Blog - Behind the scenes stories of a professional photojournalist and video producer specializing in the wine, food, spirits, & adventure travel industries
As a self proclaimed adrenalin junkie, I’m constantly seeking out new adventures in far-flung places. I’ve recently helicopter – snowboarded in Canada and lept off a 440 foot bungee jump in New Zealand. I’ve also been a frequent skydiver, scuba diver, mountain biker, and rock climber, and avid trekker – for 18 months, I traveled vagabond style through the South Pacific and S.E. Asia hiking up Mt. Kinabalu in Borneo and to the base camp of Mt. Everest.
However I don’t consider myself an extreme athlete or adventurer. It’s all relative – especially compared to all the characters I’ve encountered on my journeys. For the ten years I worked at various sports companies I was continually amazed at the boundaries athletes could push and the obstacles those with limitations could overcome. As a photojournalist I’ve had the good fortune to illustrate stories by pioneers of the adventure travel industry such as Tim Cahill, founder of Outside Magazine, who has spent a lifetime forging his own path.
So how would my experiences in Puerto Rico compare? I found an ideal balance between easily accessible adventures and authentic culture. It was an easy way to dip my toes into both worlds during my whirlwind week visit.
Here’s the photo and video highlights:
Zip lining at Toro Verde
Tightrope suspension bridges and rapelling, Toro Verde
Toro Verde is a newly built ecological adventure destination with more miles of cable than any other park in the world. My highlight was “The Beast”, where I flew like a bird superman style on the world’s highest zip line (853 feet above the rainforest floor), for nearly a mile long (2nd longest in world at 4745 feet), and reached speeds of 55mph. This was best captured on video, and provided it’s own challenge wearing three video cameras. http://www.toroverdepr.com/index_eng.html
Kayaking by starlight through mangrove coves to Bioluminescent Fajardo Bio Bay
Only eight bioluminescent bays exist in the world and experiencing the unique spectacle of dinoflagellates that light up like fireflies in the water is only part of the adventure. Kayaking through a canal of mangroves into bio bay by starlight is the best low impact approach. While I wasn’t able to capture a clear photo of the blue-green light produced by these organisms as my kayak moved through the bay, their glimmer was visible on video with my new Nikon D4, a true test of low light capability. http://www.yokahukayaks.com/
Pristine waters of Caja de Muerto island are ideal for swimming & snorkeling
Acampa Nature adventures offers private and group hiking and kayaking excursions to Caja de Merto, an island which is a combination of semi-arid dessert vegetation, white sand beaches, and limestone caves. We hiked through a a trail of green cactus forest to the highest point on the island, a 1887 Spanish lighthouse with expensive panoramic view of Puerto Rico, as the guides provided detail about the local flora and fauna. http://www.acampapr.com/
Kayaking the pristine island of Caja de Muerto nature reserve with Acampa Nature Adventure Tours owner Raymond Sepulveda
Pod of dolphins surrounds my kayak
After 10 years of exploring tropical waters by kayak, scuba diving, and snorkeling, I was finally able to experience a pod a dolphins close up when they approached our kayak within arms reach to peacefully feed at the surface. The island is abundant with marine life and coral reefs.
Mojito beachside at Hosteria del Mar Beach Inn & Verdanza Hotel sommelier mixing a cocktail at Di Vino bar
Rum punch at Eighty 20 Bistro, Verdanza Hotel, San Juan
Nightlife in old town San Juan is always vibrant, ranging from romantic sunsets and dinners to Latino salsa clubs
Colorful colonial architecture in old town San Juan
Artistically minded guests relax in courtyard of The Gallery Inn, a 300 year old historic home perched next to the Old City's North Wall, which was restored by artists / owners Jan D'Esopo and Manuco Gandia in1961 and converted to a 22 room boutique hotel, San Juan
Old San Juan view of of the lighthouse at El Morro Castle (aka Castillo de San Felipe del Morro'), overlooking Cementerio Santa Maria Magdalena de Passiz, old town San Juan, Puerto Rico
Saint Christopher Castle (Castillo de San Cristabal), the largest military structure built by the Spanish in the Americas, Old Town San Juan,
Here’s a link to my stock photography of Puerto Rico -
18 months ago Fred Noble was diagnosed with ALS. Though he’s lost the ability to move his legs, he was determined to celebrate his 75th birthday much as he has for the past 38 years – heli-skiing with Canadian Mountain Holidays. Last week he made the first ever descent on a sit-ski at the Bugaboos. Stay posted for his story about this sit-ski adventure soon, here’s a teaser from the documentary film we’re helping him create.
