Sunset over the Pacific and 2007

The sun is setting on 2007... and we head into 2008. These photos were taken about half an hour from our place, at sunset a couple of weeks ago. Given that the Pacific flows South (away from the Arctic) there is often a fair bit of mist around ... we got lucky this day.

Inkaterra Machu Picchu Pueblo

Our hotel in the valley below Machu Picchu was nothing short of spectacular. Our room included a private outdoor daybed and spa (pictured). It also has a large variety of hummingbirds, heliconias, bromeliads and birds such as the Cock-of-the-rock (pictured).






The following is a slideshow of a few of our Peru photos... click through for the album...

Peru - Machu Picchu

After Cusco we spent 3 days in Machu Picchu itself, going all over the ruins and taking about 2000 photos just in Machu Picchu. Naturally there are plenty more nice photos than just these four... see our picasa galleries for more!http://picasaweb.google.com/andrewmitchell1975

Peru - Cusco

At the end of October we went on a short South American adventure to Peru, primarily to visit Machu Picchu. On the way we spent 2 night in Cusco, a city situated deep in a valley at 11,000 feet above sea level! We stayed at the Hotel Monasterio, a converted monastery. These buildings were, without doubt, the oldest I had ever stayed overnight in. Creature comforts in the hotel included Oxygen piped into the rooms so that the lungs received as much Oyxgen as they normally would at 8000 feet.

Andrew's father visits California

My father came over to the US on a work visit and dropped by us on the way back for a week. He is pleased to have received my old canon 300d with a new 28-135mm IS lens and took plenty of photos (though not as many as I did of course). During that time we visited Monterey where these photos were taken.

Trip to Monterey with Canon 40d

I have posted photographs in the past from Monterey aquarium. These are photos from a recent visit. The photos are much nicer now that I have the newly released canon 40d. This is much better than my old camera, particularly at high iso photographs. These photographs feature jellyfish, a sunfish, and a shark in high detai.

Bay area wildlife

These four photos show the variety of wildlife that can been seen in the bay area on a weekend. All 4 shots were taken over a two day span in September 2007... migrating Egrets, deer, phesants and hawks...

Margaret tries braids

Margaret wanted to try African-American braids, however doing her whole head would have taken 18 hours. So she opted for a dozen small braids. The red and purple you can see is fake hair. She doesn't think she will ever do it again as even this took 2 hours.

2007 Visit to Sydney

In May 2007 we visited Sydney to spend a few ays with family and renew visas. If anything I was surprised by how little has changed in Sydney.

Skiing in the USA, 2007

This year Margaret and I went on a ski trip to Sqaw valley (in addition to my company's traditional ski trip). We had a great couple of days' skiing. This was Margaret's first experience of skiing in the US.
A large amount of snow fell while we were there, which made for nice powder skiing... as well as several hours driving in chains through a winter wonderland.
We were lucky that we came home when we did... some friends who left the same resort 30 minutes after us didn't get home until 14 hours after us due to heavy traffic and road closures!

Family visit Autumn 2006

Just as we were heading into winter, my father paid his first visit to us in Silicon Valley. We spent a weekend at Lake Tahoe where it wasn't quite winter enough to snow, but at least it wasn't winter enough to make driving difficult!

We also spend some time showing my father the sights of San Francisco.