Wandering albatross
This weekend I’m off on a fishing trip to Kaikoura. The charter boat provides all fishing gear, so I’ll just be loaded up with my photographic gear. On my last trip, I was trying out a new lens, a 300mm telephoto. It was incredibly difficult, the sea was lumpy, the autofocus kept latching onto people’s fishing rods rather than the birdlife, so most of my pics were no good. But I got lucky. I had the camera to my eye when I noticed a bird swooping in towards us. He did only one quick pass as I struggled to track him and get off a series of quick shots. Only afterwards when I studied the images did I realise just what I had captured. It was a Wandering Albatross, one of the very largest! Adults have a wingspan approaching 4 metres, with a body length of more than a metre. …