View towards Bugaboos Spire, glacier to the right of tooth-shaped rock was Fred's first descent on a sit ski
Snow continued to dump mid week for epic powder skiing/ boarding, but unfortunately was warm and heavy day of Fred's sit ski adventure
David & Gary secure Fred to sit ski and start go pro cams to capture the adventure
So, here’s how the first descent on a sit ski heliskiing at CMH unfolded . . .
Kudos to guides Peter and Andrew for enabling Fred's first descent, albeit the unexpected results
Fred did manage a few additional fun sit ski runs, photo copyright Bob Holmes
Fred's 75th Birthday celebration in Bugaboos style!
Fred always manages to be the center of the party, last evening of a Bugaboos trip is always wild!
Fred will be adding his own personal story about the descent soon, check out his blog for more stories of inspiration
Looking for an adrenalin rush? Check out our video of CMH’s newest summer adventure, dramatic scenery where the Bobbie Burns guides have developed a new Conrad Glacier Experience for 2012 with bridges, ziplines and waterfalls.
CMH used the our video to launch ‘The Wildest New Adventure in North America”.
Brett Lawrence setting the course for the new Conrad Glacier experience, Bobbie Burns lodge
Brett Lawrence zip lining across glacial river, working with Bruce Howatt to create the newest Conrad Glacier Experience
The CMH blog written by Topher Donahue also interviews Bruce Howatt, the manager of CMH Bobbie Burns – here’s an excerpt from his post: “You’re right. It isn’t a via ferrata nor is it anywhere close to a traditional hike. The trip is hiking, navigating wild canyons using bridges and rungs, ascending colourful rock slabs right next to waterfalls, zipline crossings, traversing rock walls next to a glacier and, coming soon, more climbing, waterfalls and hopefully some crevasse crossings. All this is mixed into some of the most scenic, mind-blowing, wild mountain hiking you can imagine. Blue glaciers, dark orange rock and bright green ponds are everywhere.”
An exhilarating excursion to the summit of Mt. Nimbus along North America\’s longest and most extensive via ferrata route. Deep in the Purcell mountains, the Bobbie Burns mountain guides designed and created a Via Ferrata (Italian for \”Iron Way\”)
We also enjoyed more ‘traditional’ heli-hiking excursions from the Bobbie Burns and Bugaboos base lodges, though the experiences were far from any other hiking experience I’ve encountered in the world.
Heli - Hiking the spectacular Anthea’s - A half-day, resoundingly alpine hike along a goat trail up to a high ridge, with great views of the Conrad Glacier, looking down at towering ice needles and into looming crevasses, Bobbie Burns Lodge.
Access to spectacular varied scenery was endless with the helicopter dropping us off where the best weather and conditions prevailed. I spent a month ‘roughing it’ hiking to Everest Base camp, and while the Himalayan views certainly rivaled Canada I’ve never expeienced adventures based from refined, remote mountain lodges with a highly-trained pastry & head chef cooking with health, flavour, and presentation in mind, using the finest fresh Western Canadian ingredients!
Heli - Hiking the spectacular Ridge Rooftop, a rocky, above-timberline hike. and one of the best places to get a 360 degree view of the southern Columbias , Bugaboo Spires, and the Canadian Rockies, Bugaboos Lodge.
