two other guys I rode with for about 15kms out of Omeo, the Lantern-Rouge riders that I held onto for dear life into Angler’s Rest. The ability to have a conversation offers a respite from the relentless drudgery of following a wheel or turning over the pedals. It also serves to remind you that other people are suffering just as badly as you are.
    Beginning the climb out of Trapyard Gap was pretty funny. On any other day, we would have been flying up this climb, but everyone had locked into their own rhythm and was pacing themselves up the hill. I could see how slowly I was going (about 10km/h) and each time I looked up I expected to see the other riders disappearing into the distance…but instead we all just travelled at the same pace. Sometimes you would have a burst of energy for 15mins and ride past some people, but then you’d fall back, and some of them would ride past you. But whereas for the first 12 hours the other riders had been either a wheel to jump on, or someone who was passing you, or someone for you to pass…once we got to the rolling section at the top of the climb, everyone banded together. We had taken the worst of it, and now we were desperate to finish as a diaspora of stragglers.
    As the sun set it really was an amazing sight. The skies were grey in front of us, save for the burning orange on the horizon, the skies behind us were clear and dissolved from pinks to mauves and purples, and on the ridges you could see the silhouettes of riders. It’s a sign of just how tired I was that the thought of stopping to take a photo was not even entertained. Then the sun set, the sleet started and the landscape started to look like ‘The Upside Down’ from ‘Stranger Things’. Everything was muted greys and shadows, with the bike lights picking up the highlights of the raindrops. As I descended briefly and turned back into the wind, I checked my watch, it was nearly too dark to see, but I made out that I had about 5kms to go, and about 12mins to do it in if I wanted to make the 13 hour cutoff. I did some quick mental arithmetic and realised…that I was in no state for mental arithmetic. In short, I needed to average over 20km/h over the last 5 kms, and I had no idea how many hills were left, and I was riding into a headwind, and within a few minutes it would be too dark for me to see either my watch or bike computer. Deep down I knew this wasn’t possible, so I decided to just go flat out for the last 5kms and at least beat the Lanterne-Rouge riders home.
    Having spent the first part of the day conserving energy for the inevitable final climb, and then spent 2 hours between Omeo and WTF Corner riding well out of my comfort zone just to avoid missing the cutoff times, it was strangely liberating to just go flat out and push myself, knowing that no matter what happened, I was going to finish the 3-Peaks.
    I don’t want to get too prosaic, but for that last 5kms, even though I was riding into the wind, I felt like I was riding down hill. Everything felt fluid and strong, and I can only assume that a strong Tasmanian was pushing me along, and in the dark I gave a quick word of thanks to Craig Percival.
    One more quick climb, and a sketchy descent in the dark and wet, then suddenly I was in the carpark of Falls Creek. Then there were people, and lights and noise, and the finishing chute. Then it was done. It was over. I pressed ‘stop’ on my watch and looked down to see how close I had come to 13 hours, my watch read ’12:58:49′! I’d snuck under the 13-hour time limit by just over a minute! Did this make up for the previous 13 hours of mental suffering and physical exhaustion? Noooooo, No, no, no, no, no!


    No.
    But I will say that the 10 minutes I spent stumbling around the finish area talking to fellow finishers (including Jean-Pierre who had been my companion from Trapyard Gap, and one of the guys who I had ridden from Omeo with) was among the best feelings I’ve had in my life.
    So unlike the Ironman where I walked away swearing ‘I would never do that again’, I reckon I would like to do this again so that I could at least know what to expect with each section of the ride…but next time I’ll train better…next time I’ll train better.
    Last but not least, a big thanks to Katie and the kids for giving me a weekend off to see what was apparently some beautiful countryside, thanks to Ailie, Peter, Troy and Aaron for the support along the way, thanks to the Sufferfest for the training videos, thanks to the volunteers who were so awesome over the whole 13 hours, thanks to Bicycle Network for running such a great event, thanks to Bill and Chris the Lanterne-Rouge riders for keeping me in the hunt, and of course thanks to Craig Percival for the inspiration to do the ride…and for the push for the last 5kms, I couldn’t have done it without you.

    To the winners go the spoils…and by ‘winners’ I mean people who have been riding for 13 hours…and by ‘spoils’ I mean not having to do that anymore.
  • How not to prepare for the 3 Peaks.

    How not to prepare for the 3 Peaks.

    It’s now just over a week until the Peaks Challenge Falls Creek (affectionately known as ‘the 3 Peaks’) a 235km bike ride through Victoria’s alpine country that has, three hefty climbs. There are many guides on how to prepare for the ride, and they are great. But who hell wants to hear how other people are going to succeed? What you really want is some poor sap to outline exactly how not to prepare yourself for this ride, so that you can either laugh at their expense, or use their approach as the antithesis of your next training block…or just thank God that at least your preparation has been better than theirs.
    Ladies and gentlemen,  I believe I am that sap. So here are my tips on how not to prepare for the 3 Peaks.

    Do all your training on an indoor trainer

    A year and half ago I wrote about falling out of love with cycling  I think it’s safe to say that neither of us really wants to get a divorce…but I am definitely sleeping on the couch each night.
    A pretty clear indicator of this is that every time I’ve had to make the choice between heading out into the wee hours of the morning to go for a ride…or trotting out to the shed to sit on the trainer and do Sufferfest sessions…I’ve chosen the ‘sit in a room, sweating like a pig and being eaten by mosquitos’ option. For the uninitiated, a cycling trainer is basically an exercise bike (or in my case a device that I attach my actual bike to), and Sufferfest is basically an app that plays footage of cycling races and yells at you. So you can see why this would be a natural choice over getting out into the hills around Kinglake with a group of friends.
    On the bright side, the number of times I’ve been abused by drivers or nearly run off the road while on the trainer is an impressive ‘zero’ (coincidentally ‘impressive zero’ was also my nickname at high-school). I can also scamper off the trainer and make breaky for the kids when they wake up…and it’s a hell of a lot easier to be served fruit toast on the trainer than out on the road.

    Lose your coach

    Last year I made a documentary about my friend and coach Craig Percival. Part of the deal was that he would coach me for an event. Craig had been my coach for the Ironman, and while I couldn’t motivate myself to do exercise…for some reason a weekly email from Craig was enough to make me feel guilty enough to actually get out of bed at 5.30am and train. I’d always wanted to do the 3 Peaks, and I thought that having a structured training regime that yielded a good result may be just what I needed to reacquaint myself with my love of cycling. So Craig and I had been working away at this goal for a few months.
    Tragically, at the end of last year Craig died as a result of complications after a routine surgery. So suddenly I lost the coach and mentor that I knew I was going to be relying on…and the many conversations we’d had about his frustration with how much time his training took away from his family, took on a whole lot more weight.
    In the Hollywood version of this story, I’ll be about 4km from the finish and feeling that I’ve got nothing left, I’ll look up to the sky (it will still be light because of how fast I’ve ridden) and ask Craig for help…and he’ll say ‘you’ve got this!’ and I’ll find a hidden reserve of strength and power to the finish.
    But in reality, I’ll probably be begging for Craig’s help from about the 75km mark…and all he’ll say is ‘Mate…you really should have trained for this! Now if you’ll excuse me, David Bowie is running in the Heaven Marathon, and I told him I’d be out on the course to cheer him on.’

    Don’t stop those swim and run sets

    Between work, family and running your own business, there really isn’t a whole lot of time left for training. So it’s probably a good idea to just focus on the cycling when you have the time to do a session.
    Or…you can do what I’ve done and split my time between swimming, running and cycling. If you really want bonus points, throw in a weekly circus class for the latter part of 2016. It will all pay dividends when you arrive at the bottom of Falls Creek and they say ‘Look, normally we make everyone ride up this hill. But if you can run 10km, tumble turn or juggle…we’re just going to drive up and you hold onto the side of the car.’

    So what have I actually done?

    I have legitimately done a lot of sessions on the trainer…including a few 2.5hr sessions that really took me to a dark place. Plus I commute 80km every week.

    Like every geriatric, I’ve swapped out my 53/39 for a more hills friendly setup (for the non-cyclists…ah who am I kidding?…there’s no way any non-cyclists made it this far into this blog! So let’s get down to random numbers, I’m going to be running a 52/36 and 11/28)

    I’ve also grown my hair long like Peter Sagan. Part of me still hopes that his incredible cycling strength is actually not due to his work ethic or genetics…but due to his long hair. It’s a long-shot…but long-shots are all I have left!

