Chennai Photography Club went for a Shutterwalk on the 28th Aug 2010. The Chennai Photography Club had immense opportunity to shoot macros including butterflies,crickets,other insects, flowers and wild fruits, landscapes and saw the rare event of a pair of wild lizards mating right at the start of the mating season
Chennai Photography Club keeps conducting workshops, photoshoots (shuttershoot ) and Photowalks (shutterwalks) twice a month. Be in touch with the chennai photography club by joining our yahoo mailing list
A Group of 8 started at 5.30 sharp and proceeded from the Tiruvanmiyur picking up people one the way in guindy, koyambedu and Annanagar to reach Tada . The Alto kept pace with the swift and met up at the Tiffin house on the way. After a couple of idlis and vada the convoy proceeded all the way to the forest check post.
Leaving our soul in Shutterwalk - Tada Aug 2010
After paying the mandatory fees for the camera, cars and the people we proceeded through the jungle and steep roads with boulders which kept rolling down as we moved up. The Alto had a bit of a struggle in this stretch.
We reached the parking lot by about 8.30 am and were greeted by the sound of the flowing water. The water bottles and the sumptuous rations were distributed among the participants before the start of long walk that we were about to take. Now we had the cannons and the nikons shooting at the crystal clear waters of Ubbalamadugu.
Soon we encountered the butterflies and down we were on the path shooting at eye level with them. Well most of us did not consider being dressed well when we were to be leaving i guess. All of us them got fed up of the butterflies and they got fed up of us. We proceeded the next 15 feet just to encounter a spider that had built a very different nest instead of the web.
Then for the next 1.5 hours we were walking on a sunny path encountering different types of insects, flowers and the like, most of the time the group was on the ground or crouched in the open sun without any shade this was taking a bit of a toll on all of us. While Tada walk by itself is not very difficult try standing in the open sun for such a long time while concentrating on photography and you will realise how strenuous field macro photography really is.
Then came the river crossing, the second till now, take your shoes and socks off camera in bag to avoid it getting wet and move came the orders from the group coordinators. The rocks were slippery but the group was helping each other out to cross the stream and out we were in one piece.
Then came the red fruits and the other insects of the jungle and at last we took a small snack break to have the banana and the orange juice that we were carrying and making sure that put in all the trash back into our bags to take them all the way back. Some time later we encountered the 3rd river crossing this is from where we are in the shade but the going gets tougher as we are now moving along the river walking on the river bank , sometimes in the river frequently crossing the river back and forth just to move ahead. This took its own toll on the body, for photography though there was so many opportunities in the water, the stream and the mini- water falls that we kept encountering.
At around lunch time we decided its now time to head to the target the tada falls and have our quota of the swim, have lunch and head back straight to our cars. About 1/2 hour later we decided enough is enough as the path was getting difficult and the boulders over which we had to climb bigger. It was time to end the trekking and get to our swim. We found an isolated pool and settled down for the swim. Some just crashed without getting in and other enjoyed the clear water of tada.
All was well and we decided to dress up again and have our lunch that was when we encountered the South Indian Rock agama mating. All of us left the eating and rushed to the mating scene with the long lenses. One was as mad as to get as close as a feet with the 18-55 kit lens and take a picture.
Then there we were heading back to the cars as quickly as possible , very tired and just wanting a cup of chai on the way back along with the evening snacks of snack bar , apple and chips.
All is well that ends well but at this point we were all discussing how some part of us was probably back in tada… was it our soul ???
