Reindeer

Group photo at Camp Millar, Bellsund, Spitsbergen

CURIOUS WHALE

Recently I had the opportunity to visit the 2011 Veolia Environnement Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition which is owned by the Natural History Museum and BBC Wildlife Magazine. Here is another photo from that exhibition.

PHOTO NOTES

It was first thing in the morning, just off Santa Catalina, when the call 'whale nine o'clock' came over the tannoy. Robert rushed on deck. He was on a whale-watching holiday in Baja California, Mexico, and had already had incredible encounters with humpbacks, blues, fins and greys. So he was primed and ready with his camera. Slicing through the velvet-smooth water towards the boat was a minke, which was not what they had expected. Minkes are uncommon in the region. Even more surprising, she seemed to want to make contact with the whale-watchers. For more than an hour, she played around the boat, sometimes rolling onto her side and looking up at the people craning over the side or going under the boat to dazzle them with underwater and surface blows. It was an unforgettable experience, crystallized in this photo, which reflects the grace and beauty of a mammal completely adapted to its marine environment.

Take time to savour the photo.  Enter it, as it were, with all your five senses: what do you see?  What do you hear?  What do you smell?  What do you taste?  What do you touch? [or, what touches you!]  Equipped with the photo and the title given by the artist, compose a short poem or prayer and share it with others in the "comments" section of this blog.