Back to the Roots :)

I made the last photos with my 18-200VR lens this year in January. Its been in my spare photo bag ever since, I haven't used the lens for half a year because I've been quite happy to carry the "big equipment" with me in my backpack. So, despite earlier thoughts, I decided to sell the lens.

And I immediately regretted it. Soon after I made the decision to sell it and found a friendly buyer, the mountain hiking season started "for real" in July with a week off from work - and oh my, carrying all that stuff with me in the summer heat is really exhausting.

I always had the 12-24mm wideangle zoom and the 70-300mm VR tele zoom with me, supplemented with the 50mm/1.8 - together with the camera body, extra battery, filters, clothes (rain cover etc. is a must if you go into the mountains - you never know how fast the weather changes...), lunch and water the total weight easily adds up to something like 10kg.

On my first hike I even had the tripod with me - and I didn't even use it! Stupid either way. :-) On the second hike I left the tripod in the car - better. On the third hike I had enough of the weight. I thought to leave the camera at home, but instead I picked the super-duper plastic 28-80mm zoom lens and just the camera (with fully charged battery:-). The 28-80's front lens rotates while focussing, so polarizer was not very useful anyway.

What can I say? It was fun! Of course I felt somewhat limited with the single lens, but the light weight made the hike much more enjoyable (that why I partly regret selling the 18-200VR now!). And it was "back to the roots" for me because the 28-80mm was the first lens that I ever used, on the borrowed Nikon D70 that infected me with DSLR and photography fever. :-)

Here's one of the photos from the hike on Sunday (more to follow in my web album later):


Pine Roots (FinePix S5Pro, 1/230s @ ISO 100; f/8, 28 mm DX)

And: needless to say that I learned something again that I want to share here: even if you don't want to carry all the equipment up to a mountain peak - take it with you, keep it in the car so that you have it ready! I left all my other lenses and accessories at home that day (of course, this might be the safe path because you never know if someone breaks into your car etc.) - and on the way home I came along the Weitsee once more and the light way just lovely... but without tripod and telephoto lens, it was no good... :-/