    Most importantly, I’ve resigned myself to what is going to be at least 12…and quite realistically 13 hours of mental and physical carnage. I’m not going to waste any energy trying to sit with packs that are going too fast, I’m not going to stop for very long at any of the rest areas along the way, I’m going to eat before I get hungry, I’m going to try appreciate the natural beauty of the Victorian high-country, I’m going to remind myself that you learn so much more about yourself when you push yourself to your limits, and I’m going to remember a sign I ran past on the Melbourne Ironman that simply said ‘Just remember, you paid to do this!’.

  • My new podcast

    My new podcast

    They say that ‘Harley Davidson’s are like haemorrhoids, sooner or later every arsehole gets one’…I think that in 2017 we will probably be able to swap ‘Harley Davidson’ for ‘podcast’. With that in mind, I’d like to announce my new podcast!!!!

    But why?

    Well first and foremost, I love podcasts. For the last 5 or 6 years they have been my escape hatch while I do menial tasks like the dishes, or hanging out the washing, or colour-grading a video. They also help me block out the real world if I’m ever on public transport, and they are pretty much the only thing that gets me through any long run.
    Secondly, so much of the video work that I do comprises half hour chats that are edited down to 2-3 minutes. While I love the process of editing a conversation down to just the essentials…there is invariably good stuff that never sees the light of day, and there is often something nice about being able to ease into the flow of a conversation, rather than just hearing the highlights. I simply don’t have the hard-drive space to do long form videos (plus I think that if you’re going to use a visual medium, you need to make it visually engaging…and two people chatting for an hour just doesn’t cut it), so the audio only world of podcasts seemed like a really good solution.
    Thirdly, I really like getting to know people’s story. But life with 3 kids doesn’t allow for a whole a spare hour where you can just talk to someone about their life…unless you schedule it in. So this is my way of scheduling it in. Also, after 40 years on this earth, I feel that I’ve met a number of really interesting people, who have a great story to tell.
    Finally, I wanted to set myself the challenge of creating a range of content, from a single session. So my aim with this project is to create; a podcast (45mins to an hour), a video where the person talks about something they have done that they are really proud of (3-5 minutes) and a portrait photo.

    Why has it taken you so long?

    Weellll, the honest truth is that I attempted to start a podcast about 4 years ago with my brother, Tom. Both of our lives were pretty frantic at that time, and despite having a lot in common, we were spending less and less time together. So I thought that if we could catch up once a week to record the podcast, then that would be a good, regular excuse for a catch-up. So after a bit of coaxing, I borrowed an audio recorder, and Tom and I sat down to chat about a range of topics. From memory, it was pretty good. There were some jokes, some witty insights and some fond reminiscences. I say ‘from memory’ because at about the 1 hour mark of the recording I looked down to see how the audio recorder was going and realised that while I had armed the recorder, I had not actually started recording (on that recorder you press ‘record’ once to get it ready…and then again to make it record)…I think that if I had at least got it recording at that moment I would have heard one of the world’s great exasperated sighs emenate from my younger brother. But I didn’t even capture that…and I’ve been too embarrassed to ever ask him to do it again.

    Traps for young players

    Hoo Boy! I can remember when I went for my driver’s license thinking that if a friend of ours (who was not the sharpest tool in the shed) could get his license…then surely I could get mine! Similarly, I’ve listened to some pretty amateurish podcasts, and so I thought that if they can get a podcast recorded and uploaded…then so can I. But I was wrong. So very, very wrong.
    From the start I had to decide if I was going to have my questions as part of the podcast. If they weren’t, then I would only need one microphone…but I would have to edit the answer in such a way that the question was self-evident. Or I could hold the microphone and ask the question, then pass the microphone to the interviewee for their answer…but this sounded like a terrible way to have a conversation, or I could put the microphone in the middle of the table and we could both talk and sound equally faint and echoey.
    Alternatively, I could use my two radio mics that I use for my videos, and that way both myself and my interviewee would have a mic. But then I would need to work out how to plug the two mics into a recorder (that can accept to different audio sources) and then get that to plug into Garageband so that I could monitor the audio. In the end this is the option I went with…but this meant having two wireless mics, two wireless mic receivers and an audio recorder and a laptop all on the desk in front of me while we recorded (and me desperately trying to pay attention to my guest, while also checking battery levels on the various devices, and monitoring audio, and making sure everything was still recording). In short the whole set-up looked some carnival freak show where a snake eats itself while their handler looks on in confused disbelief.
    I’ve now done 4 recordings…and while I think I’m getting better, the simple fact is that I will need to buy some dedicated microphones, as the sound is still pretty average and ‘roomy’.
    One highlight was spending an hour trying to work out how to get the two mics to work on the recorder and then how to get Garageband to recognise the recorder. Suddenly after another flurry of settings changes I could hear my voice through my headphones. This was great as it meant I had finally cracked the code and got the computer to recognise the mics. But the only problem was that there was a weird scratching noise (like something rubbing on the mic). I checked both mics and nothing I did could get rid of the scratching sound… it even made it when the mics were just sitting on the table and clearly not touching anything that would lead to the scratching. Eventually I turned them both off and let out a sigh…which came through my headphones clear as a bell. With both mics off, this shouldn’t have been possible. Then I realised that I had my headphones (my iPhone headphones) plugged into the Mac…and Garageband had been recognising the microphone on the headphones not the microphones I’d been trying to set up. So everytime I picked up one of the mics and did a check, I could hear my voice, because my iPhone headphones could hear my voice.
    That was not a career highlight.

    Then there was learning how to edit on Garageband, writing some theme music in Garageband, creating artwork for the podcast, finding somewhere to host the podcast, learning how to share from wherever you’re hosting the podcast to iTunes…in short, it’s a whole lot harder than ‘upload video to YouTube’.

    Another little thing I had to overcome is that whenever I’m doing a video shoot, I don’t appear in the final product, so it’s really important that you don’t hear me talking from off camera. As a result I’ve become very good at responding to what people are saying, without actually making any noise (there is a lot of nodding and smiling). But on a podcast, it’s ok to audibly support the person speaking…in fact, it sounds kind of rude if you’re apparently not responding to what is being said. So over the course of the first 4 episodes I think I’ve got a lot better at responding to what is being said and making the recording a genuine conversation.
    But…I…could…still…really….benefit…from…slowing…down…when…I…speak.

    *Insert call to action here*

    This is all just a rather long winded way of saying, the podcast is now live.

    You can head to the website to find the podcast and video here:

    http://www.twodegrees.com.au/podcasts/

    or you can just listen to it/subscribe here:

    iTunes

    SoundCloud

    I’ve got a bank of 4 more up my sleeve, so as long as I keep recording one every couple of weeks, I should be able to release them fortnightly (even if I miss a week or two).
    I’d love to have your feedback, it’s still very much a work in progress, so I’d love to know what works and what doesn’t. But if you have anyone you think would be good to talk to, then please let me know (I’m looking to maintain a 50/50 gender split, so if you could give one of each that would be awesome!)
    In terms of a creative project, it has been awesome to try my hand at creating a music intro/outro, I’ve loved having an excuse to shoot four portraits and hone my skills there, I’ve been excited to have that ‘this could all go horribly wrong, but I’m doing it anyway’ feeling back in my life…but most of all, it’s been great to just sit down and have a chat with some really interesting people.

    Episode 1 – Joel Strickland
    Episode 2 – Georgia Haynes
    Episode 3 – Veeral Patel
    Episode 4 – Penny Burke

     

  • Top photos of 2016

    Top photos of 2016

    Sitting at work desperately pretending that you’ve got something to do? Stuck at home with the kids thinking ‘Wait…I’ve got to put up with this crap 24/7 for how many more weeks?!!!’ Holed up at a holiday destination somewhere where it’s too hot/wet/cold/windy to do anything? (if you’re in Melbourne there is every chance that it’s been all 4 of those things in the last half hour). Then fear not, relief is at hand.
    No, I’m not going to distract your boss, or look after your children, or sacrifice something to whatever Gods are the controlling the weather in your local area…instead I’m going to present you with my favourite photos of 2016. A year when I adjusted to life with a new camera, shot a wedding in the country, got paid to shoot some portraits, ran some photo workshops, filmed my first ever documentary and travelled through Queensland with the family in a campervan.
    Did I manage to take 17 photos that I was happy with? No! So, in no particular order, here are my top 16 photos of 2016!!!

