It's been a while

It's been a while since my last post. Been pretty busy both with work and private. I cycled a lot, but I didn't took much pictures lately. Until last weekend. Last Saturday I went out on the bike early. the weather was looking good. It was a bit chilly in the early morning, but the light in the early morning and late afternoon/early evening is the most gorgeous for photography I think.

I'm still in the middle of getting to know my new camera, the Nikon D200. This semi professional camera has, let's say, a little more steep learning curve than the point and shoot compact digital camera's. But finally it's worth the whole learning process, because it will reward you with much better pictures. But I'm still at the beginning of this learning process. But I must say that I was not unhappy with the first results of my first serious photo cycling trip from last Saturday.

I cycled from my hometown Utrecht through Oud-Zuilen, Maarssen and Breukelen and then through Loenen (aan de Vecht), Nieuwersluis and Vreeland and then back. Most of the pictures I shot near Oud-Zuilen and Maarssen. After that I mainly cycled. When I came back around noon I had cycled almost 60 kilometres.

Here is a first selection of the pics I shot. I hope you like them.

Although the coot is not so detailed I liked the light and the reflection in the calm unruffled water
I always found the great blue heron an impressive bird. They were quite rare for some time, but are more common in Holland right now.

I spend about one hour on the waterfront of the river observing this grebe-couple and their youngsters. First I thought they had two youngsters, but later I discovered a third one on the back of the mother between her feathers. It was fascinating to watch them. While the mother looked after the youngsters the male grebe went out for food. I can't help they are operating in such stereotype sex-roles. Women's liberation hasn't made it through the birdsworld obviously. Anyway, they are excellent divers and the male grebe came back with little fish quite often, which caused great enthusiasm among the youngsters judging by the exiting sounds they made.

Typical cat behavior, completely ignoring me

Geese on the run for a tractor.

I liked this one because of the early morning sun shining on the back of the head of the goose.