Monday, June 18, 2012

Cape St. Mary's



I've finally made progress in the studio.  In the clean up part anyway.  I've even found things I was looking for months back!

On the painting front, its been slower going, but you simply trade off one thing for another, don't you?  This past weekend I went to Cape St. Mary's Ecological Reserve to photograph the nesting gannets there.  Its a 1.4km hike over the cliff trail that is a bit rough in parts, but you end up overlooking the nesting site, Birdrock and are literally 10 or 20 feet away from thousands and thousands of Northern gannets.


I don't do heights and cliffs well, so for me this was a little heart in mouth at times, but I managed and got some great photos.  The weather cooperated with sun there which helped a lot, as its so often foggy there on the edge of the southern shore.


There were herring gulls and several types of murres there as well, but the gannets outnumbered them all.   They are unique birds and I love their pale ochre heads and that wonderful blue eye ring.  Last year I completed a painting of  a gannet flying over the ocean - Vertigo.  Now I have lots of resource material for new pieces.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Ooh, how beautiful! Are you going to do some paintings from Birdrock? That would be awesome! (hint hint)

Gary L. Everest said...

Hi Jeanette,
Thanks for sharing this wonderful glimpse of the incredible natural beauty of Newfoundland.
Congratulations on surviving the cliff-edge hike, too! You're a brave and hearty soul.
Sincerely,
Gary.

Jennifer Rose said...

very cool :)
must have been very loud o.0

Jeanette Jobson said...

It is a lovely spot Katherine. And yes lots of inspiration for some paintings of it.

Gary, perched on top of a cliff with a little sign saying 'unstable edge' never instills confidence in me. But the views were wonderful. Glad you enjoyed them.

It was fairly loud, but not overly so, perhaps due to the fact they were nesting and not flying around as much as they would normally. The smell was a little high too...

Unknown said...

Nice to see some of your photos.