    No. 1 – A shed in Daylesford

    Blinded by the light
    Blinded by the light

    Katie was performing at festival in Daylesford with Songrise. We had lunch in someone’s garage/workshop and just as we were about to had off I saw this beam of light coming through from the corrugated iron roof. I scampered over and did a quick shuffle-dance to raise some more dust off the ground and then asked Xavier to stand under the beam. I asked him to stare up at the roof…but as with many times when I ask a child to pose, it didn’t look like a child looking at the roof…it looked like a child who had been asked to look like a child looking at the roof. But then he decided to clap his hands in the shaft of light and I managed to capture the moment he was winding up for the clap (‘winding up for the clap’ may also have been a euphemism for consorting with prostitutes in the 1800’s…but that is not what I meant).
    The big photography lesson for me was to get the shot set up…and then let the person interact with it…trying to manufacture a moment is still not a skill I have.

    No.2 – Cooling down

    Alain Laboile comes to Preston
    Alain Laboile comes to Preston

    Ok, you know how 6 words ago I was saying that manufacturing a moment is not a skill I have…well here is a case in point. Not even if the local water supply had been laced with peyote could I have said ‘What I want to do is get a shot where Xavier is in a bucket, looking cherubic while he rests his head on his big sister’s hand, who is looking lovingly at the camera, while sitting backwards on a high-chair, dangling her legs over the high-back of the chair…and ideally wearing a bandage on one knee’. But if that moment does unravel in front of me…I am getting better at capturing it.
    I’ve mentioned this before, but this shot was shamelessly influenced by Alain Laboile

    No. 3 – Adrift on an incoming tide

    A boat at Shallow Inlet on low tide
    A boat at Shallow Inlet on low tide

    Last year I wrote a blog on how keeping fit can actually help your photography. One of the things I mentioned then was sometimes when you’re out for a run or ride you see things that you know would make a great photo, but that you would have missed if you’d been driving (or indeed at home watching YouTube videos about photography). So on an early morning run I saw these boats sitting on the sand at low-tide, and I thought it would make a great photo that could represent futility, or being stuck, or dwindling natural resources. But by the time I actually got to head back there to take the photo, it was early evening. I took a few photos of the boat from the front (or as we nautical types like to say ‘the pointy end’), but it just didn’t work. Then I swung around to the back (or ‘arse end’) and realised that it looked like it was heading out to sea. Despite the fact that my shoes were getting soaking wet…and covered in crabs…I set a long exposure, and this is what I got.

    No. 4 – Making the job easy

    Cousin Nick
    Cousin Nick

    I think my dream job would be to take candid portraits of people, where they didn’t know I was there and so I got perfect, unscripted, unprompted moments. Unfortunately, this is also pretty much a perfect description of a stalker. So for the time being, I think my dream job would be taking portraits of people who are as easy to work with as Nick. I had some ideas, he had some ideas and he was 100% willing to commit to all of them. As a result I got some of the best portraits I’ve ever shot. But I think this is my favourite as it actually captures how easy-going Nick is. There’s a genuine smile that’s also in his eyes…and of course there’s that beard…that beard. There are three certainties in life; death, taxes…and me never, ever being able to grow a beard like that.

    No. 5  –  Nhillbilly nights

    Yurts and space
    Yurts and space

    One of the things with a long-exposure shot, is that you press the button to open the shutter and then wait 30 seconds for the camera to take the shot…then wait another 30 seconds while it gets rid of the noise, and then after a minute of sitting in the dark and cold an image appears on the screen of the camera and you see what you’ve captured. Sometimes you look and realise that you’ve got the camera slightly tilted, or that you’ve cropped something out (it’s so dark that you can’t see anything on the viewfinder while you’re looking through it) or that the camera has moved during the exposure and everything is blurry. And so you sigh, make a few adjustments and try your luck again.
    But sometimes you look at the screen and you see something like this, and you know you’ve captured something special! That orange glow to the left of the frame is the moon rising. That light inside the yurt was so soft, that I could only just see it with my naked eye…but on a 30 second exposure, suddenly it looks amazing. And the fact that the milky-way is rising from the top of the yurt? Well to be honest…that was just good luck…but I’ll claim full credit for it anyway.

    No. 6 –  Shaz and Lofty

    Shaz and Lofty
    Shaz and Lofty

    This the the shower block on Sharon and Lofty’s farm. It’s all exposed timber and corrugated iron, and as soon as I walked in I knew I wanted to get a shot here. It had textures and colours and light and shadows…in other words, it had everything a photographer could want. Yet my favourite thing about this photo is that the setting plays second fiddle to the bride and groom. Your eye can look almost anywhere in this photo and pick up little details…but it will always return to how naturally happy and excited the newlyweds look.

    No. 7 – The country wedding

    2016-top-16-7
    The country wedding

    I think that this is my favourite photo of the year. I love how Australian it looks. I love the story it tells. I love the lights and the shadows. I love the lady resting her arm on the pram, the boy listening to the speeches but also putting a reassuring hand on the dog. I also love that by this stage I had taken photos of the bride and groom, I had taken photos of people watching the bride and groom, but taking photos of people looking at the people watching the bride and groom…that’s pretty meta.
    Upgrading to the Fuji X-T1 was a really big decision. But I simply couldn’t have got this shot on my old gear. So this photo reminds me that sometimes taking the plunge pays off.

    No. 8 – Water torture

    Autumn raindrops
    Autumn raindrops

    I’m sure that if I had simply gone outside and snapped a quick photo of a raindrop falling and it looked like this…it probably wouldn’t have made the cut. But I know that I spent at least an hour in the drizzle just waiting to capture the moment one of these drops fell. As you can see from this shot, there were plenty of raindrops to choose from, but by the time you had the tripod set up and you had got the focus dialled in…it would have dropped, so then you would choose another one, but then while you were waiting for that one, three other ones would drop and you would curse yourself for not choosing one of them…then the wind would blow, moving the vine and getting the raindrop out of focus…or it would drop and you were just a split second too late.
    Needless to say, I did a lot swearing at rain-drops on that day.
    Now let’s never mention it again.

    No. 9 – Solar plexus

    On the beach in Queensland
    On the beach in Queensland

    OK this is going to get a tad technical. But on my first attempt at getting this shot I had the camera on autofocus. I got myself in position, pressed the button halfway to arm the autofocus in the middle of the shot, and then got Josh to run and jump off a ledge across in front of the Sun. He was wearing a hat,  and he was doing this awesome ‘airwalk’ with his legs…so he looked like something halfway between Michael Jackson and a skater. Brilliant!
    Except of course that I’d set the focus before he was in shot…and so the camera had focussed on whatever was in the middle of the shot then…at best it was that boat travelling through…at worst the horizon. Either way, Josh was completely out of focus and the shot looked pretty crap. So this time I got Josh to stand exactly where I wanted him to be for the shot, I focussed on him manually then got him to run and jump off the embankment again. This time he was in focus…and I was pretty happy with my timing as I managed to get him just as passed the sun. Admittedly I was trying to get him as he blocked the sun…but I think this actually looks better!

    No. 10 – The pier at Hervey Bay

    Hervey Bay
    Hervey Bay

    As part of my Lightroom workflow I will add a star rating to all of my photos. Basically a ‘5’ is a photo that I am over the moon about (I probably shoot about 10 of these over the year), a ‘4’ is one that I am really happy with and I know will be a solid photo once I’ve worked on it, a ‘3’ is one that I need to look at again, and if I don’t like it on the second viewing, I’ll delete it…I don’t do ‘1’ or ‘2’ stars as they are automatically deleted.
    This photo was a ‘3’. Even on a second viewing I couldn’t decide if I liked it. I took quite a few similar photos, and on this evening the sunset had set the sky ablaze with colour. In this shot the colours were just a bit washed out as I had gone for a 2 second exposure and it was all a bit bright…but I really liked the framing, and I really liked the people on the pier, the footprints in the sand. So this photo lived on my computer as a rare ‘3’ star photo. When I got back home from the trip I looked at the photo again and decided to try it as a black and white…it worked so well that it now adorns one of our walls.
    You really need to have some rules about how you cull your photos, or you will end up with a hard-drive full of average photos…but you also need to be able to bend those rules occasionally so that you have time to give photos a second chance.

