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Adventures in Hemmingland!!! or "you can't do this to me I'm an American!" |
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Talking things over with Maasai elder Africa! Just the name conjures up images of Sir Richard Burton, Bror Blixen, Ernest Hemingway and Johnny Weissmuller! I had returned to Tanzania twenty years after my first visit. Things were primitive back then. The food was bad, hotels worse, you had to pay with cash for everything (if you got robbed you were screwed) and to make my first trip even more memorable the x-ray machines at the local airport were so hot they could have baked an elephant in 20 seconds so all my film that I so carefully packed in their lead lined pouches were totally ruined. Fast forward 20 years. First class hotels, buffet meals, ATM's and internet cafes and digital cameras. For this trip I hired photo guide extrodinary Paul "Terry" Larsen. His trips are always booked a year in advance and he's in such demand his clients are gotten by word of mouth. This photo trips was small with only eight of us. This is good because the last thing you want is people banging into each other when a good shot comes up. But everyone was cool and we had a great time photographing lions, cheetahs, crocodiles, elephants, rhino's, cape buffalos and other animals too numerous to mention. We explored mainly the Ngorongoro Crater, Arusha Park and of course the fabled Serengeti. There were lots of people taking tours like we were. More people than I remember years before. This can cause problems if these people are not with you. One afternoon we watched with fascination as a lion stalked through high grass sneaking up on a wildebeest. Our cameras were preset and ready for the final attack. Another tour group joined us. And then another and another. The lion was just ready to strike when an overzealous tour guide drove his land cruiser too close to the wildebeest and the animal bolted. The lion simply turned and walked back into the grass. We all sat back in disgust and threw a few special four letter words from our mouths for that particular guide. The National Geographic photographer working from the vehicle next to me glanced me a look of equal frustration and I think I heard the term, "motherfucker" under his breath. Is Africa dangerous? Well, I did ask Terry to stop the car one day so I could take a pee break. He wisely told me to wait until we reached a clearing nearby. After relieving myself Terry pointed to the area I had wanted to stop. Behind some bushes were two sleeping lions. Shows you how complacent you can be. A few years before an impatient Japanese photographer got out of his car to get a closeup of a feeding lion. The lion ignored him but the three lionesses hidden in the brush did not. His tombstone reads, "Rest in Pieces." I'll be back.
I'm watching!!! Do rocks move? They do in Death Valley. For years I'd heard about the famous moving rocks located in a very isolated part of the park at the southern edge of a dry lake bed called, "The Racetrack." Why they move is still a mystery, but most likely its from flooding from winter rains and snow melt. But I took lots of vodka and mescal just to make sure they did!
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| In March of 1996 I was back in Alaska to attempt to cross the frozen sea ice from the town of Deering to the south to Kotzebue on the northwest shore of the Baldwin Peninsula to the north. It was my first time living out in the open during an arctic winter and it was a real eye opener for a guy used to living along the warm California coast. I wasn't able to finish due to some bad choices I made in equipment like a -30 sleeping bag in -68 degree weather, a stalking polar bear and a lead (crack in the ice) too big for me to cross. While camping late one night on the way back to Deering I got into a little trouble................ | 
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Switching
on my tiny radio, I was hoping to get a little music to pass the night
but only static filled my earphones. I would read by headlamp until
I was sleepy. It must have been near midnight when I had to answer natures
call. I hadn't slept since turning in. Wanting to go quickly I put on
only wind- proofs over my long underware. With a handful of toilet paper
I unzipped the door of my tent and stepped into the polar night. The
wind was strong and snow flakes flew into my face making it hard to
see. I timed my business carefully. When the urge came I quickly pulled
down my gore-tex pants and let fly. Twenty seconds was the most I could
allow my full moon to rise. With that taken care of I turned to walk
back to my tent. Only my tent had disappeared. I looked all around but
in the dark, misty night everything looked the same. I had neglected
to keep my shelter in sight. In stormy weather visibility can be cut
down to zero and people have accidentally frozen to death just a few
yards from their tents. I stood motionless for several minutes pondering
what to do. I fell to my knees feeling for my footprints in the loose
snow. My hands were ungloved. I didn't see any point in wearing mitts
if I was only going outside for a few minutes. My fingers numbed very
quickly feeling my way along the frozen ground. Little depressions in
the snow lead me back to my now frozen feces. I was going in a circle.
