PHOTO-A-DAY CHALLENGE
A Week of Office Views
Week 96 of the photographic documentary of my daily life
Right after getting back from the short road trip to Sweden, we got straight into a busy week at work. That busy I didn’t even take a single picture outside of work for the first few days.
And now, it’s Monday evening. I’m sitting on the laptop, sipping on a glass of my dad’s wine while reading through an endless list of stories. Yes, I’ve gathered more than 60 stories in my reading list. Even though I had set a limit of 30. I just didn’t have the time to read. And when I did have time, I just added more stories.
We just closed off on a long weekend. This Monday was a public holiday here in Germany, and therefore we were working as well (Mondays are usually our official off days).
Wednesday night, we got back from Sweden. Thursday starts my week on the photo-a-day challenge. And from Thursday until Monday, I only have pictures of my office views to share with you.
They might be cool. They might be terrifying to some. And they are my daily bread. It’s what I earn a living from.
Jumping out of planes.
Here we go. Not many days go past in Germany without a cloud in the sky. But unless they pile up, we don’t mind them and just jump through the cushion-soft white fluff.
This picture was taken on the ride up to altitude.
It takes us about 15 minutes to get to 13,000 feet (4,000 meters). Within those 15 minutes, I have to calm down my passenger, get us jump-ready and yawn about 20 times (don’t tell anyone, it’s the lack of oxygen and not that I get bored up there).
The next day the clouds were gone, and we had endless views across northern Germany.
No, they don’t have mountains up here. And yes, it’s what I miss the most.
I guess this might have been what Dennett meant with “boundless beauty,” but I’m going to share some different endless views in a separate post addressing the prompt.
Another day at work. Another day of jumping out of planes. And another day of controlling my passengers while falling at approximately 220kph towards the earth.
This is my focused face.
Thank you, sunglasses, you help me still look cool.
Below you can see the closest town to where we live. It’s not a big city but has all we need and is only 5 kilometers away from the trailer park we live in.
And this is happiness shining through my sunglasses.
I took a 14-year-old boy on a skydive, and he and his parents question to me was what I will do if the parachute doesn’t open.
“I’ll pull the reserve, my second parachute.”
And then they asked what I would do if that one doesn’t open. I didn’t say it, but that case is as likely as the scenario that someone will drive head-on into them on the highway, or wait, actually less than that. Because people do that on purpose. Drive on the highway in the wrong direction.
So, I don’t know.
My second parachute will open.
But let me ask you: This is what you worry about, and you still signed up for a skydive for your son? Honestly, if I wasn’t into skydiving and had children, I surely wouldn’t let them jump out of a plane with a stranger. Not with those worries in mind.
And as you can see, our parachute did open, and the boy had lots of fun under the parachute. I gave him the steering lines to make some turns, and he loved it.
If you look closely at the image, you can see my home, the trailer park, right underneath his right hand.
That same day I still did a student jump. Meaning I took a student up on his second solo jump ever. It was late in the afternoon, and the sun was shining through the clouds.
The student had opened his parachute, I fell a bit further, opened my chute, and then turned towards the sun. I had my camera mounted to my chest but really wanted to take a picture of the beautiful scenery as I was thinking of sharing it with you, my readers.
I left my steering toggles, twisted the camera for a moment, and took two pictures. The only ones so far I took with the intention of adding them to the photo-a-day challenge.
Yes, I think of you while flying.
And no, this is not what it really looked like. Once again, the picture doesn't do justice to what it really felt and looked like up there.
Monday was coming up, and we were getting a bit tired. Some of the staff were getting sick but still pushing through.
We were expecting thick cloud cover and rainstorms later that afternoon, and I took this photo above the clouds in the morning just before reaching our jumping altitude of 13,000 feet.
Since we worked Monday, we got Tuesday off instead and after all those office views and skydiving-related pictures, I’m sharing today more than one. Outside the skies.
I was a busy bee as my husband was saying. He had announced already in the morning he was planning to do absolutely nothing, so I didn’t even bother him if he wanted to join me for a paddle session.
