Adam Monk Photo Tours & Images Gallery

There is a lovely small Monastery I always visit on my Bhutan Photographic tours each year, on the slopes of the Phobjikha Valley in Western Bhutan.  Normally it’s very quiet and serene with just a few peaceful Monks and a stunning view down the valley.  As I have been going there for quite a few years, we usually get invited in to photograph the morning prayers in the small temple, a special privilege not normally granted (see this post). Not this year.

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Last weekend, almost straight after returning from Bhutan, I went on a trip to the town of Quairading, in the wheat belt of WA with 60 other photographers… It was a weekend away organised by the WAPF, the West Australian Photographic Federation, and specifically by Ric & Ailsa McDonald from the GEM Camera Club.  I have been promising to go on one of their photographic weekends for years, but I always seem to be out of the country on an expedition of my own when the WAPF weekends come around.  Well finally I was around for one, so I went, jet lag and post Bhutan tour exhaustion and all!

A few minutes after the previous image at the Ura Valley festival in Bhutan.  Really it’s just the same post split into two.

I always go off on my Bhutan photo tours with the best intentions to write Blog entries as I travel with new images daily.  Occasionally it works out as planned and I put up the odd entry as I travel…  Not this time, not even one entry.  I think this was a result of pretty hopeless internet, and a tour group who were so enthusiastic to do and see everything that I was run ragged every day.  By the time we were finished for the evening it was all I could do to drag myself to bed!

I also embarrassed to say that I have barely looked at my images from that trip, again as a result of too little time, or at least the desire to sleep during whatever time I had.

This image is of two of my Bhutanese guides, Tshering (on the right) and Kezang, having a laugh with some local kids at the festival in Ura Valley, it’s a candid shot facing away from the action of the dancers at the festival.  Shot on a Nikon D810 and the 24-70mm f2.8 lens

I’m in a hotel in Bangkok on my way to Bhutan for this months 15 day photo tour to Bhutan.  Got to get up at 3am tomorrow morning for the flight to Paro which should take about 4.5 hours, including the stop at Guwahati airport in India.  Last time we got stuck on the runway in India for about 6 hours waiting for the fog to lift from the Paro Valley so the pilot could see the runway and not actually crash into the mountains.

It’s certainly an exciting descent, going through 3 valleys with the edges of the cliffs brushing the wingtips… Not the sort of thing you would want to do if the valleys are filled with dense fog!  Anyway, the 6 hours on the runway turned out to be very interesting as we were in the plane with about half the government of Bhutan (in economy class), who seemed to be a lovely humble bunch who were more than happy to chat to the wide eyed curious foreigners about the working of their little Himalayan country.

I can’t say I’m actually hoping it will happen again, 6 hours in sweltering Assam province of India in a metal tube in the baking sun with no A/C was not something I am keen to repeat, but still, sometimes the most amazing things can come out of trying circumstances.

What does all this have to do with the image I am posting?  Nothing really, other than it was shot in Bhutan and I am on my way there now…

The image is actually of a young novice Monk studying his lessons in the tenuous warmth of the early morning sun at the Gangtey Goemba, a tiny Monastery in Central Bhutan in the Phobjikha Valley