    No. 11 – Family photo

    Family photo among the Kauri Pines at Paronella Park
    Family photo among the Kauri Pines at Paronella Park

    I’m quietly confident that there are more photos of Yeti’s than there are of our family together. I also took a photo earlier in the trip, but I feel that in this shot you can see that we had bonded as a family over the two weeks of camper van life…and our tans are a lot better.
    Take that Yetis!

    No. 12 – Black and White beauty

    Black and White beauty
    Black and White beauty

    I can boss relative strangers around in order to get a shot that I want, I can tell clients to do whatever they want and I’ll usually be pleasantly surprised by their response, I can tell myself that a photo of a friend or family member doesn’t have to be perfect…after all, it’s just a photo that you’re doing for them.
    But I can’t do any of that with Katie. Every direction, every gesture, every request and every reply carries with it the weight of a near 20yr relationship, a 14yr marriage, ups, downs, trials & tribulations, kids, jobs, wins and losses. So getting a photo that captures everything that you love about someone that has been an integral part of nearly half your life, with all of that history between you is no mean feat. But I reckon this one does it, and does it well.

    No. 13 – Uncle Jack Charles

    Uncle Jack Charles
    Uncle Jack Charles

    To be brutally honest, I think it would be pretty hard to take a bad photo of Uncle Jack Charles. The hair, the beard, the boundless energy, the infectious laugh, the incredible story, the stagecraft…it’s all a photographers dream. So the challenges become; manufacturing an opportunity and trying to come up with something original. I know I took some photos that were better, but they were photos I felt I’d seen of him before.
    This one felt original.
    I know this is insanely trainspottery…but it’s actually that tiny reflection in his right eye that I love the most.

    14 – Django and the Spotted Mallard

    The Spotted Mallard
    The Spotted Mallard

    One of things I’ve been trying really hard to do this year is to look at the whole frame and make sure everything works. It’s often really easy to see what you want to shoot and simply take a photo of it, then when you look at it later you realise that you’ve cropped out half of a person, or you’ve got a whole lot of unnecessary space at the top of the picture when there was stuff happening at the bottom that would have really added to the story that you were trying to tell. So in this shot, obviously Django is the star. But I also wanted to show the audience watching on (I love the guys hand on the back of the person next to him…it speaks volumes about how relaxed and supportive the room was), and I wanted to show the incredible ambience of the Spotted Mallard (the mirrors reflecting the natural light, the candelabras, the myriad lamp-shades), and I wanted to get all of those sodding ducks on the curtain behind him in the shot. In the end I had to position myself pretty much behind the bar to get the shot…but I was so happy when I got this shot.

    No. 15 – BMX bandit

    BMX at Fed Square
    BMX at Fed Square

    If nothing else, I want my photos to be a document of our family. Right now, Josh rides his BMX pretty much every day. In a year’s time he may shooting his own YouTube videos about BMX, or he may have moved on to something else entirely, but I would hate for this year of obsession to have gone undocumented. So Josh and I headed into Melbourne to take some photos of him in action. I really love this photo for a few reasons. One, I realised that the sunlight reflecting off the windows of a nearby building and illuminating the set of stairs would be enough to shoot a fast shutter speed and capture him mid-descent. Two, in order to capture this I had to break with my usual approach of ‘don’t draw attention to yourself’. If the the 10yr old on the BMX doesn’t care who’s watching…then the 40yr old taking photos shouldn’t either. Three, I love that despite being in the city there is only one other person in the shot…and they are looking at Josh. Four, and this is probably most important, we printed this picture onto a large canvas, and Josh has it beside his bed.

    No. 16 – The turning point of the 8in8in8

    'The pain won't last..'
    ‘The pain won’t last..’

    I’ve written about this photo before…but for those late to the party. The man on the left is Craig Percival. He was my coach for the Melbourne Ironman, and had brought me onboard to document his attempt to become the first person ever to compete an Ironman (3.8km swim/180 bike ride/ 42.2km run) in all 8 Australian States and Territories, in 8 consecutive days (the 8in8in8). The man on the right is John Maclean. John was a triathlete who was hit by a truck while out training and became a paraplegic. He went on to become the first ever wheelchair athlete to complete the Kona Ironman (the world championship race in Hawaii) and was a massive inspiration to Craig.
    This was day 6 of the 8in8in8, and Craig had finished the previous day’s Ironman in Canberra so late that his crew had driven through the night to get him to Sydney to start his 6th Ironman. I’m not sure what someone who has done 5 Ironman’s in 5 days and has slept for about 1.5 hours in the car is meant to look like as they stare down the barrel of having to do it all again…but Craig looked like it. He looked broken.
    His crew had let me know that they were going to pull the pin on the event, he simply couldn’t go on. But then Craig saw John, and saw that 3 x World Ironman Champion Craig Alexander had come down to join him for the swim…so he reluctantly agreed to do the swim (from memory his words were ‘Ah shit…how can I say ‘no’?’)
    This photo was taken just after the swim, when Craig was getting a massage and having his battered feet attended to. John had basically come over to tell Craig that it was OK it he wanted to pull the pin, people would understand…but by the same token ‘the pain won’t last, but the memories will’. I honestly believe this was a turning point for the whole 8in8in8.
    I love this shot because you can see the steely determination in John’s eyes, the full eye-contact with Craig, you can see that he was learning to walk again and had left his wheelchair behind to come and show Craig that anything is possible, there’s nothing staged or fake, it is just a moment of honesty.
    Tragically Craig died from complications after knee surgery in December, if you’d like to learn more about him and possibly give a donation to help his family, please head to https://www.gofundme.com/helpcraigpercivalsfamily

    So there you go…my top 16 photos for 2016. If I could draw any overarching themes they would be; I sure am a sucker for black and white, I take better photos when I’m travelling and putting myself out of my comfort zone, and thank god for kids who are still willing to have their photo taken.

    Now onwards to 2017!

  • 8 portrait tips…and a request.

    8 portrait tips…and a request.

    On the 14th of December last year I purchased a brand new camera, on the 30th of December I took a photo of friend who was about to announce to the world his plan to do 8 Ironmans in 8 days in the eight States and Territories of Australia. His name was Craig Percival, and he was kind enough to have me film a documentary about his attempt to become the first person to ever complete what became known as the 8in8in8.

    craig-2
    The photo of Craig Percival

    On the 14th of December this year I was staring at the at that same photo I had taken of Craig, but this time it was in a booklet that had been handed out at his funeral. At age 45 he died from a blood clot while recovering from an operation on his knee.
    Amidst the tragedy and senselessness of his death, the photographer in me was actually really proud that his family had chosen a photo that I had taken to represent the person he was. I felt that in a very small way I had done something to help…and now I’m asking for you to do something to help.
    A page has been set up to help the family that Craig left behind, and I would love for you to put some money towards it. But I feel it’s only fair that I give you a little something in return…so in keeping with the theme of 8in8in8…here are 8 tips that I’ve learnt about taking portraits, and how they relate to the photo I took of Craig.

    1. Us and them

    I’m sure there are people out there whose public persona is actually a 100% reflection of the person they are. For the rest of us we are walking a constant dichotomous tightrope between the person we are, and the person we want people to think we are. We normally keep this bubbling away under the surface, but a portrait photo is a weird time when a single image is going to conspicuously identify who we are, and so as the photographer you have to decide which incarnation of the person you want to capture. If you capture the person they want to project, then you’ll probably miss the chance to capture something honest or slightly flawed…but then again, they’ll probably still want to talk to you after you publish the photos on social media. Alternatively, if you capture something a little more raw or candid, you will probably capture something that will get you a dozen likes on Instagram/Flickr/500px…but you’re probably not going to get that ‘Thanks so much for taking my photo’ email that were hoping for…or perhaps more importantly that ‘I’m going to recommend you to my friends’ email that you were hoping for.

    Man in a hat.
    Man in a hat.

    So my simple answer, is shoot both. Start by getting a few traditional shots of them smiling in a traditional pose…then move on to a couple of shots where you can try to capture a break in the facade. Maybe give them prop, maybe move them into a space where they are really comfortable, but do what you can to try and capture an unguarded moment.

    nick-portrait-65
    Man with bananas

    Craig actually has an easy smile…but he’s not someone who will flash a Hollywood smile on cue. So I made a few jokes and then as I delivered the punch-line on the last one, I snapped as soon as I saw him start to smile.

