On Sunday 19 May 2013, our third 'Photography: Day of Discovery', we enjoyed the most gorgeous warm and sunny spring weather one can imagine, after a worrying week of watching daily changes on the very unsettled and sometimes frightening weather forecasts.Everyone arrived in time for the early start with Kevin Sawford being the first. He had been so excited about tutoring with us for the first time that he didn't waste much time with sleeping and arrived over an hour earlier. He had some brilliant photos of a wonderful sunrise from Orford Quay on his camera at 6am already.
Watching the sun rising at Orford Quay; Photo by Kevin Sawford.
Danny Porter, Jon Evans and Tony Pick, the other tutors of the day, proved their talent in discovering wildlife on the way to the boat too, when they spotted an unusual bird on the tarmak, who had hit a window but luckily recovered well from the shock and flew off happily.
Reed warbler after striking a window; Photo by Jon Evans.
The tutors' enthusiasm after this fantastic start to the day was infectious and our small group of 'students of the day' benefitted for the following 12 hours in the whole variety of photographic subjects that we offered. Everyone was very keen to learn, payed a lot of attention and one after another could switch off the automatic button on their camera and got many chances to try the new skills and knowledge on different wildlife, macro and landscape subjects - even portrait shots (of humans) were tried successfully in the mild afternoon light.
Our Havergate hares have got so used to being photographed that one of them came right up to the 'Visitor Centre' hide and napped in a sheltered and sunny spot for hours, just six feet from the open hide windows - too close for the 600 lense! There must be hundreds of portrait shots of him in the cameras and the patient ones under the photographers got to see much more clearly than they ever had expected, that this was a male hare indeed.
The birds on the island are very busy with their breeding activities at this time of the year, which restricted us from accessing the path down to Dovey's hide, but enabled us to predict bird movements especially with the gulls watching their nest areas in the gorse from some posts nearby. I'm sure there are many excellent photos with gulls landing, balancing and leaving these posts as the birds didn't get tired at all to come and go and pose while keeping an eye on us too…
The other birdlife on the island was a bit distant and less accessible for the cameras, but a change to macro lenses opened another world much closer. Thanks to the sunny and warm weather we were lucky to see some small coppers flying around and many of the tiny red, white and pink flowers on the meadow and salt marsh plants opened their heads during the course of the day.
Small copper on a daisy; Photo by Tony Pick.
A jolly party returned to Orford at 6.30pm with full memory cards, empty batteries and fatigued legs, and I am not taking it too far if I write: everyone, 'students', tutors and facilitator had a wonderful day out, including a fantastic picnic - provided by the Pump Street Bakery - on the sunny lawn in front of the 'Visitor Centre'. All of us will remember this peaceful day on Havergate Island for a long time to come.
Below is the comment section for this particular 'Photography: Day of Discovery'. Please read the first comment with humour and maybe more between the lines ;-) The other comments further below are 'the serious stuff'.
"Liked: Timing, Catering, pre-event publicity, price. Change: Maybe go back later to allow for some evening light shots." Fay.
"Enjoyable day, good food & good camera advice. Have learnt a few things too." Mary F.
"A splendid day with so much help from photographers and well catered for. Blessed with sunshine but sadly lacking interesting birdlife!! Other things of interest to photograph. Would thoroughly recommend to others. Many thanks for everything." Rosemary.
"Perfect day, gorgeous food, good company, excellent advice, friendly tutors, statue like hares and Monika even organised sunny weather. Would like more bird species please." Anonymous.
"Excellent! Wonderful facilitator (Monika!) So well organised. Fantastic tuition from all photographers - wonderful location & catering too!! I have learnt so much :-) (plus a free mug)." Caroline Davison.
"An excellent location, extremely well organised, super food and most of all, superb guidance by the enthusiastic photography experts. I have learned more today about my camera and photography in general then ages spent reading guides and manuals. Many thanks to Monika and the guides. A splendid day and good value for money. I would recommend this event to anybody." David Robson.
These were the comments on the day, but as things happen, there was more to come and again I found a lovely email with a photo in my inbox the next day:
"Hi Monika, Just to say a big "thank you" to you, the tutors and the RSPB for a wonderful day at Havergate yesterday. I really enjoyed it, such a great day. The hares were amazing and I learnt so much from the friendly helpful tutors. My photographs show a great improvement already and I understand more about all those difficult technical bits now. So glad I had the opportunity to go. Just waiting to see if Jon exhibits his glamorous photo of us crawling along the shingle on our bellies towards an unsuspecting hare. Thought you might like this hare (attached) just smelling the flowers!" Email and photo by Frances Browne, Long Melford.