Placing
my cold hands under the arm pits of my parka I waited for them to warm
. After some life flowed back into them, I resumed feeling my way along
the ground. By now I was shivering uncontrollably. The colder I got
the more fear crept up my spine. Then I backed into something. Thinking
it was that polar bear I had seen earlier that day I jumped to my feet.
It was my tent. Quickly as I could, I unzipped the door and dove in.
Pulling off my frozen parka and pants, I eased myself into my sleeping
bag and primed the stove. Three cups of hot chocolate couldn't warm
me up. I buried myself deeper into my sleeping bag and shivered until
morning.
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| The worst climb in the world is the Matterhorn. I don't know a single person that climbed the stupid thing and liked it. From the distance of Zermatt village it's every mountaineers dream, a snow clad pyramid shaped peak with seemingly flawless faces and ridges. Up close the Matterhorn looks like a slag heap. The peak is a dull grey color and practically every ledge is piled high with loose rock. The climb just seems to go on and on without any end. A sort of climbers purgatory. From the base to the summit is 4,000 vertical feet. That may not sound so bad but remember you have to climb down the 4,000 feet as well. A hard day's night. It was late August when I started climbing behind a line of about 40 to 50 climbers. To an American standind in line to climb a mountain this was a new experience. It was a dry year and there was almost no snow. The weather was unusually warm and I ran out of water 1/3 of the way up. Part of the time I climbed with Gunther, a climber from Munich I met at the base. We roped up and climbed together for a while until the altitude got me. Gunther was leading and I tugged on the rope and told him to go on without me. I didn't notice until later that he took two of my expensive #4 cams. I was climbing at a snails pace and managed to reach a snowy shoulders 2/3's on the was up. A young Japanese girls was sitting in the snow babbling, "I'm going to die here, I'm going to die here." I assured her she wasn't and urged her boyfriend to get her down at once. I guess he thought she would like the trip. The last part of the climb follows a sharp ridge protected by thick fixed ropes. Ethics required not using them but I was so tired , dehydrated and altitude sick I was glad they were there. |
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Below me was the great north face. 4,000 feet of almost vertical rock and ice. It was here that after a successful first ascent that one of Edward Whymper's guides slipped taking three more climbers with him before the rope broke. Once on the summit people were shaking hands and enjoying the view. I just sat down on some rocks and panted like a fish out of water. After five minutes I started down. Like I said, the Matterhorn is the worst climb in the world. But I sure glad I did it. | |||||||
| Sometimes a once in a life time opportunity comes along. We were in camp having breakfast when our guides came in with some exciting news. While fishing for char they had caught a greenland shark. Gathering up our dive gear and cameras we loaded up our snowmobiles and headed for the coast. A three foot wide lead split the ice. This open fissure stretched over a mile into the distance on the Admiralty Inlet. Slipping into the water with all our gear between five feet of thick sea ice seemed problematic at first but as I saw Graham, & Hiro squeeze between the two icy shores and disappear under the opaque surface the thought of me, my dive gear, underwater housing for my Nikon F3HP and two strobes didn't seem too much concern and took the plunge. The salty sea water mixing with the fresh melt water from the ice was like being immersed in a jar of thick gelatin. Sinking beneath the melt water, I drifted beneath the ice and came face to face with a greenland shark. Unlike the megatoothed white shark or the sleek, elegant mako the greenland seems primative. Slow and lathargic, its eyes useless from parasitic copepods, the shark survives by crusing the great depths and coming upon whatever scrapes or slow fish it may find. We circled the animal carefully. Though unoffensive by reputation, this shark may be more vicious than people realize. The stomachs of some specimans have been found polar bear, arctic char and fast moving ringed seals. Caribou, that swim vast distances from one island to another have been seen pulled down into the sea. Only a handful of people have dived and photographed this mysterious creature. I ran out of film but stayed | ||||||||
| watching the others at work. The shark drifted into the icy depths. Hiro followed taking the remaining shots from his Nikonos RS before running out of air and making an emergency ascent from 120 feet. We squeezed back through the narrow ice and breathed in the crisp morning air. |
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| Located
in the Bering Strait, between Alaska to the west and Russian Siberia to
the east, Little Diomede Island is the most remote of American settlements.
