This next post sees an overnight stay in a cabin ontop of a mountain with very changeable weather and lighting. Thankfully I had a roll of trustworthy Kodak Porta 400 to deal with changing conditions.
We stumbled upon Nesselwang and this amazing lodge (Böck lodges) on top of a mountain quite by accident. Following our “non planning” holiday we were in for a surprise when we took the cable car up to Nesselwang lodge, with 4 separate large cabins and a large restaurant and visitors area underneath. The funny thing is that at 6pm the staff all finish up and head back down the mountain, leaving you alone on the mountain until 8am the next day. It is quite an experience to be up there pretty much alone and it is hard not to start thinking of The Shining or something similar. We enjoyed it so much we stayed for two nights, there is something really special about being disconnected from everything and just being near nature. All shots below taken with my Nikonos camera and a roll of Kodak Porta 400.
A quick collection the cable car up the mountain and an unnecessary amount of tree photographs. The landscapes were really quite breathtaking and hard to replicate on 35mm film (where is my large format camera when I really need it?!).
Cropped version of the above. The amazing thing about these cows is that they were pretty much free to roam most places on the mountain and ended up in vertical inclines that you would just not expect them to be on!
Oh and the cowbell sounds go on all night long! Apparently they are part of “Bavarian culture”. Check out this failed lawsuit against cowbells: link here.
I am so impressed with this photograph. Not from my composition, but from how well the film managed the high contrast. This was taking early morning before breakfast, I would have expected the sky to be completely blown out but was pleasantly surprised to see quite a bit of colour.
I love the colours and brightness in this shot. Taken before the cable car opened so there was no one on the mountain.
More Bavarian landscapes. I am not going to comment much further :-)
The lodge used old cable cars to create individual mini-cabins for people to eat in. This was taken when everyone had left and we were alone in the lodge and the weather turned bad very quickly.
I liked the colours in this shot, although it did not come out as vividly as I would have liked as it was cloudy when we left the mountain.
Overall observations
I am glad I saved a roll of Kodak Portra 400. It really comes into its own with good lighting, but is also extremely versatile in dealing with scenes of high contrast. This was quite a brief post because there isn’t that much to comment about numerous tree photographs. It really was a great experience and I look forward to visiting this part of Bavaria again.
Thanks for stopping by!
Neil
