The World

Ponte Veccio, Florence, Italy (left)

We visited Italy in 2005 on part 2 of our honeymoon - it was the compromise destination (My wife wanted to go to Sri Lanka, I wanted to go on an Antarctic cruise in a Russian Icebreaker.  Yep, Italy works!)  Florence was a massive contrast to the 2 other locations we'd spent time in beforehand - it was a hot, busy, noisy city packed with tourists, so finding places to escape to was a priority.  The south side of the city was far quieter with many beautiful public gardens worth visiting.  After spending the day exploring these, we'd worked our way to a perfect vantage point over the city with views over the Ponte Veccio as sunset approached.  It wasn't actually planned, but oh dear!  There was no way I was going anywhere! 

I spent over an hour taking photos of an increasingly spectacular sunset over Florence.  The clouds were perfect!  The view was perfect!  I still believe that it's the best sunset I've had the chance to capture, and having looked at the pictures afresh, there are a few more photos from that evening that deserve another look.  

The Rockies, Alberta, Canada (right)

Skiing is one of my passions - mostly because of the thrill of speeding down the side of a mountain, but also because of the scenery.  I'm mad enough to insist on the risky strategy of taking my "big camera" out skiing with me in a rucksack rather than shoving a little compact into a jacket pocket and making do with that.  I've also always wanted to visit the Canadian Rockies, so I jumped at the chance of a ski holiday with friends to Banff, visiting the famous resorts of Lake Louise, Sunshine Villiage and Mount Norquay in some of the most spectacular parts of the Rockies.    

I'd definitely class myself as a cold weather person, and at -23C, this was definitely a cold day on the mountain at Lake Louise!  Skiing conditions weren't perfect and there was some concern on arrival that the resort wouldn't open due to high winds, but the lifts opened an hour or so later.  The one benefit of the poor weather though was the dramatic and fast changing skies over the mountains!  

High Atlas Mountains, Morocco (left)

The High Atlas mountains were probably my highlight of our visit to Morocco in 2012 - a real contrast and change of pace to the previous few days in Marrakech!  

Whilst mountainous, the landscape was very arrid, although clearly shaped by water - I can imagine seasonal rains and snow melt would simply flood down the dry valleys, causing dramatic erosion in the sandstone bedrock such as this!