Progressive deescalation of pandemic alert levels as COVID-19 comes under control in New Zealand saw travel further from home return as an option. Accommodation was easy to get and we arranged a week at Mount Maunganui at short notice.

The beautiful weather of the lockdown continued and the change in pace with daily walks on the beach was lovely. The children joined us for the first weekend and this was the first time we had all been away together on holiday for some time. Family ritual of kebabs for dinner and walk around the Mount Base track ended in the winter dark giving the opportunity to see Grey-faced Petrels/Ōi against the last glow of the sky. Returning to their burrows at the prebreeding stage of their season we could hear them calling in the dark. We feel quite an attachment to these fascinating seabirds after the work Edin has done with them. For a better account of this see Edin’s recent blog post, The Ōi of Mauao.

A trip to the Mount is always enjoyable as photography opportunities are everywhere. Street, landscape, beach and wildlife are all available subjects so there is something for everyone. As a generalist I often have to decide what to focus on to avoid becoming too distracted by all the opportunities.

While photographing birds in the dunes, I noticed in the distance a board-rider hydrofoiling out to sea under his own power and then riding the waves back toward shore. I hadn’t seen this before so headed down onto the beach for closer look. It looks like hard work but amazing fun.

The next day I found that this hydrofoiling technology has now also extended to stand-up paddle boards.

Surf and dog photos with Nikon D850 and Nikon 500mm f5.6PF lens. Sunset and B&W photo with Fuji XT3 and Fuji 16-80mm f4 lens