In winter, when the Strait is frozen over you can land an airplane on
a manicured ice runway one mile from town. My project was two fold, to
write about the people who live in such a lonely, desolated spot and to
stand on the Inter- national Dateline. Because there are no B&B's
or hotels on the island I had to stay in the local school house. I slept
in the library between nonfiction and biographies. 162 people live on
Little Diomede, mostly Inupiat Eskimos. They live, as did their ancestors
before them as subsistance hunters. Most people viewed me as a curosity
with my bulky camera bag, overly warm clothes and incessant questions.
Then, on a cold, blustery Thursday, my guide Herbert Milligrock led me
off the island's rocky shore and out on the sea ice to the International
Dateline. The ground was a broken, jumbled mass of hard blue ice with |
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steep hilly mounds of consolidated snow. This was polar bear country. I kept scanning the horizon for the big predators. We headed for the bright orange windsock that was stuck atop a long pole above the ice runway. The Dateline was just beyond at 169 degrees longitude. After an hour walk we were there. I made the mistake of shooting into the 10-below wind and coated the lens of my Canon camera with a tough coating of ice I couldn't remove. I put it back in to the camera bag and pulled out the Nikon and shot into the sun. Not the best think to do photographically but it was better that a frozen camera. Herbert took out two little flags from the backpack he was carrying, one American and the other Russian and planted them in their respective places. When you stand on the International Dateline or "the border," as the locals call it you're doing four things. One foot is in today and the other in tomorrow. The United States is on one side and Russia the other. Facing south, North America is on the left and Asia is on the right. Below your feet, the cold Arctic Ocean mixes with the warmer Pacific. Less than a mile away from us was Big Diomede Island, Russian territory. Most people in the lower 48 states never knew the United States and the old Soviet Union and the troops of the KGB and the Alaskan National Guard faced each other for decades. I set up the tripod and took some shots of Herbert and I on either side of the border. | |||||||
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My new moosehide mukluks were not portecting my feet very well so we headed back to town. Over the week I wandered the ice ice alone, photographing whatever inspired me. While working below the school I looked up to find a dozen tiny eyes watching me from the windows. I waved and the children merely laughed and whispered to each other. I wandered what the joke was all about. Later I found out the children of the town honored me with an Eskimo name. I forget the exact wording but loosely translated it meant, "bear bait!" |
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| Because of the depth we anchored our boat onto the steep, rocky pinnacle towering above us. After suiting up I followed my companions dive guide Michel Garcia and Chiliean filmaker Rodrigo Fernandez into the indigo blue water. The water was was so clear you could see the bottom 200 feet below. Placing the regulators in our mouths, we slipped under the rolling surface. The pinnacle we were diving is called Moto Kao Kao. We were diving off the southwest shore of myterious Easter Island. Michel and Rodrigo led the way while I followed taking pictures of the great coral head that decorated the vertical walls. Black backed butterfly fish, endemic to the island followed us as we circumnavigated the pinnacle. Spiny lobsters peered out of their dark holes, waving their antennae into the light. A movement under a coral ledge caught my eye and I raised my camera and fired. For a millisecond a brillant red squirrelfish was illuminated as it hovered in darkness.We followed the contours of the pinnacle in a lazy arc, decompressing as we ascended. Stopping at ten feet for safety we watched as great schools of oceanic jacks passed in the distance. 10 minutes later we broke the surface and climbed back into out boat. Later that week, I made a deep dive with famed free diver Mike Rapu and his assistants, Claudio Pena and Christian Saahvera. At 120 feet we reached the cave formation called, "the Lost Arch." During my trip I wanted to get a picture of a moral eel. I had a few shots, but wasn't satisfied with any. At "the arch," I finally got my chance. Coiled between two volcanic pockets was a beautiful eel. Briliiant white in color with contrasting dark spots. To an underwater photographer, that sharp toothed little eel was Elle Macpherson. I focused my camera but the controls seemed to be frozen. I heard a dull, metallic sound within the housing. I turned the housing around and saw the lens focus ring had come off! It's a good thing people can't hear you talk underwater, because my dive guides would have heard expletives coming from the torrant of bubbles from my regulator would have made a longshoreman blush. This never happens to David Doubilet! With Chaco Ika, last of the Easter Island royal family |