    2. Everything is awesome

    If you are taking photos of famous people or unashamed extroverts, then you’re probably not reading this blog. The rest of us are taking photos of people who really don’t want to be having their photo taken…they may want the end product…but they’d rather not go through the process of getting there. So if they’re feeling vulnerable and exposed, the last thing they need is you appearing out of your depth or annoyed.
    They will blink just as you take the shot, you will stuff up your exposure or your composition…but they don’t need to know any of that. You just need to keep saying ‘That was great! I’m going to grab another one of those’ or ‘That was perfect. Let’s try something a little different’. If you fill the room with positivity and encouragement, you’re going to get a much better photo.

    georgia-1
    Photographer, Georgia Haynes
    Of all the photos, I think this one carries the most weight.
    The first person I ever asked to pose for a portrait, Luke at the Cobbler’s Last.

    Shooting with a new camera I couldn’t for the life of me work out how to override the ‘preview’ mode on the EVF. In short, because I was shooting with a flash I had the shutter speed at about 1/160 which was really dark (but when I took the photo the flash would fire and the light the scene). The display on camera was showing me a preview of what the shot was going to look like but it couldn’t account for the flash, so I was basically looking at a black screen. Normally you just look through the optical viewfinder and see exactly what you can see with your naked-eye. But the Fuji X-T1 doesn’t have an optical viewfinder and so I was desperately hunting through menus trying fix the problem…all the while pretending that everything was going swimmingly. I eventually worked it out…and hopefully Craig was none the wiser.

    3. Flash

    My favourite thing when taking a portrait, is when you just capture a fleeting look or moment. You can’t ask someone to pose and give you that look…it’s just something that happened organically. That’s why I love using a flash for my portraits, it gives you the chance to freeze a moment. Now clearly, I’m not talking about the pop-up flash on your camera, I’m talking about some sort of off-camera flash…and ideally some sort of diffusion like an umbrella or soft-box. And yes I’m sure you can do the same thing with a quick enough shutter speed. But as someone who swore black and blue that I would never use a flash…I love using a flash in portraits, and I know that my best photos have been taken using one.
    If you don’t have a flash (and realistically you’re looking at hundreds of dollars to get a flash, and triggers, and diffusers) then just hire one with some equipment for a weekend and have a go. It will only cost about $70 to hire a flash, stand, umbrella and triggers, and you’ll learn a hell of a lot. For bonus points, download the OneLight video from Zack Arias.

    hull_brown-boys_web-40

    Sir James,
    Sir James,

    I picked up some second-hand strobes and gear for about $200, and the photo I took of Craig was the first time I’d used it.

    4. Something to do

    One of my favourite things to do while watching the news or current affairs is try to guess what direction was given to the person on camera for cutaway footage. For example ‘OK, just walk over to that book case and take out a book’ or ‘just walk past the camera and sit down at the chair’ or even ‘just walk towards the camera’. If you ask an actor to do this, they will nail it. If you ask a normal person to do it, they will look like a very unconvincing version of themselves doing something unconvincing. Why? Because they’re over-thinking it. If you could look inside their minds there would an inner-monologue yelling ‘OK left foot then right foot…No wait…right foot then…no, I was right the first time…left foot then left foot – OH GOD WE’VE FALLEN OVER!!!’
    It’s the same with a portrait shot. Tell a person to ‘just look natural’ and they will spend the next five minutes trying to work out where their hands would be if they were being natural. So wherever possible, give them something to do, whether it’s looking down and then looking up to the camera, or rubbing their hands, or playing with a prop…just give them something that can briefly distract them from the fact that you’re taking a photo of them.

    nick-portrait-55 softbox-13

    Dad Portrait-33

    While shooting these photos of Craig I actually gave him a pull-bouy to throw up in the air and I took a couple of photos of that, which looked pretty cool and really got him thinking about something other than being photographed.

    craig-4

    5. Ask

    For me the pressure of taking a portrait shot, is nothing compared with the pressure of asking someone if you can take their portrait. To a large extent you are saying ‘If  you give me your time/money, I’ll make you look good’. Which is a pretty big promise. But even in these days of selfies and endless photos on social media…people still rarely have a nice digital distillation of themselves. After all, selfies invariably end up looking everyone else’s (person at an arm’s length away from the camera looking at the screen instead of the camera)…and friends will quite happily post of photo where they look great, and you look like balls. So don’t be afraid to take the plunge and go and ask someone if you can take their photo. You’ve got a 100% better chance of taking a great photo if you do than if you don’t. Oh, and the people who say ‘no’ are probably hiding something 😉

    photo-course-1
    Photographer, Eddie Jim

    With Craig, I didn’t ask him in advance as I figured if I’d said ‘Can you come around for a video shoot and then some photos?’ it would seem like too much of an undertaking. Instead I set up the soft-box in advance (if you look in the background of the shot where Craig walks towards the camera you can actually see the soft-box set up in the background), and then when we had finished the video  I said ‘Would you mind if I just grab a couple of shots, so that you’ve got some photos for the website.’ Talking on a video is more stressful than standing and having your photo taken…so he probably figured he had already done the hard yards…and besides, what did he have to lose? If he didn’t like the photos, he just wouldn’t use them.
    In the end he used that shot on pretty much all of his web and social media content.

    6. Take inspiration

    You have so many options at your disposal when it comes to taking a photo. There are endless combinations of shutter speed, aperture and ISO…and that’s before you’ve even started composing the shot, or getting someone to pose or choosing a lens. So don’t be afraid to find something that you like, and then try to emulate it. I’m not saying you should make a career out of ripping off other photographers, but when  you’re starting out…or if you’re in a creative rut, don’t be afraid to experiment and try to work out how they get the shots that you like. A friend of mine (Eli Mrkusich) introduced me to the work of Alain Laboile and I had a great time trying to recreate it with my kids…albeit without the French countryside…or the incredible light he captures…or his endless creativity…or his…look, let’s just say we were not only not in the same ball-park, but not even really playing the same sport. But it was fun, and photography should be fun!

    cooling-down-4

    With the photo of Craig I think I was trying to be somewhere between David Hobby and Zack Arias.

    7. B&W

    Friend, and fellow X-T1 enthusiast, Luke Vesty and I often have the same discussion where we have done a black and white execution of a shot and a colour execution…we feel that the black and white one is better, while our wives think the colour is better. We reassure each other that of course we’re right (and on top of that we’re brilliant photographers…and remarkably good husbands), but I do think that a lot of photographers have a weak-spot for black and white. It’s probably because growing up, the photos that had the biggest impact were black and white and so we are subconsciously trying to replicate them (it will be interesting to see if in 20 years time there are vast swathes of photographers with a weak-spot for the Instagram filter ‘Juno’). Whatever the reason, I love using black and white in portraits…and with a digital camera I don’t even have to be brave and commit to shooting on black and white film…I can just press ‘black and white’ in Lightroom! But going with black and white does also give you a lot of options in terms of pushing the contrast or colour balance without having to worry about someone’s skin tones suddenly looking like an Oompa-loompa.
    I also think it adds a lot of gravity and sincerity to a shot. Seeing as I lack that in myself…I like to try to pretend I have it by putting it in my photos.

    Boy on train
    Boy on train

    The photo of Craig actually worked really well in colour (as it was primarily a black t-shirt on a white background anyway)…but as this was the first time I’d used my new flash equipment I hadn’t learned how to angle the infra-red trigger away from the person in the shot…and so there was a horrible red cast over Craig and the wall behind him was a little bit pink. But you know what lets you hide amateur-hour mistakes you’ve made with colours? Black and white! So, black and white it was.

    8. Change it up

    There have been plenty of times when I’ve found a shot that I like, and then I’ve just fired off multiple versions of that shot. If I have half an hour with a person, I might take pretty much the same photo for 25 minutes, and then try something different for the last five minutes. Yet when I start working on the photos in post, it is invariably one of the photos where I’ve done something different that ends up being my favourite.
    So by all means, take the shot that you’re comfortable with, but then change the lens, or shoot from up high, or from below the eyeline of the person, or change your orientation from portrait to landscape. Whatever it is, just think differently and make a change. You may not get a better photo, but you will learn, and you will keep your subject engaged and active.

    uncle-jack-charles-10
    Uncle Jack Charles
    daylesford-6
    A Daylesford woodland nymph
    joel-strickland-2
    Motorsport photographer Joel Strickland
    qld-trip-227
    Some random beautiful woman in Queensland

    With Craig I did dance a little between a 35mm and a 56mm lens…and I reckon while the landscape version of his head and shoulders shot was the winner for the day…this portrait 3/4 shot could have been…if I’d only paid a bit more attention to not cropping out half of his hand!

    craig-3

    So there you have it, 8 tips on taking better portraits. If you’ve learnt anything from this post…or if you’re just a decent human being…then please donate to the GoFundMe page.  https://www.gofundme.com/helpcraigpercivalsfamily

    percivals-5 percivals-4 percivals-2

    Over the course of the 8in8in8 I got to spend some time with Lindell, Sam & Sienna and I know the hole that will be left in their lives by Craig’s death. While we can never replace their loss, we can always do our bit to help out.