After a late breakfast, I jumped in the car and headed to the small pond where I could easily access one of the nearby canals. Just before reaching my parking lot, I spotted two storks in the open field.
The farmers had cut the grass, and this is the storks' favorite time of the month. One of the two was close to the farmland road I was on, but he didn’t seem to get bothered by my arrival. I stopped the car, pulled out my camera, and was able to take a few decent photographs.
Just a few minutes later, I was back in my element. On the water. With my paddleboard. And in case you are thinking the water looks dirty and polluted, you’re right and wrong at the same time.
It is dirty but not the way you think. The white grease on the river is actually fluff. Pollen. It’s late springtime here in Germany and it’s snowing all around. Seeds are flying from the trees, bushes, and grasslands.
And, of course, all those pollen need to settle down eventually, somewhere. Also on the water.
It was a difficult paddle since the wind was starting to pick up as I was preparing to launch the board. I chose to go against the wind at first to have it easier once I got tired and had to paddle back.
But I didn’t plan with the wind. It was very unlikely but still a possible event and it did happen. Just as I decided to turn around, so did the wind. And I had a headwind again.
I was fighting on my way back, I tell you that.
But before I fully turned the paddle, I stopped to capture these lovely water lilies. I still wasn’t brave enough to take my good DSLR on the water and captured the flowers with the GoPro as everything else.
And no, this wasn’t enough exercise for my off day. I had spotted big, red poppy flower seeds from the air and had planned to inspect them from closer on my off day.
We never flew directly above them, which made it difficult for me to determine the exact location of these fields.
Late in the afternoon, I strapped on my rollerblades and headed out. Skating through the countryside looking for poppy flower fields.
I didn't find the big fields but a few smaller ones. And I got this picture of poppy flowers shining in the last light of the day. Not too bad, I would say.
Wednesday we were back to work but since the first customers were booked for 11 am, I had some time in the morning to catch up with my reading list (it had now grown to 80 stories ).
I also grabbed my camera and walked a few meters into the forest next to our trailer park. I can hear the birds while lying in bed. But here in the forest, their songs just appeared so much louder and clearer.
I was hoping to photograph a bird or two but with these incredibly tall pine trees, the birds were high above my head in the tree tops.
Just as I wanted to give up and I heard a weak screaming. And some chirping. Something from a smaller bird. Something that sounded like it came from the bushes in front of me.
The hunt began. At first, I just kept on hearing the soft voices of the chicks and then spotted the mother bird flying off the ground onto a nearby tree. Eventually, I identified some logs as the home of this family and remained patient until I got a few decent pictures of one of the hatchlings.
Proud of my result, even though it was nothing near the great bird photographs fellow writers like Erika Burkhalter, Dennett or Randy Runtsch are sharing with us on this platform, I turned around, copied the pictures onto my tablet, and sent my mom an example of it requesting the species.
This time, I did have a bird species in mind. I don’t know many birds, but the “Zaunkönig” being one of the smallest birds I’ve ever seen, I was sure this must be one of them.
While waiting for my mom’s reply, I did some research on this bird. I was rather disappointed to find out the English name for this bird is “Eurasian wren” since the German word for this proud bird is “king of the fence”.
They are known to have their nests well hidden, which would explain why it took me so long to locate the young ones. They build their homes in the undergrowth or on bushes but also in wall cracks.
The Eurasian wren, often just called wren in anglophone Europe, is the only member of his family to be found in Eurasia or Africa. The adult bird only reaches 9 to 10 cm (3,5 to 3,9 in) in length and weighs around 10g.
And here comes the reply from my mom. I was right. It is a wren. Or how I say:
“King of the fence”
This has been my week in photographs. 7 days. 7 photographs. Anyone can join. Once. Or weekly. It doesn’t matter. We welcome everyone! Dennett started this photography challenge in 2020 and many have participated ever since.
Erika / Eileen / K. Barrett / Juan / David / Mia / Susan / LensAfield / Kim / Barbara / Diana / Barb / Sandra / Shruthi / Ellie / Pene / Olive / Gustavo / Jane / Penny / Jillian
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