Enjoying my view from the top of Ridge Rooftop hike, Bugaboos Lodge
View of Bugaboos spires from Bugaboos Lodge
Here’s a few last vantage points, I’ve created 360 degree virtual reality tours of two locations, click here to view (you’ll need a fast internet connection to view the detailed hd panos)
For 30+ years CMH has been guiding guests on extraordinary lodge-based journeys in BC’s Canadian Rockies. Here’s a link to their website and blog with more details about these adventures:
Photos and videos look fabulous on the ipad, but organizing them into tightly edited albums is the key to making your presentations powerful. I love presenting photo essays on my ipad, and have received many requests on how to import, organize, and edit visuals for the strongest impact. The wine industy has embraced this tool for presenations, both for consumer and trade – Jordan Winery recently purchased 97 ipads for their employees to best tell their brand story in an entertaining, engaging, and interactive manner. I have additional specific tips for how to optimize the ipad for presentations using iTunes:
Below are the main steps you can follow:
1. Save photos inside different folders on your computer, organized by subject. The name you choose for the folders on your computer is how the album name will display on your ipad.
2. I suggest saving all these separate subject folders inside a master folder titled “ipad photos” or something easy to remember. Make sure you keep the master and sub folders in the same location, since this is where you’ll synch photos to your ipad in the next step. One suggestion for wineries may be to create a master folder with their winery name, then sub-folders with winery name – hospitality, winery name – winemaking, winery name – scenics, etc. This will save you the embarassing situation of accidentally pulling up your personal photos vs winery photos at a presentation.
3. Open iTunes, click on your ipad device, navigate to the photo tab, then from the ’sync photo’ option drop down menu select the ipad photos folder you’ve created and saved on your computer. The sub folder titles you’ve created inside your master folder will stay intact during the transfer, so all your photos will be in these separate albums.
4. If you want to change the photos, you’ll need to do this on your computer following the steps above, then re-synch the ipad, which will delete the old photos and add the new. There’s other options to import photos via a special cable, but it’s more time consuming. By detault, if you accidentally download a photo when using your ipad it’s automatically saved to ’saved photos’ album, so you want to keep this separate.
5. Uploading your own videos is even easier. First compress the movie file as a .mov file format and save on your desktop, then simply drag and drop this icon into your movies tab in itunes.
After much research, I’ve found the best option for showing custom presentations is a company called Shows 4 Pros, an app which is customized for the iphone or ipad an allows you to customize order of photos, effects between photos (fade or dissolve time, or manaual advancement vs auto slideshow), and create multiple lists by category. They also have excellent customer support if you run into any technical difficulties.
Sideways author Rex Pickett talks about his new book, Vertical, and his love of Oregon wine country.
For the cover of this month’s Oregon Wine Press magazine, http://www.oregonwinepress.com/, I flew down to Santa Monica with Robert Holmes to photograph and interview Rex Pickett about his latest book, Vertical, the sequel to Sideways. I wasn’t sure what to expect. Would the author be similar to his now infamous character, Miles – or had success changed him to become more like his charming but philandering character Jack? While Rex could easily play either role, after spending a relaxed afternoon chatting about Oregon, pinot noir, and the life of an artist I can see how Rex could be a blend of both, weaving autobiographical details into many of his stories.
Rex has not had an easy road to success. Although the movie Sideways won an Acadamy Award for the best adapted screenplay, Rex only received a pittance of the profits. His struggles to get his first book published were monumental. He still lives very modestly; the cover photo and interview are in his one bedroom apartment in Santa Monica. I hadn’t read Vertical at the time of our interview, but I was curious how he would depict my hometown and the Oregon wine country I’ve come to know so intimately during the past ten years. Now that I’ve finished the book I won’t give away the details of which wines are featured or how the story unfolds, but I can say fact and fiction are balanced with comedy and tragedy, evoking a surprising range of emotions. Oregon pinot noir is celebrated throughout the book, and a variery of artisanal wineries are mentioned. How the book, or possible movie, will affect Oregon wine will be an interesting development. I’d love to hear your thoughts, feel free to comment below . . .