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Traveling
as much as I do I usually stay in hotels. Not being used to this I learned
early in my career not to be complacent. While staying on the 6th floor
at the Arc Hotel in Ottawa, I got up one morning and looked out on the
traffic below. Being the he-man that I am, I sleep in the buff. Looking
up from the street below I noticed a small crowd of people watching
me from a large window from the office building across the street. Apparantly
they were enjoying the impromptu show I was putting on. As you've seen
from my photographs, I'm not exactly George Clooney in the looks department.
The women in the window seemed to be more laughing than lusting. I blew
them a few kisses and then closed the curtains. Playgirl magazine didn't
come calling. |
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| Call this story, the night I forgot everything.... |
It was 9 o'clock at night. The Rat Pack (Dave, Mike, Roger & Me) were suiting up for a night dive at Monestary Beach. Somewhere during packing I forgot my fins. While the others dressed I went home and got them. When I came back the others were waiting for me. I hurried into my drysuit. Where was my mask??? I went home to get it. 3 pairs of hateful eyes watched as I finished suiting up. Just as we were heading for the beach the Secret Service pulled up (No Kidding)! They asked us what we were doing, they looked at our ID's and searched our cars with bomb sniffing dogs. i asked them what this all about but the little assholes said it was none of my business and they drove off down the coast highway. Later I found out the President Clinton would be visiting in a few days and this was SOP for his security services. We finally headed for the water 2 hours after we started. I didn't notice my tank was out of air so I went home. David called me the next day. Visibility was so bad they all came out after five minutes.
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Ever try to photograph 20,000,000 bats? Neither have I. Until I met up with Bat Conservation International. Started by Dr. Merlin Tuttle in 1982, BCI owns and maintains Bracken Cave, just outside of San Antonio Texas. Old pal David Moore, photographer, potter and Colorado's answer to Glen Quagmire joined me. Ever been in Texas in the middle of summer? 101 degrees by day and the low 90's at night. Being from the cold & foggy Monterey coast I melt when the temperature rises above 78 degrees. The cave is home to the largest concentration of mammals in the world. Like Dracula, bats come out at sunset. This would produce some unusual photographic challenges. Bats fly fast and in low light and no matter how much I wanted them to they wouldn't stay still! So I placed 8 GB Lexar flash cards in each camera (I didn't want to miss anything by changing cards) and varied the ISO from 500 to 2000 depending on the whether I was shooting into the fading sun or the darkness of twilight. The bats flight patterns went from ten feet from the camera to 30 feet so there would be no closeups. I set my flash on full power with new batteries and full battery packs. I varied my exposures via f-stops while keeping the shutter speeds as high as possible to freeze the action. The shots I got became surreal rather than accurate but I liked what I got. As we left BCI Developement Director Jonathan Friedman asked me if, I "got some good shots?" "No," I said. "All those bats were in the way." |
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For two months now I've been trying to photograph a golden eagle that's been hunting the ground squirrels that live on the pastureland of September Ranch. I pass by the ranch every day but I always seem to miss him. Today I saw him on the ground feeding. I rushed home to grab my gear. Just as I arrived back at the ranch he took off. I waited two hours but the bird was a no show. Wait till next time... Almost got him today. I passed by the ranch and he was on the ground again. I turned the car around, parked by the road and he bolted again before I got the camera out. I'll get him next time.... Blew it again, and again, and again. |
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Homer, Alaska is the bald eagle capital of the world. Every March thousands of eagles congregate to feed from scraps of the many fishing boats. I arrived with camera gear and 2000 little toupees for each eagle. They sure put up a fuss when I tried to put them on! The best thing is that the eagles are so used to humans that you can get quite close to them. I got some fantastic close-ups, perching and flying shots. Jeane Keene, the famous "eagle lady," envited me to her famous feedings. Imagine being surrounded by hundreds of hungry eagles, flying, diving and fighting all around you. Very fast and exciting. When I left I checked to make sure I still had two ears and nine fingers. Did I say nine? Oh, Oh!
