{"id":3160,"date":"2016-01-06T19:19:06","date_gmt":"2016-01-06T19:19:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/2ndcupoftea.com\/?p=3160"},"modified":"2016-01-06T19:23:05","modified_gmt":"2016-01-06T19:23:05","slug":"the-all-seeing-eye-or-a-costly-way-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/2ndcupoftea.com\/?p=3160","title":{"rendered":"The All Seeing Eye – or ‘A Costly Way Home’"},"content":{"rendered":"

T<\/strong>his short piece (really a photography essay) is dedicated to all the photographers and would-be photographers that have travelled on my tours this past year; you’ll appreciate this one (I hope)…<\/p>\n

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A camera is a save button for the minds eye – Roger Kingston<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

One afternoon in November on my last tour of 2015 around sunset, with a wonderful group of travellers, I set off for the last bus journey of the\u00a0season from a little village high in the so called Pyrenees of Malaga<\/em>.<\/p>\n

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As a rule, after food – and especially after wine – on the home journey, I talk very little (which you’ll know if you’ve travelled with me, is not easy for me). On this occasion we’d decided to take a different route, one neither myself nor driver knew. Why not? Learn something new. The guests would be sleeping anyway – dormitory on wheels.<\/p>\n

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Photography is an art of observation. It has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them – Elliott Erwitt<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s always a rather melancholic moment for me, as I love my job so much, that last bus ride of the year and I didn’t even feel like chatting to the driver much. Two months until it starts up again. So I simply sat and looked out of the window from my ‘suicide seat’ as I call it (I do also refer to it as ‘the best office in the world’, as my view changes daily).<\/p>\n

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Don’t shoot what it looks like. Shoot what it feels like – David Alan Harvey<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The sun was setting, and driving through the beautiful Andalusian countryside, which must have been surrounded by thousands upon thousands of olive trees as we made our way down to the Mediterranean and our hotel. Suddenly on the left after a small hill we passed an old ruin behind which stunning views opened up on the rolling olive undulations below. But, crucially on one wall of that very ruin, someone had painted an eye. Maybe it was the timing too, but it struck me as one of the most beautiful pieces of artwork I had seen in a long time. A flash, and it was gone. There was no time to point it out, or even ask whether anyone else had noticed it. Gone.<\/p>\n

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Look and think before opening the shutter. The heart and mind are the true lens of the camera – Yousuf Karsh<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Now I love photography. However when I guide, I never bring a camera with me, as I feel it doesn’t look all that professional if the guide is taking pictures – as if they haven’t been there. Plus we have other things to do. However, I confess to having lost a little the passion for photography over the past few years – a passion that very much once possessed me. This one glimpse\u00a0changed that in an instant. Really, that was all it took. Strange. I was gobsmacked and vowed to buy myself a good camera for Christmas, come back in January and get a good photo of this very spot, if only I could recall where it was.<\/p>\n

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Photography is a love affair with life – Burk Uzzle<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

If only… Well, today, camera duly purchased I set off with a good old fashioned map and tried my best to retrace our tracks from that day in November. A couple of wrong turns and a couple of hours later and there was my eye. As beautiful as I remember her being. It was yet another ‘magical’ moment afforded to me in my short time here in Andalusia.I hope I have done her justice and though that day in November\u00a0did turn out to be a ‘costly way home’, who, frankly, cares? It is once again, score one for travel…<\/p>\n

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Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst – Henri Cartier-Bresson<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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