I love the sea, for many reasons. I love the soothing sound of small waves reaching shore after having travelled thousands of miles from distant places. I love its produces: please do wake me up for lobster. I love the sweet memories of fishing marlin with my father. And I love the fact that it’s hardly possible not to take an interesting image. This here’s the North Sea at the end of the day when the rain had just passed and the setting sun was breaking through on the horizon. I love the sea.

Last weekend we spent a few hours at the southernmost stretch of coast of the Netherlands. Arriving back at our car the first splats of rain started dropping and mere minutes later visibility was down to 10 meters. The torrential rain and accompanying storm that has flooded big parts of the UK had finally arrived on the mainland.

Yup, the Mack is Back. Kind of refers to the fact that my own internet connection will arrive shortly; in the meantime I’m virtually exploring the local community by illegally tapping into an unsecured wifi connection of some neighbour. The past months brought me to our new home in Brussels, a private air show by Saab in Sweden and the northern parts of Italy, amongst others. The 25 second exposure that you see above and which has been made a gazillion times before, is obviously taken in overcrowded, noisy, smelly, hot and humid, but oh so beautiful Venice. I’ll try and post an accompanying “been there, done that” image of Tuscany sometime next week…

Or does it? Look at the tranquility of the scene above. Wonderful, isn’t it, with the gentle waves rolling onto a mostly deserted stretch of beach at Scheveningen. Then click here. The same beach, the same sunny day and only 50 meters away: a shovel lying in the sand amidst tracks of heavy vehicles, preparing the beach for the onslaught of tourism and a butt-ugly pier in the background. So, yes: a photo never lies… but it doesn’t necessarily tell the whole truth either.

The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Well: eat this! The top room, second from the right, was ours for three nights and I had to dive into the pool with some €5000 worth of gear hanging from my neck to provide you with this image. Place of crime: Bali. Just to make you feel better: I’m back, it snows outside and it’s 45° colder.

In my previous entry I wrote I’m better suited for warmer climates. Well, I really hate to break the news to you, but we’re heading there for some serious R&R. That means no updates on this site until somewhere in February. Til then & have fun in the meantime!

Imagine sitting on a speedboat, racing across the waters of the port of Rotterdam at more than 80 km/h (for the American readers: more than 50 mph), camera in hand, not strapped in, boat jumping up, down, left and right when you hit the waves, terribly hung-over, taking images of another boat. Got the picture? That’s what I call fun. And a “quickie”.

There are hidden spots of beauty to be found all over the Netherlands. The spot where I took this image, tucked away up north in the province of Friesland, would definitely be one of them and watching the sun set from a small boat in the middle of the lake added another touch of magic. Quite a pleasant change from hectic Parisian life.

What can I say except: we were on vacation and this is how that looks like in the south of France, in this case in the quaint old port of Cassis that I can heartily recommend. And nope, that ain’t me in the picture: such is the fate of the photographer.

Less is more, in photography as in life itself. Were we to appreciate the simple things in this world better, life would be more rewarding than it often is in this day and age. At least, that was one of my lessons learned from the recent suicide of a friend. Hence I present you an image of some of the simpler things: sunlight reflected in water underneath a running tap. Making it even simpler would result in it being art and thus make it more complex again.