What happens when you take that left turn at Albuquerque? You wind up at the Internat- ional Balloon Fiesta. It was a bit windy so conditions weren't ideal but I did get to photo-graph the mass ascention of hundreds of hot air balloons from around the country. But I did have to leave my BB gun in the car.
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Local boy makes good, Peter Hemming gets into the SMITHSONIAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY
When it comes to love I've never been lucky. I've probably driven more women into convents and lesbianism than George Costanza. But when it comes to photography I've been very lucky. I always come back with what I go after. I went to the Grand Tetons in January to get some winter shots of the peaks all covered with snow. Well, I found out January is the worst time to go because the mountains are shrouded in clouds. On my second day the clouds parted for a few minutes so I got a shot of the summit of the Grand and that was all. A couple from North Carolina pulled up next to me and said that was the first time in 10 days they had seen a peak. I only had 5 days. I spent most days photographing elks and big horn sheep along Miller's Bluff and always checking the range in the mornings and evenings. Disheartened, well, pissed off was more like it I drove to the airport for the flight home. As I turned the bend away from Jackson Hole the entire range was clear. With my cold weather gear packed and only an hour and a half till my flight I had to work in 30 degree weather with a wind chill of probably 20 with a light jacket, sneakers and no gloves. For every ten images I had to duck back into my car to warm my numb fingers and then go back out again. The shots I got were probably pretty standard since I couldn't choose my lighting conditions. But I came back with what I went after. Pretty lucky, huh? Now about that blond checker who works at the Safeway................
Did I photograph a ghost? I was photographing in the local cemetary in Monterey during Memorial Day. I was working on a book I hope to publish about life on the Monterey Peninsula. I liked all the flags decorating the various monu- ments so I started shooting. But a funny thing happened. I took 4 images over the gave of Earl Ammerman, a WW1 veteran who died in 1952. All 4 images I took over this grave had a foggy or hazy look about them. All other photos I took both before and after turned out clear. Did old Earl come back from beyond to talk things over with his fellow spirits? I'll have to ask him someday.
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If you haven't been to Washington DC yet, I'd suggest you go. It's
expensive as hell and there's no parking but just to walk the streets
of the nation's capital will inspire any red blooded American. When
you see the many monuments, memorials, military cemetaries and museums,
it really makes you appreciate how lucky you are. What quark of fate
made me a traveling photojournalist who lives a life most people can
only dream about and not a starving Ethiopian in the horn of Africa,
paddling an oar on the Ganges or a bearded Taliban in Afganistan?
Makes you think, doesn't it? Well, I made my first visit to DC even
more memoriable by falling down a flight of stairs and breaking my
wrist while photographing the Iwo Jima Memorial. I survived and healed.
God protects fools, drunkards, photojournalists and the United States
of America. 
Talk about lucky. We had the US Open recently in nearby Pebble Beach.
I'm not into golf nor was I hired to do any photography so I stayed
home. But on the last day of the event I was doing some photography
along Carmel beach when I swung my camera northward through the trees
and caught Tiger Woods and his caddy strolling toward the 11th hole.
He looked bummed. He finished 5th.