Ariadne Van Zandbergen's Blog

Leopard’s nest

Ariadne — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 15:31:22 +0000

I went to Chobe for a few days and was lucky with an amazing leopard sighting. This female was sitting high up in a tree in a fish-eagle’s nest. She had just finished eating the chicks and was now having a bit of a rest in this comfortable place. Mother fish-eagle was sitting nearby calling unhappily. After her nap she came down the tree and disappeared into the bush (as leopards do best.

The Best of Zululand

Ariadne — Sat, 30 Jul 2011 13:19:49 +0000

We recently revisited some of the Zululand parks near to where we live. It was a short work trip/ break between other projects. I wanted to get some new stock photography for this area, and with no commissions to worry about, I went without any pressure and an open attitude: I’ll get what I get. The photography ended up being productive above my expectations. The black and white rhino sightings were amazing and another highlight were some very good cheetah sightings.

Sky walk

Ariadne — Mon, 02 May 2011 09:45:57 +0000

I went on a little adventure that turned out to be more than I bargained for. In a group of 7, we embarked on the ‘Sky walk’, the hiking version of the epic 100km mountain trail run: the Sky run. This un-marked and often elusive route took us from Lady Grey to Tiffendell in the Eastern Cape. The hike over mountains and valleys took us 6 days (one of these we just sat in our tent waiting for the mist to lift). The weather made this already challenging journey something I won’t forget easily. Without going into details: we got drenched, hailed upon and we were frozen to the bone, but we all made it. I had few opportunities to take out my camera, but here are some pics.

Somaliland

Ariadne — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 14:52:50 +0000

We just got back from Somaliland or should I say Somalia? Somaliland is in the Northern part of Somalia and declared its independence some 20 year ago. Despite its political stability and democraty it hasn’t been recognised by the UN and so doesn’t formally exist. This makes getting to Somaliland tricky: you need a Somaliland visa (different from the Somalia visa), but since the country doesn’t officially exists there are almost no Embassies to it and aside from a few VERY dodgy airlines that fly on a African bus system (only if and when full), there are no international flights to the country either. We got our visa from one of the only Embassies to Somaliland in Ethiopia and made our way on overland from there. This was just the beginning of a very interesting trip. Here are a few pics.

Durban Cyclist

Ariadne — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 10:30:08 +0000

I took my teenager stepson to Durban a few months ago. I wanted to get some cool pics of the city and him to have a good time as well. Needless to say his patience levels were challenging to work around. Watching this cool dude on his bike got both of us interested for some time.

Stock Image Link

Golden Gate

Ariadne — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 11:18:24 +0000

I went for a couple of nights to Golden Gate NP. The Free State scenery grows on me. After an exceptionally wet summer everything is beautifully lush…I mainly went to photograph scenery and I didn’t have a long lens ready, but this jackal let me approach really close so I could take this pic with a 200mm lens.