    Thanks,

    Chris.

  • A final thank you to Craig Percival

    A final thank you to Craig Percival

    Last week I received the shock news that a man that I admired and considered a friend had suffered a heart-attack. At the back on my mind was always a fear that he may die, but this was Craig Percival, he’d done 8 Ironmans in 8 days in the 8 States and Territories of Australia…he was invincible. So numerous times over the last week I’ve refreshed my email in the hope of seeing a message that started ‘Great news everyone…’, knowing that from there another story of Craig’s endurance would begin.
    Instead I opened my email this afternoon to find a message that began ‘It is with the heaviest of hearts…’ and I momentarily resisted opening it, in the hope that I could delay inevitable, but I couldn’t. One of the most amazing people I had ever met had passed away, and it broke my heart.
    Craig coached me for nearly 15 months to the completion of my first Ironman. He also got me on board to film a documentary about the 8in8in8. During that time we would communicate every week, whether through email, text or phone…and not once did he say ‘Chris, you know what the best thing for you to do is? Wallow in self-pity.’ So I can’t imagine he wants me to start now. Instead I want to focus on the amazing things that he did. Because we need a lot more people like Craig in the world, and at the moment, we’re one down.

    ‘Not only can do, but did do’

    In a world where people are too scared to tackle the seemingly impossible, Craig was willing to commit 100%. Not only that, but if you were looking to do something seemingly impossible, then he would commit himself 100% to that as well.
    We need to keep this alive, because that sort of dedication and enthusiasm is contagious…and we seem to be surrounded by an ever increasing number of ‘seemingly impossible’ things.

    This group of kids cheered Craig's every lap.
    This group of kids cheered Craig’s every lap.

    A family man

    Craig was fiercely devoted to his kids. He often told me that the thing that he used as a motivator for when he was doing a really hard run set in his preparation for the 8in8in8 was the thought of him running over the last hundred meters of the last marathon with Lindell and the kids.
    One of the most beautiful moments of the 8in8in8 was when he was reunited with his kids before the final swim in Melbourne. Like a prizefighter he taken so many punches and hits over the preceding 7 days and still stayed on his feet, but a hug from his daughter nearly nearly overpowered him.
    He was also part of an incredible team with Lindell. There were so many times during the 8in8in8 when it looked like it was just them against the world, and instead of relenting, they took strength from each other and overcame. It was amazing to watch.

    60kms into the 180 ride,and still a marathon after that. Sometimes the only person who can support you is the person who knows you best
    60kms into the 180 ride,and still a marathon after that. Sometimes the only person who can support you is the person who knows you best

    8in8in8-tmsm-13

    Inspiration

    You can’t fake inspiration, and Craig was just inspirational. I don’t know how many marathons, 70.3 and Ironmans he had coached people to…but it would be thousands. And every one of those people had been inspired by Craig and in turn has no doubt inspired other people.
    I met Greg McDermott and April Gillies on the Sydney leg of the 8in8in8 and Greg recently rode around Australia with April providing support. They walked along the Cronulla foreshore into the wee hours of the night to support Craig…but I also feel that they got a boost of inspiration for what they were looking to embark on. Peter Wheatley did 30 marathons in 30 days. Ailie Coulter did the Ultraman world champs. These are people who have been inspired by Craig, and who in turn have inspired me.
    So please, if you can do one thing in memory of Craig, inspire people. Make people feel good about themselves and see what they can achieve.

    percivals-8

    Giving

    When I did the Melbourne marathon, Craig was there yelling on support, when I did Shepparton 70.3, he was there, giving me a wetsuit fitting that was worth at least five minutes in the swim, at Ironman Melbourne he jogged along with me and when I said ‘I just vomited blood’…he said ‘Bonus!’ He raised over $100K for the John Maclean Foundation, and even in death he gave his organs so that other people might have a second chance at life.
    In a world where more and more people want to take more than they give…it’s those who give that we remember.

    I was so proud of being part of the 8in8in8. I felt so privileged to have been let into the inner-sanctum with Lindell, Kate, Grant, Ginny and everyone else, and to spend time with Sam and Sienna. I don’t want to dwell on the hurt, because I know that there are people hurting a lot more than me, but Craig, your loss is a brutal reality that hasn’t even sunk in yet.
    Just know that you have built an incredible family of athletes, and we will rally around Lindell and the kids. Not just now, but for as long as they need us, and know that you have changed my life with both my Ironman and the 8in8in8, and I will be eternally grateful.

    Your friend,

    Chris.

    P.S If anyone reading this would like to support Craig’s wife and kids, please head here and give generously https://www.gofundme.com/helpcraigpercivalsfamily

  • The 4-day week

    The 4-day week

    At the start of this year I made the decision to cut-back my work at DHHS to four days a week so that I could spend one day a week focusing on my creative endeavors and my video and photography business.  After nearly pulling the pin on it in July…I’m sticking with taking the Wednesdays off for at least the rest of the year, here are a few things I’ve learnt.

    The upsides

    There has been roughly a 500% increase in the number of mid-week roast dinners. KPI’s around the cleanliness of the kitchen, and laundry that needs to be done have been smashed, and being able to do a mid-week market shop makes meal planning a lot easier.
    It has also been fantastic spending more time with Xavier as he watches me clean the kitchen, hang out clothes and do the market shop. It’s both every 40yo man’s and every 5yo boy’s dream!

    I have been able to work on three projects that I otherwise wouldn’t have been able to.

    I won’t lie, there is something intrinsically wonderful about only working in 2 day stints. It means that every day is either a Monday or Friday…unless it’s a Wednesday, in which case, it’s a weekend!!!

    The downsides

    While my domestic duties KPI’s may be being smashed…the scoreboard for creative endeavors is less impressive:
    Number of blog posts written = 0
    Number of portraits done = 0
    Number of podcasts recorded = 0

    As for the business, while it has been awesome to be able to do the few photo jobs and one video job…thus far they have paid about 20% of the money I would have made if I had just worked the Wednesdays at my normal job.
    On the positive side to this I currently have outstanding invoices (from jobs I have done on my weekends) that will take me to well over 50% of what I would have earned at my normal job…but an unpaid invoice, while providing some level of comfort, is of absolutely no use when you need to pay for petty little things like food. In fact, on the day before my last payday by my 4-day  week employer, the money I had in the bank was 0.03% of what I had in outstanding invoices. They’re the sorts of numbers that would make an accountant or financial planner weep. *On this, I do have a few clients who pay me the day after I invoice them, and I love those people from the bottom of my heart. But the rest of them…WTF?! You have your videos…pay your invoices!!!*

    On top of that, running the business as an actual business means you have to do boring things like pay for business insurance. But as I’ve discovered, this is not in fact boring, as you get to enter a bizarro world where people come up with elaborate reasons as to why they can’t take your money.
    I decided to get in contact with the insurance company that looks after our home insurance as I thought I might be able to swing a discount (I won’t say the company’s name…but let’s just say you’re “lucky” to be with them…and their name sounds the same as a girls name…and it’s AAMI…shit, this discretion thing is hard!) Here is how the conversation went:

    AAMI: AAMI business insurance how can I help?
    Me: I’d like to insure my business so that if any of my gear gets stolen then it’s covered. I’ve got my home and contents insurance with you, but I understand that if I’m using my gear for any sort of business then it’s not covered.
    AAMI: That’s correct. What sort of work do you do.
    Me: Photography…
    AAMI: Yes
    Me: and video.
    AAMI: Oh…do you do any directing with your video?
    Me: Well I have to tell people where to sit or stand, and sometimes I have to get them to do things like walk into a room or do whatever it is that the video is about.
    AAMI: Well I’m afraid we can’t cover you.
    Me: What?
    AAMI: I’m sorry but if you do any directing then we can’t cover you.
    Me: But I tell people what to do with the photography as well, is that a problem?
    AAMI: No…but we can’t cover you if you do it for video.
    Me: But that’s insane…I mean-
    AAMI: I’m sorry but that is our policy.
    Me: It’s just that-
    AAMI: but we do have a subsidiary company that will cover you, would you like me to put you through to them?
    Me: Um…sure.

