Inspiration For Longevity

Yes please, bring on the mist!  Once again, a never-ending thanks to Setsuko for taking me to the absolutely gorgeous Chinzanso Motel and Garden. It is truly out of this world! For us, the treats started after dinner with the evening illumination.  Rest assured that this is not a treat we will be able to do very often as this adventure was quite expensive, but worth it for the photography! That is one spectacular light show! As if that is not enough, the powers that be added a mist that typically rolls in at 10 minutes and 40 minutes after the hour.  I felt like I was in the London fog! The fun continued the next morning with a 7:10am mist showing. That was something else as it was so thick I could barely see more than 1-2 feet in front of me.  A true white-out like those I have experienced on the ski slopes! Now Setsuko is never one to rest on her laurels. For the grand finale, she took me to the Bunkyo Municipal Hosokawa Garden that is adjacent to the Chinzanso Mot...

I hope you enjoy these photos taken at the Ueno Zoo. What a great day of photography! The weather was gorgeous and the birds and animals were a pleasure to photograph. For many nature photographers, the ultimate challenge and experience is bird flight photography. It is definitely a numbers game as it takes me a lot of shots to get one or two that are really good. Mission accomplished as I think there are some good ones! While most of the animals are in contained areas, the birds in flight are wild birds. Many of those pictures were taken of the Japanese Cormorant. There is a huge pond in the zoo where the Cormorants are building nests. As they flew back and forth, I did my best to capture those birds in flight. So cool! This was my first significant opportunity to use my new 200-800 lens. Wow! For some of the shots, I used that lens with the 2x extender. That took the lens power to 1600! Both of the shots of the two Cormorants together were taken with that combination. As much as I lo...

  What an incredible day of photography in Ueno Park! Oh, my gosh! Thank you Setsuko! That place is truly amazing! What is also amazing is that there is more to see! The park has some fabulous museums in addition to the museum that houses the beautiful paintings I captured. There is also the Ueno Zoo! Next time!  Just as amazing is the fact that these were all taken with my iPhone 15 Pro Max. What is the world coming to???? As I think I mentioned before, I never cease to be amazed by the array of gorgeous sites in Japan. From the gardens, to the shrines, to the animals, to the buildings, to the colors, to the angles, to the statues, to the grave stones and to the shapes, this is truly a country made for photographers! We were fortunate as the weather could not have been much better. I guess we are living right! All the best! Bob