The Daily Telegraph - Saturday - Travel
Capture the world on your camera
Emma Thomson picks the best tours to help you hone your photography skills, in locations from the Sahara to Svalbard
As noon approached and we jiggled across the grasslands back to camp, we crossed paths where dozens of 4x4s were lined up in military fashion. Bursting from their rooftops were travellers all fixated on a hyena some way off. It struck me how special my own experience was, just four of us, having those early, quiet hours to ourselves, watching the sky warm from purple to fiery orange.
Without a strict sightseeing schedule, we could wait as long as need be for that rhino to reveal more of itself than just an immense leathery rump. There was time to see small yet significant events: a beetle rolling its dung boulder home; the electric-blue flash of a lilac-breasted roller flitting through the thorny acacia trees; and the graceful curve of snake tracks etched in the sand. We were able to see more deeply.
This ability to notice the small details is one of the skills I honed on a photography-themed tour. Tired of taking mediocre travel photographs and determined to master the basics, I booked a course based in Tanzania’s Serengeti National Park.
I couldn’t have asked for a more creative classroom. There were nerves at first. Revealing your first tentative attempts is akin to showing your primary school teacher your first finger painting; you are eager for praise. But our tutor cut through our shyness by getting us to focus on jazzing up our composition, not just positioning the animal in the middle of the frame; on panning the camera to create a sense of movement; and on discovering how details, a zebra’s stripes for instance, can have more impact than capturing the whole beast.
Granted, opportunities were missed on the first few days as we adapted to selecting the correct aperture and shutter speed. But then, a few days in, we encountered a lioness basking in the long grass. We waited: cameras poised, breath baited. Suddenly, she turned and stared straight down the barrel of our lenses. Thrilling sightings of giraffe and buffalo followed which might have eclipsed my memory of the encounter, but thanks to a little training I had clicked my camera at the right moment, with the right settings, so I’d forever be able to stare into those burning amber eyes.
In a world of travel that delivers notable images every second, it’s always worth acquiring a few new skills with the camera. Here is a selection of the most exciting photographic tours currently on offer, to help upgrade your holiday photos from commonplace to conversation pieces.
Big cats
Whisper Pantanal in the ear of any animal lover and he or she will quiver with joy. Located in south-west Brazil, the world’s largest tropical wetlands (10 times the size of Florida’s Everglades) are home to more than 1,000 bird species, as well as giant otter, tapir, anaconda, caiman, capybara and southern tamandua. However, the highlight is the healthiest population of jaguars found anywhere on Earth – and tours offer consistently good chances of spotting and photographing them on the banks of the Paraguay River.
Exodus (020 3131 2008; exodus.co.uk) has an 11-day Land of the Jaguar tour which costs from £4,049 per person, including flights, accommodation, meals, transport and tuition with expert wildlife photographer Paul Goldstein. Regular departures.
Desert dreams
Sahara. The very name conjures up creativity. In locations calling to mind movie classics such as Lawrence of Arabia and Gladiator, photographers can start by capturing the snake charmers and souks of Marrakesh and then move deeper into the dunes where subject matter ranges from nomadic Bedouin camel herders and Tuareg tea ceremonies to ancient gnawa musicians beating goatskin drums and unforgettable sunsets and sunrises. The myriad forms of the dunes are subjects in themselves.
Creative Escapes (020 7111 1293; creativeescapes.co.uk) offers a 10-day Saharan Retreat with departures annually in November and March. It costs £2,095 per person and includes all accommodation, transport, tours, transfers and tuition.
Scottish safari
The mirror-like lochs, lightly snow-capped peaks and heatherlaced hills and moorlands of the Cairngorms – a mountain range in the highlands of Scotland – are ideal for landscape photography and conceal a wealth of wildlife, too, from golden eagle and snowy owl to red deer, pine marten, otter, the elusive wildcat and the only herd of reindeer in the British Isles. Granted it will probably rain, but dramatic plays of light usually follow.
Naturetrek (01962 733 051; naturetrek. co.uk) offers a new five-day Birds and Mammals of the Cairngorms tour departing on March 30 2017. It costs £1,195 per person, including accommodation, tuition and meals, but not flights.