    CGU: Hello, how can I help?
    Me: I’d like to get some business insurance?
    CGU: Is there a reason you’re calling about this?
    Me: I’d like to get insurance to cover my equipment.
    CGU: But nothing’s happened that makes you want to have to do it suddenly?
    Me: No…I just…I called AAMI and they put me through to you.
    CGU: What sort of business do you do?
    Me: Photography and video
    CGU: OK, I’ll put you through to a consultant.
    CGU: Hello, how can I help?
    Me: I want to insure my photography and video business.
    CGU: Do you do any directing with the video?
    Me: Yes, but..
    CGU: Well I’m afraid we can’t cover you.
    Me: But I was put through to you by AAMI because you could cover me. Besides the only direction I do is filming what people do in their day-to-day lives…there’s nothing dangerous.
    CGU: Sorry, but we don’t cover that.
    Me: This sounds insane…
    CGU: I’ll just check with my supervisor.
    *Hold music*
    CGU: Yep, we can’t cover you. I mean if your client asked you to hang off a cliff or jump out of a plane, then you would have to.
    Me: What?! No I wouldn’t.
    CGU: Well, you would.
    Me:
    CGU:
    Me:
    CGU: I can give you the name of an insurance broker who might be able to help.
    Me: *sigh*

    Honest to God…it was like being a 5 year old and being yelled at by a parent/teacher for doing something your friend told you to do and being asked ‘If Marcus told you to jump off a cliff, would you?!’…except in this case the assumption seems to be that an additional 35 years of life experience has lead me to a place where the assumption is that I would in fact jump off the cliff!

    If this were a world where money wasn’t a concern…then the decision to go to 4 days was a masterstroke. But unfortunately, we are not. So the questions become, ‘What is the value of all the non-financial benefits that taking the day off-brings?’, and ‘Is it enough to balance everything out?’ At this stage I would say that it’s a line-ball decision, but probably sustainable…so long as we don’t get offered free accommodation in France and start planning a family jaunt to Europe…I mean, that’d be pretty stupid.

  • Two out of three ain’t bad

    Two out of three ain’t bad

    One of my favourite photographers, Zack Arias, was discussing a philosophy for whether to take a job. The philosophy wasn’t one that he came up with, but it’s one that he likes.
    There are three values; Good money, good people and good work…every job has to hit two of these values before it’s worth doing. The last two months have seen a really big increase in the amount of work I’m doing through my own business, and so suddenly I’ve had to look at my philosophy for doing work, if I can’t do it all, I need to know what to say ‘yes’ to and what to say ‘no’ to.
    About a month ago I was approached to do a job with a family friend, Don Palmer. The job was not as a photographer or editor or anything that I was working towards…but more as a location scout and general gopher for the shoot. We were going to be shooting for his organisation Malpa, there was a DOP (cameraman) on the job called Mark Tipple and the talent for the job would be Uncle Jack Charles. The money would be exactly $0.
    So I put the philosophy into action:

    Good money – Negative…but then again they may simply be getting what they pay for.

    Good people – I’ve know Don for nearly 20 years…and Katie has known him her whole life. He’s just a thoroughly decent person who I would happily donate my time to whenever he asks. The DOP (Mark Tipple) is insanely good with both stills and video, and Uncle Jack Charles is well…Uncle Jack Charles.

    Good work – The video we were shooting was for indigenous kids who had been chosen to be taught traditional and western medical practices that they could take back to their communities. Which is a pretty amazing cause.
    I haven’t worked on a video shoot where people who actually know what they’re doing are in charge for a long time…and I haven’t worked with an actual actor for even longer. Plus, if I bring along my camera there is every chance I’ll be able to get a few photos in between takes.

    So no money, but brilliant people and amazing work…I said ‘yes’ to the job.

    uncle-jack-charles-3

    Heart vs wallet

    Working in a creative field is always a bit weird when it comes to getting paid. I can’t imagine many people would say to their electrician ‘I’ve got this great idea for a house…but I haven’t got any money for it…could you do the electrical work for me, and then everyone will see how great you are as an electrician and so you will get lots of work from referrals?’ But if you do something creative people tend to think that seeing as you’re enjoying yourself, then you probably don’t really need to get paid. After all, they hate their job…that’s why they get paid.

    At the same time, a lot of really great projects will simply never get off the ground unless people chip in to help out. So where do you draw the line? If you only go where the money is you will be creatively suffocated…if you only go where the lovely ideas are…you will be out of business within 6-months.

    I’m sure you’ve seen this…but it applies nicely to photography and video work as well

    So with the beauty of hindsight, did I make the right call?

    Pros

    I got to watch a really good DOP in action which was a bit like getting a two hour masterclass for free.

    Mark Tipple in action...my camera smelled like smoke for a week, so I shudder to think what his smelled like!
    Mark Tipple in action…my camera smelled like smoke for a week, so I shudder to think what his smelled like!

    I got to watch a world class actor in action. Speaking as someone who spends most of his time filming either politicians or people who are not used to being in front of a camera. It was a revelation to watch someone who can nail a script time and time again, who can read with the pacing, inflection and timing that makes you feel as though they are speaking to you, rather than reading someone else’s words, and who brought so much energy to what he was doing.

    Craftsmanship
    Craftsmanship

    I got to introduce Josh to the world of being on a film-set. There is a weird alchemy that occurs on a film set when the cast and crew are happily working towards the same goal, and Josh got to live that first hand…and meet Uncle Jack Charles who had seen in ‘Pan‘ just the week before.

    Not quite sure who is more excited to meet who.
    Not quite sure who is more excited to meet who.

    I got to take advantage of someone else’s lighting set up and take photos of someone as engaging and enigmatic as Uncle Jack Charles.

    Am I devastated that I missed the focus on his eyes...yes, yes I am.
    Am I devastated that I missed the focus on his eyes…yes, yes I am.
    uncle-jack-charles-9
    Watching Uncle Jack was like witnessing a force of nature. He was relentlessly engaging.

    uncle-jack-charles-12 uncle-jack-charles-10

    Cons

    I missed swim squad…and suffered like a dog the next week.

    Conclusion

    The Gillian Welch song ‘Everything is Free‘ (a song about artists giving away their work because “we’re gonna do it anyway, even if it doesn’t pay”) rebounds in my head every time I’m asked to do a job for nothing. But I would hate to become the sort of person who passes up the opportunity to work on an amazing project like this…and with people like Don, Mark and Uncle Jack.
    Some experiences are priceless.

    A moment of contemplation
    A moment of contemplation
  • Life begins at 35mm

    Life begins at 35mm

    There’s a great moment in an episode of the Simpsons where Groundskeeper Willie solemnly whispers to his tractor ‘Were it not a violation of God’s law, I’d make you my wife’. Such is his love for this inanimate object.

    Willie

    Without wanting to scare you too much…I’m starting to feel the same way about my Fuji 35mm f1.4 lens.
    But why?! I hear absolutely none of you ask. Well here are a few of my reasons.

    Form

    I am quietly confident that whoever designed the X-T1 was doing it with the 35mm lens in mind. It just looks like it’s meant to be there. Whenever I have another lens on the body, it looks like exactly that, a lens on a body. But with the 35mm it just looks like a perfectly balanced camera.
    It’s also wonderfully unobtrusive. If you want to swan around announcing to the world that you’re a photographer and quite a big-deal, then a 5D with a 70-200mm does a wonderful job. But if you want to just blend in with your surroundings and keep people at ease, the 35mm is sublime.
    It also lets me live out the fantasy that I’m James Nachtwey or some other old-school photo journalist, trying to take that critical once in a lifetime shot, with only a few frames of film left on the roll…when in fact I’m just another Dad taking a photo of his son riding a BMX down some stairs, and if any of the 38 photos I took didn’t work…I’ll just make him do it again.

    BMX-1

    Function

    Want to shoot some portraits? The 35mm will knock them out of the park.

    Man in a hat.
    Man in a hat.
    Boy on train
    Boy on train

    Want to shoot some landscapes? Again the 35mm will do the job.

    Sunset
    Sunset
    The lure
    The lure

    Want to take a photo of your wife and son running on a giant hamster wheel at night time? Ok…that seems a bit left of centre…but sure!

