/// Wild Tracks - Landscape Photography by Eduardo Gallo

WILD TRACKS

Passion for Landscape Photography

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Mount Aspiring National Park, South Island, New Zealand

March 2012

Mount Aspiring National Park, South Island, New Zealand

Canon 5D MkII & EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM, 1s + 1/8s f/8 ISO400 @24mm

Google Earth for this photo
CREATION

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. Now the earth was unformed and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters. And God said: 'Let there be light.' And there was light. And God saw that the light was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.

And God said: 'Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.' And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day.

And God said: 'Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear.' And it was so. And God called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters called He Seas; and God saw that it was good. And God said: 'Let the earth put forth grass, herb yielding seed, and fruit-tree bearing fruit after its kind, wherein is the seed thereof, upon the earth.' And it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, herb yielding seed after its kind, and tree bearing fruit, wherein is the seed thereof, after its kind; and God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, a third day.

And God said: 'Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years; and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth.' And it was so. And God made the two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; and the stars. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness; and God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, a fourth day.

And with all that light God saw that down under He had created a huge red island with no mountains and very little water. And God said: 'Let there be another island nearby to balance it out. Let it be as different as possible from its neighbor. Let it be made of mountains and drowned by water.' But then God realized that He had run out of building materials, having used all the rock, all the soil, all the sand, to create the rest of the dry land. God looked around him for anything that He could use to make up his mistake, and found the Lego blocks he had enjoyed so much as a kid. So He took the blocks and created two small islands to the East of the previous one, which He called Aotearoa, "The land of the long white cloud". And so this land ended up composed of flat wide valleys separated by huge ice covered mountains of vertical walls. There was no rock and no soil to build "V" shaped valleys as in the rest of the Earth dry land; only enormous Lego blocks to move around separating "U" shaped valleys from each other. But God saw that it not only was high, cold, and wet as had been His will, but that it was also extremely beautiful, so God was happy. And there was evening and there was morning, a fifth day. And then there were a sixth, a seventh, and many more ...

And many days later I ended up in Aotearoa, loaded with a heavy pack, full of enthusiasm, and ready to start hoping up and down those huge Lego blocks. A van drove me around the beautiful shore of Lake Wanaka to the start of a long flat valley surrounded by steep mountains on all sides (background in the picture). I could easily see four vegetation zones no matter where I looked: fertile glacier fed meadows at my feet, native beech forest along the slopes up to the tree line, slippery snow-grass farther up, and finally enormous extensions of ice and rock near the clouds. It was warm but I knew wet weather was coming my way, so I needed to climb the first Lego block that very first day before the blizzard arrived leaving me stranded. The treacherous and steep root filled path within the forest quickly turned into an extremely steep route above the tree line. An altitude gain of 4600 feet. What an introduction to New Zealand. The higher I climbed the stepper it became. A sweaty face turned into drops falling from my cap, and then the drops started coming together into what seemed like a flow. I attached the walking poles to my pack and ended up scrambling up with my hands, making ever more frequent stops to recover my breadth.

Exhausted, I finally arrived at the top by nightfall, dropped my pack, set up the tent, took out my cheese and my peanuts, and enjoyed the wonderful views chewing like a mouse. I had certainly earned them. Cascade Saddle, an appropriate name. It was indeed a saddle, narrow but flat on top, near vertical on both sides. One of the most beautiful places I've ever set up my tent on. Felt asleep like a baby. On the morning I woke up into the way Nature has of telling everybody that a storm is coming. Chilly, humid, windless, clouds slowly coming in. A crispy atmosphere setting off the alarms inside you. Somehow you know that it is time to hurry up, break camp, and rush to lower altitudes while you are still able to see your feet. But not before taking a few photos of my previous day route, while watching the Sun for the last time in many days, although I did not know that at the time.

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