Spitzkoppe Penguins

Our tents were pitched less than 5 minutes from a rock arch which, it turns out, is a tourist magnet for sunset photography. We are part of the problem, of course, given this is one of the reasons we came here, but it is disappointing when you can't get a single photo without other people in it. Like at Deadvlei, patience is needed, but it was more difficult here because the area you want to be is so much smaller. I'm pretty sure I've got some good photos on my camera, however, and even these phone photos are not so bad, I hope you agree.

Having played with shadow photos and then captured the fading light, we returned to our camp for the BBQ.

Whilst the food was cooking, I had a chance to once again try my phone in astro mode and as it was so dark, maybe it would capture the Milky Way. The first attempt was a bit ordinary, but after tweaking a setting the second attempt was wow! No way is it perfect, but for a phone, it's certainly impressive. The photo of the BBQ area is also impressive for a phone, I might add.

We then ate our food and chatted but I didn't want to be doing that. It was dark enough for night photography well before we even sat down and I felt time was just leaking away. We have just one night, one opportunity to capture the stars over this stunningly dark location and here we are, eating, and wasting the time we have. I was probably the only one thinking this, being honest.

Finally, we could go and do what I was so looking forward to doing at Spitzkoppe.

Side note: At first I never understood why this platform is called "Find Penguins". I might be wrong, but maybe it's because when you see loads of tourists, they do look like penguins waddling around, hence the title of this footprint.Read more