I had a
strong desire to visit Himalayas and roam in the wilderness of nature sometime
in my life. The opportunity had come in
the form of advanced workshop of Nikon School.
Though I was still fiddling with the basics of NikonD I decided to
attend the Advanced workshop just to visit the roof of the world. Ladakh in Leh of Jammu Kashmir state of India
is a beautiful place with its Karakoram Himalayan ranges and lakes and
rivers. It is a cold desert with scanty
vegetation.
 |
| My first attempt |
My visit was
from 28th September to 2nd October. That is the time when temperatures start
falling and visitors/tourists visits are low.
The travel experience and photography sessions with Nikon mentors are
unforgettable memory to be cherished forever.
As part of landscape photography we were asked one day to photograph
night skies – Milky Way and star trails.
I was afraid of going out in cold nights. I decided to skip that session. But one of the young enthusiastic budding photographers
who was having supper sitting beside me enquired what I was going to do that
night. I said I am afraid of cold and
will go to sleep. She said, ‘Looking at you
I can say that the chance of visiting this place by you in future is
minimal. Why don’t you enjoy and click
some pictures of night sky. You cannot
have such wonderful opportunity again.
It’s a matter of fifteen minutes to half an hour. Just don’t miss’.
 |
| Mentor checked and corrected the settings |
At the same
time one of the guys had already gone out to click few pictures of Milk way and
started showing to everyone in the group.
The pictures were awesome and I decided that I too should have few
photographs of night skies at Pangong TSo.
 |
| My attempt trying composition |
With the
help of mentors I could click few pictures of Milky Way. As a child I vaguely remember seeing Milky Way
as my elder sister pointing at some group of stars. But for the first time I saw the beautiful
sky with stars, an amazing view never to forget in my life. I feel grateful to the young lady who
encouraged me to spend few minutes in the wilderness of cold nature amidst
mountains, lake and starry skies.
 |
| One more attempt |