    Hamster wheeling
    Hamster wheeling

    If you are after a travel lens, it is the one lens that I would take with me anywhere. If there’s such a thing as a ‘desert island lens’, this is it for me.

    Holiday
    Holiday
    Country wedding
    Country wedding

    But what about the 35mm f2 with weather sealing?

    Good question. If Fuji would like to send me one I’m happy to run a comparison…but until then, I’m happy as a clam with my f1.4. As Zack Arias says ‘There’s a little bit of magic in this lens!’

    In conclusion

    If you’re looking to make the move to Fuji, then this lens should be on your list of initial purchases. If you’re already a Fuji shooter and you have this lens, set yourself a challenge of shooting on it all day (you won’t be disappointed), and if you’re a Fuji shooter who doesn’t own this lens…well you need to take a long hard look at yourself…ideally through the glass of a 35mm f1.4 lens…that you’ve just purchased.

    Wedding getaway car
    Wedding getaway car
    Life's tough in Noosa
    Life’s tough in Noosa
    Flotsam
    Flotsam
    Blinded by the light
    Blinded by the light
    Bare-feet and wine
    Bare-feet and wine
    Sunset at Hervey Bay
    Sunset at Hervey Bay
    I love the 35mm this much!
    I love the 35mm this much!
  • Our first camper-vanning holiday

    Our first camper-vanning holiday

    Now I know that for a lot of you, when you hear my name the first thing you probably think is ‘rugged outdoorsman’ or ‘free spirit on a permanent road-trip of self discovery’ or ‘knows his way around an engine’, in other words a person perfectly suited to driving a camper-van for two weeks through Queensland. Then I’d say ‘I think you misheard me, I said “Chris Riordan”.’ And then you’d say, ‘Oh, I thought you said “Chris the Bearded One”. You said “Chris Riordan”?…Dear God, don’t let him anywhere near a camper-vanning holiday!!’
    Well it’s too late, I’ve just returned from my first ever family camper-vanning trip, and now I’m going to tell you about it.

    Britz_web-35
    Our home on wheels

    Britz_web-29

    Our trip

    So our family (2 x adults and 3 x kids) flew from Melbourne to Brisbane, then collected our campervan and drove for two weeks up to Cairns. We spent our first night in the driveway of a relative in Buderim, then travelled to Noosa for two nights, then on to Hervey Bay for two nights, 1770 for two nights, Airley Beach for 3 nights, Mackay for two nights (we parked the van outside and stayed with some friends in their house), then finally to Paronella Park for one night, before returning the van in Cairns the next day.
    In the interests of full disclosure, I will say that we hired the campervan through Britz, and that they reduced the price of the van hire by 35% in exchange for a video and some photos from our trip. But this blog was not part of that deal, so these are my own thoughts…untainted by financial gain, fear or favour.

    Driving the campervan

    The campervan is basically a VW truck that instead of having a large rectangle on the back to put things in…has a small house to put people in. So you are never going to beat anyone from a standing start at the lights, and if you’re going through a roundabout, allow for a lot of body-roll because the centre of gravity is remarkably high. But once you get out on the highway (which is where we did 90% of our driving) you’re laughing (metaphorically of course…if you laugh for 90% of your trip you will be exhausted…and possibly detained by local police.)
    If you’ve ever moved house and driven the removal van, then it’s pretty much the same. And if you’ve ever ridden a bike on the road, then you will know the feeling that every single other person who is not doing the same thing as you…wishes you were dead or off the road…or ideally, both. So when you come to a passing lane and you want to get around the campervan/caravan in front of you who has been travelling at 90kms p/h for the last half hour, resist the temptation to pull out and go around them…because I can guarantee that there will be 5 cars who will want to do it first, and who have a much better chance of getting up to speed and around before the passing lane cuts out.
    At the end of the day you are driving a big cumbersome vehicle, but at the literal end of the day, you get to park the big cumbersome vehicle and cook, sleep and bathe in it. So it’s a pretty sweet deal.

    Qld trip-112 Qld trip-39 Qld trip-12

    Cooking

    There was a stove with four gas burners and a grill…so we were set for everything from coffee and hot chocolate in the morning, to pasta and pizza at night. While I may have been a tad paranoid about serving up pasta so many times, the kids didn’t seem to care. We also cooked on the BBQ’s at the various caravan parks where we stayed about every 3rd night.

    Britz_web-9 Britz_web-3

    Toilet

    Yes there is a toilet on the van. But it’s best to see this as a last resort. If you’re a woman who can remember attending blue-light discos at the Macleod YMCA, you may remember seeing a skinny guy with greasy hair and Stussy pants who seemed to spending way too much time insisting the DJ play more Guns n Roses b-sides. You may remember looking at him at the start of the night and thinking ‘OK…I will try to kiss someone who I’m actually attracted to…but if by the end of the night nothing has happened…I’ll kiss that guy.’ Well that’s pretty much how you can view this toilet, it’s there and available…but there are plenty of better options available.

    Setting up and packing up

    You know those kids toys where you have to push the correct shape through the correct shape-sized hole? Well I think our first attempt at setting up the van must have looked a bit like two adults using one of those toys (‘Well I think that looks like it goes there. Hmmm, nope. Maybe if I just push it really hard?’) But once we had it sorted we were able to set up the van in about 15 minutes when we arrived at a caravan park. And our packing up took about 25 minutes.

    Intimacy

    Ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha ha haha ha! Tee hee hee hee hee! Bwah ha ha ha. Snort. Chuckle. Ho ho ho ha ha ha hee hee hee! Guffaw, guffaw, guffaw! LOL!
    Oh wait, did  you mean finding a newfound level of intimacy with your family as a result of spending so much time in close quarters…or finding intimacy with your partner? The latter. Thought so.
    Ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha ha haha ha! Tee hee hee hee hee! Bwah ha ha ha. Snort. Chuckle. Ho ho ho ha ha ha hee hee hee! Guffaw, guffaw, guffaw! LOL!
    Ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha ha haha ha! Tee hee hee hee hee! Bwah ha ha ha. Snort. Chuckle. Ho ho ho ha ha ha hee hee hee! Guffaw, guffaw, guffaw! LOL!

    No.

    Accomodation

    Clearly your accomodation is your camper-van…but you have to park it somewhere, and that is invariably a caravan park. Some caravan parks will have an amazing location (beach access for example), or great staff, or great toilets/showers or a combination of these. Thanks to the work of Katie, we were a bit sad to leave every place we stayed.
    We also got to meet some very interesting people. When we arrived at 1770 we had to do some driving that Ken Block would have been proud of to park the van in the designated spot. When we got out, a girl who was staying in a nearby van with her grandparents came over and offered to help us unpack our van. We said we were fine, so then she took the kids off on an adventure through the nearby bush. ‘Isn’t this nice’ we thought. Then a few hours later she knocked on the door of our van to show us the Python that she had just found in the toilet block. She was calmly holding it and offering us a go. ‘Are you sure it’s safe?’ we asked, to which she replied ‘It hasn’t bitten me yet.’ That ‘yet’ made me think that being bitten by snakes was a part of life to which she had simply adapted.

    Python-1 Britz_web-22 Britz_web-21

    Pros & Cons

    Pros
    We really started to gel as a family after the first couple of days. There is a sense that you’re in on a big adventure together, and that really brought us closer together.
    We did a LOT of walking, which was great for getting the kids sufficiently tired to go sleep each night.
    We got to see some amazing places that we wouldn’t have seen if we had flown, and we couldn’t have afforded to spend two weeks staying in hotels.

    Qld trip-64 Qld trip-48 Walking-1

    Cons
    There are plenty of times you will have things you want to do, that are 4-5kms away…and the thought of convincing a 4yo that a walk is a great idea seems like too much hard work. But the idea of packing up the entire van just to drive into town seems insane. It’s times like this that you wish you had a car.

    Our trip from Airlie Beach to Paronella Park ended up taking 8 hours. The night tour was at 6.15pm (and we were only there for one night), and we arrived at 5.30pm. So we desperately unpacked the van and started to cook dinner, with the goal of eating by 6pm and then making the tour in time. Then the van’s power fused…and it took 15 minutes to work our how to reset everything. So we had to do the tour on an empty stomach and then eat dinner at about 8.30pm.

    Reverse parking an enormous van in a confined space while caravan park yokels watch on after you’ve been driving for 6 hours, is every bit as much fun as it sounds.

    But would I do it again? Yep…in a heartbeat.

    Qld trip-18

    You can see some more photos here:

    Queensland//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js