I’ve wanted to photograph a wedding in Guernsey ever since I read The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society and this article. So when I received an email from Helen last year with the subject “Wedding in Guernsey!” I was pretty stoked. After a few email exchanges, my visit to Guernsey was booked.
You might wonder just where is Guernsey? It’s one of the British Channel Islands, although they are closer to France geographically.
Now about Helen and Tom. Their first date involved a late night chat, an impromptu late night stroll on the beach and then watching the sunrise together. Couldn’t have been more perfect. They love to travel and spent a year travelling the world together.
The wedding day started with the boys having a (very cold) swim at the beach. So fun! Because you can only legally get married in a church in Guernsey, they found Ste Apolline Chapel that dates back to the 14th century, and got married with 15 of their nearest & dearest in attendance. Then a reception followed at Fairfield with a big marquee, lawn games, yummy food, music & dancing. We took their wedding portraits along the stunning southeastern coast, where the landscape inspired Renoir to create a series of paintings, and was also Victor Hugo’s favourite picnic spot.
It was truly a beautiful day with many memorable moments. But I think Tom’s speech will forever go down in history as one of the funniest Groom speeches (at least in my opinion). I was laughing so hard at some points that it was hard to take photos.
Thank you Helen & Tom, for inviting me to share in your beautiful day, for welcoming me so warmly, and for trusting me to tell your story!
In July I photographed a Venice honeymoon portrait session for Hieu and Alex. Hieu and Alex are from the U.S. (Georgia and San Fran). They were on a 3-week honeymoon in Europe and Venice, Italy was one of their stops.
I was in Europe for 3 weeks myself for a couple of weddings and Venice was my first stop. It had been 5 years since I last visited Venice and I was very much looking forward to my second visit. I think a lot of people who have been to Venice love it. There are also those who think it’s overrated. The complaints I often hear are: it’s too touristy; it’s not authentic; things cost too much. But I think most “touristy” places are touristy for reason. I don’t think those places are at fault just because everyone want to visit. Yes Venice can be crowded, yes it can feel less like an authentic city compared to other places, but there is more than a thousand years of history that took place in this city built on water. Every canal, every calle, every brick has a story, and I believe all those stories have left invisible marks on the city. You can’t see them, but you can feel them.
We woke up really early for this honeymoon session since July in Venice is quite hot and humid. So we decided to start just after sunrise. It was a more reasonable temperature and it was also before the crowds attacked the city :) We started in their hotel, then we walked over the Rialto bridge, wandered through some small lanes (calles) to Piazza San Marco and ended it with a gondola ride!
Three. That’s the number of times I’ve been to Iceland now. But no matter how many times I’ve been there, it just doesn’t seem to be enough. The more I go, the more I want to go back. I also feel like I can never quite capture in photographs the Iceland that I see in my mind’s eye.
For this trip, I photographed a very lovely fellow Canadian couple in and around south Iceland for their anniversary session. Then Mike and I picked up a rental car and drove up to the Snaefellsness peninsula and then on to the Westfjords, which is this stunningly beautiful and remote landscape. And very isolated. If you are looking for edge-of-the-world beautiful landscape, this is definitely one of those places.
I think I’ve gushed enough about this beautiful place here, and here. Below are some favourites from this past trip.
Starting from Reykjavik, 3 hours later we were winding to the “top” part of the Snaefellsness peninsula.
The town of Stykkisholmur.
From Stykkisholmur, it was nearly 4 hours on a stretch of route 54 that was badly potholed to get to Holmavik on Strandir coast of the Westfjords.
Looking out onto the Holmavik Harbour from our guesthouse. This was one of the creepiest place I’ve ever stayed in.
Not because of the Museum of Witchcraft across the street, or the fact that we hardly saw anyone around town.
It was a very old house and as soon as I saw it, I had a funny feeling about it.
It didn’t help that we were the only ones staying there haha.
The next day we took a road trip along the Strandir coast. It was 104 km of coastal gravel road pitted with potholes the size of giant watermelons.
The journey took about 3 hors each way since we didn’t have a 4×4 so we drove slowly. At the end of that was a geothermal pool at the edge
of the universe.
“Breathtaking” seems like an overused word, but I can’t think of anything else to describe the drive.
A little seal colony in one of the fjords.
Seeing the Northern lights dance was definitely one of the most amazing experiences I’ve had.
We stayed at a farm in Heydalur for our last 2 nights and the resident dog followed us the whole way on a 4-hour hike…we played fetch with him!
His name is Loki :) (the Nordic god of mischief)
There was also an Arctic Fox that lived on the farm!
I met some really lovely people when I went to Iceland last March. So when I had the opportunity to go back in September, I was thrilled to have the opportunity to photograph Kristin and her family as Kristin is Selma’s sister (you may remember Selma & Andri’s snowy anniversary session).
