Iain Leitch Photography

Most people when they think of a beaver they think about the North, that's what I though too until I saw one right before my eyes in the Avon river. I was down by the river tying to get pictures of kingfishers, which I did but there not all that good so you won't be seeing those, I was walking along the river bank looking up in the trees for the kingfishers, I then heard a splash and looked to see some water splash up and thought it was a kingfisher taking a bath but it was a beaver eating on a fallen branch. I at first thought it was a muskrat as I did not think beavers lived on this river at all but I guess I was wrong as I got proof beavers do live here.

Last night it was clear without any clouds so i figured i might go out and try my luck trying to make star tails. I moved down to my neighbors driveway because that was the darkest part of the street, pointed my camera up at a group of stars, set my shutter speed at 30, f/4.5 and ISO at 1600, I then set up my remote shutter as not to move the camera on the tripod in anyway and went away at it I took 16 shots of 30 seconds each for a total of 8 minutes of photos. I then used StarStaX which is a program that can stack images on top of one another for free. I combined my 16 images and got a pretty decent photo. I then went over to Adobe Photoshop Express and messed with the light and dark and clarity. This is my good copy of my first attempt at star tails. I plan on doing much more of this.

One day I was outside and I thought that I saw a leaf beside a flower pot so I went to pick it up but then it moved and it turned out to be a moth. Normally when I see a moth they are no bigger then a loonie but this one was the size of a maple leaf. I got a couple pictures of it but this is my favorite one. It was there for about 3/4 of the day but then I went outside and it wasn't there. Then i found its wings over my front step with the body no where to be found. I assume ants got it and cut off its wings and took the body to the ant hill.

For the last two days of the trip we were in the capital of Croatia, the city of Zagreb. We toured around the city the first day and that is where I took the three photos I'm showing here. The first photo is of a stature/fountain just outside a cathedral. This cathedral is the only cathedral where the two towers are no the same height. The second photo is of a building I thought looked nice and to show the street lights they use here. The final picture is of a church on a square beside the parliament and prime ministers office. The church roof is made up of tiles showing the crest of Zagreb and the crest of Croatia.

On the seventh day of the trip we left the city of Split and drove up to Plitvice Lakes National park and toured the park for a couple hours. The park is famous for its many lakes and waterfalls. They have 16 lakes in the park and each is a different level then the one bellow it so the water gets to the next lake by waterfall. The waterfalls in the most case are not huge but maybe on average two meters tall. The tallest one i saw was maybe 30 meters tall and that was going straight down a cliff. The park is a UNESCO world heritage site and was created in 1949. It is home to European brown bears, wolfs, deer and many other small mammals it has many birds and is mostly beach forest. It was by far my favorite place of the trip even better then Dubrovnik. The water in this park is stunning it is blue as all get out and so clear. There are also so many fish in the water because people are not aloud to fish or swim in these lakes.

On the sixth day of my trip we went to the town of split and stayed a night in a hotel there. I didn't find the town all that photogenic so that is why there are only three pictures I chose to put up here. Split is on the site of an Roman Palace that an emperor built to stay in after he retired from being the emperor. The first picture is of inside the palace of a church window. I thought it looked atsy so here you go. The second picture is a mural of the local soccer team in Split. In the towns of Split and Zagreb they are very passionate about there soccer teams and its best not to talk about them. The final picture is of the Church tower inside the palace that was built in the middle ages.

On the 5th day of this trip we were in the town of Dubrovnik again to climb the walls. The old par of the town is completely walled in and the walls are some of the best looked after in the world. We went up the walls and you can see the bay, overlook the town with all the houses covered in the red roofs. It is an beautiful place and I highly recommend going there.

On the fourth day of the trip we went to the city of Dubrovnik which is a UNESCO site. The old part of the city is walled in and no one has every successfully invaded the city. The first picture is of a church right when you walk in through the main gate of the city. The second picture is looking down one of the many small alleyways of the city. Most of the alleyways are no wider then an average persons arm length. The third picture is of an old church which is now a bank. Growing out of the pot above the door way is an Cyprus tree. The tour guide said that it was 200 years old. The next picture is of the main church inside the city walls. The next two photo's is of  the sunset from our hotel. One is overlooking the gardens down to the sea the other one is overlooking the pool down to the sea. The seventh photo is of a small boat in the harbor in the city. To me it looked like the perfect boat to have. The final picture is of one of the many cats that roam the streets inside the w

On the third day of my trip we left Rome and took a bus down to Pompeii, in the first picture it is of and store front which was there version of fast food. In the second picture is the change room for the Roman baths, the next picture is of an water fountain which was feed by and aqueduct then into a lead pipe. Next up is a picture of the main square of the town looking at the volcano that destroyed the town. The next picture is of a plaster cast of a man that was buried then killed in the ash, when people were digging up the town they would stumble upon cavity's in the ground and they filled them with plaster and they turned out to be the spaces were people were. The next one is of a road in the town they would have these three stones across for people to walk on because the roads were often full of human waste. The next one is overlooking some of the ruins of Pompeii and the volcano. The final picture is of the port of Bari as I was boarding the ferry to go to Croatia. 

 On the second day of my trip we went to see the Vatican, the Piata Navona, the Pantheon and the Victor Emmanuel II Monument again. The first photo I took well waiting in line at to get in the Vatican. they were all waiting for a traffic light to turn green and they lined up perfectly with each other. The next photo was looking out into some garden in the Vatican museum, it's the one with the giant pine cone at the other end. The next photo is looking above a doorway inside the Vatican museum. Next picture is looking up at the balcony the pope stands on when he gives his speeches. After that photo is one of the Swiss guard and after that is looking back at the Basilica. Then when we were in Piata Navona I spied a pigeon sitting on top of a statue of a pigeon. Then comes the Pantheon which looks better outside then inside in my opinion.  Then is the Victor Emmanuel II Monument from a different view.  All pictures were taken with S 1/500, F 8 and ISO Auto.

I haven't been posting over the last 12 or so days because I was in Europe on a school trip. The first place we went was to Rome. We went to the Colosseum and toured that then down to the Roman Forum and did a tour of that. I saw the lizard in the Roman Forum the church was just on the outside of the Forum and then we walked down to the Vittorio Emmanuel II Monument which was huge.