Wild Svalbard
The Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard (previously known as Spitsbergen) is most famous for its polar bears, which outnumber humans on the island. However, its moss-laced tundra, wind and waterhewn glaciers and paintbox houses in the main town of Longyearbyen make for intriguing photo opportunities. As a bonus, during summer the midnight sun provides photographers with 24 hours of continuous daylight.
Photo Iconic has teamed up with Norwegian specialist Hurtigruten (020 3553 2516; hurtigruten.co.uk) to launch a new nine-day Spitsbergen expedition departing on June 10 2017. It costs from £2,885 per person, including flights, boat sailings, accommodation and tuition with the founder of Travel Photographer of the Year (tpoty.com), Chris Coe.
Easter Island
If you’re travelling this far, you will want to make sure you get a good set of photographs to document the experience. Easter Island – one of the most isolated in the world, located 2,337 miles west of Chile – is famed for its monumental stone Moai statues that appear to stare solemnly out to sea. A photography tour will get you there before the crowds to ensure the most atmospheric images and the best angles. It will also allow you to spend longer snapping the statues, ceremonial sites, caves and rock carvings – which are still being excavated and studied to discover their purpose and meaning.
Responsible Travel (01273 823700; responsibletravel.com) arranges tailor-made photography tours of the island costing from £4,116 per person, including transport, accommodation, tuition but not flights.
Exotic India
Rajasthan – India’s largest and most colourful state – is full of palaces, forts, carved temples and a plethora of interesting faces to photograph. Among the highlights are visits to the Blue City of Jodhpur, whose predominantly blue walls provide an eyecatching backdrop for portrait photography, and the Pink City of Jaipur which comes to life at sunrise and sunset when the light hits its sandstone buildings. Meanwhile, the five-day Pushkar Camel Fair attracts a chaotic gathering that will provide plenty of action shots, as vendors trade their dromedaries and compete for the matka phod (longest moustache).
High Places (0114 352 0060; highplaces. co.uk) has a new 15-day Indian Photographic Odyssey – Rajasthan departing November 5 2016. It costs from £2,995 per person including flights, transfers, accommodation, meals and tuition but not visas.
Gorgeous Gozo
The lesser-visited little sister to Malta, the island of Gozo is the same size as Manhattan and gets a mention in Homer’s Odyssey – as the rumoured home of the nymph Calypso who fell in love with Odysseus. It offers a range of photographic material, thanks to the island’s fiestas, horse races, carnivals, concerts, market squares in the capital Rabat, azure bays and the Unesco-listed Ggantija temples which are among the world’s oldest free-standing structures.
Artisan Travel (01670 785085; artisan travel.co.uk) offers a new four-night Delights of Gozo break from £895 per person, including flights transfers, accommodation, meals and activities. Regular departures. Picture perfect: a lion in the Serengeti, top; houses in Svalbard, Norway, above; a close encounter at Pushkar Camel Fair, below right; and women in traditional dress in Rajasthan, below
Bear necessities
Squeezed between Italy, Austria, Croatia and Hungary, Slovakia is often overlooked. Yet this mostly mountainous republic is home to the wolf, boar, lynx, Ural owl and brown bear, 450 of which prowl its karst and forest. Concealed inside secure and discreet hides, you can photograph the bears in their natural habitat without disturbing them.
Tatra Photography (0161 408 8988; tatraphotographyworkshops.com)has a four-day Wild Brown Bears tour departing in May and April 2017. It costs from £849 including half-board accommodation and tuition with Ben Hall – winner of the British Wildlife Photography Awards.
Italian wild west
Abruzzo is one of Italy’s least-visited regions. It’s also Europe’s greenest, thanks to three national parks that cover a third of its area and are home to wolves, wild boar and Marsican brown bears. Ancient villages coil themselves around the hillsides, medieval hermitages cling to cliff edges like swallows’ nests, castles perch on mountaintops – but the highlight is arguably the Campo Imperatore, a swathe of undulating grassland nicknamed “Little Tibet”, which, in the springtime, is a riot of wildflowers frequented by horned Maremmana cows with tinkling bells around their necks. The location is so similar to the American prairies that production companies filmed Spaghetti Westerns here. Frui (020 8123 4559; frui.co.uk) has a seven-day Abruzzo trip departing July 21 2017. It costs £1,599 per person, including accommodation, half-board meals, transfers, tuition and activities such as truffle hunting. Flights cost extra.