A lot of people feel that photographers should pick an area of specialty and stick to it, others think that doing a bit of everything is good as you are diversifying. For me, I love weddings as much as photographing families because they both involve storytelling. I love it when families feel relaxed around me and will just do their thing – whether it’s playing, walking, or hanging out. That allows me to just do my thing – document those moments and the in-between moments. To me, the most beautiful photos aren’t the perfectly posed shots, or the “say cheese” smiles, but the ones where they aren’t so perfect, but captured a moment that only lasted a second but is nevertheless precious, and the ones where a bit of the subjects’ souls were captured.
This session was definitely one of those occasions for me. :)
If you’ve been to my site before, you know about my love of Iceland. So when Gita contacted me about photographing an anniversary portrait session in Iceland for her and Matt, I almost fell off my chair. When we met, we just chatted away about travel. I learned that we share the same love for travelling, new experiences and the open road. I also learned that they’d be celebrating 14 years of marriage at the beginning of September. So the trip to Iceland was pretty special. September couldn’t come soon enough for all of us.
I often get asked what I think is the most important thing to consider when working with a photographer. And at meetings, I always get asked questions like what kind of camera I use, whether I use Nikon or Canon, etc etc. While those questions are legitimate questions, I think the most important thing is whether you feel a connection to your photographer and their work. Working with a photographer is like making friends, if you have a connection with them, it’ll be a much more rewarding working relationship. Because photography isn’t just a product, and what your photographer tries to capture isn’t just what the eyes can see.
Thank you Gita & Matt, for bringing me to Iceland to document this milestone in your life and for trusting me to do it.
Ever wanted to be in two places at once? You can at the Bridge Between Two Continents. :)
The Cinque Terre is a series of five villages perched on the Italian riviera coastline southeast of Genoa. The villages are, for the most part, only accessible by boat/ferry or the regional trains that run through them, connected from Pisa to Genoa. The first time I heard about them was reading a Rick Steve’s guide book on Italy. We visited in 2012 as part of our Italy trip. After spending a few days in the beautiful Tuscany countryside, we realized we missed seeing the ocean.
The train ride to CT was an adventure. The high speed trains in Italy and across Europe are fast and efficient. But the slower, local trains are so interesting. Perhaps because they provide a taste for slow travel and what feels like a more authentic experience, traveling almost like a local. We caught a train from Siena that was destined for La Spezia with a switch at Empoli. Once in La Spezia, we needed to catch a local train for CT. A map here if you are interested. On the Empoli to La Spezia leg, we stopped at Pisa station for a very long time. At first I didn’t notice because I was enthralled by my book of choice for that trip: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. But then Mike pointed out we’d been sitting there for 20 minutes. There hadn’t been any announcements, not even in Italian. No train conductors appeared to tell us what was going on. A few minutes after, some of the locals started to get off. I asked one person if he knew what was happening, and he said no one knows. Then I saw across the platform, there was a train coming into the station in 5 minutes that was headed to La Spezia. I told Mike we should just get off our train and hop on that one since our ticket brings us to the same destination. When the new train arrived, our original train was still sitting there. That experience reminded me a lot of taking the trains in China as a child. The disorganized nature and lack of information.
So, a note about taking regional trains in Italy, if your train stops for a long time for no reason, don’t panic! The CT train from La Spezia spent much of its first 5 minutes passing through mountain tunnels, then suddenly, we are out of it, and you just see emerald green and blue waters of the Ligurian sea, it was a sight that caused the whole train to go “wow!”
Favourite things about the Cinque Terre:
– The natural stunning scenery
– You get a bit of both: mountains & ocean
– Hiking between the villages: though when were there in 2012, a couple of them were still closed as a result of the landslides that happened in fall of 2011.
– The amazing seafood in the area
– Amazing gelato! (although really, gelato is amazing everywhere in Italy I’m sure)
– The indescribable old-world charm of the villages. You know the saying about a slower paced life in more remote areas of the world, and here, even though it’s not that remote, you feel it. Even as travellers, you feel more relaxed
– How despite the increasing crowds visiting the region, it still retains its charm and authenticity. At night, when the day trippers have gone, the streets are filled with mostly locals (lots of Nonna’s) and it feels like time has not touched this place much in the past fifty years.
There is a tunnel on the walkway from Riomaggiore to Manarola (affectionately dubbed as Via dell’Amore, or Lover’s Walk), and it is filled with graffiti and writings.
Train station with a view :)
Vernazza. It’s the favourite village of a lot of people. We bought pizza from a pizza place just up the street from the harbour.
We sat down by the seawall, in the shade, ate delicious pizza (probably one of the best I’ve ever had);
drank Italian lemon soda (my fave!);
watched the comings and goings at the harbour and in the square;
And then sat on the rocks and watched the sun dip below the next town and the curve in the landscape.
It was one of my favourite days from that trip.
(Sorry, no photo of the pizza, you’ll just have to take my word for it).
This last photo makes me think of Old Man and the Sea.
Except it’s more like Old Men here…although they were kind of far, so not sure if they are even old! :D
Where to stay:
Aria di Mare in Manarola – lovely place, definitely rooms with a view
