The first days we tried to concentrate on the forests as this was the most important part of the mission. Because these areas are huge and uncut by roads the dimensions that one has to drive and walk to reach certain locations are enormous. When the weather is less than perfect it just doesn’t make sense.

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

There were several days where we hiked into untouched forest areas on overcast days … just to arrive at the most exciting places with blue sky, spotlights of sun touching the forest floor and huge contrasts - the absolute nightmare for forest photography. But - as this was a rainy summer in central Europe I was lucky - I had two completely rainy days where I was able to photograph deep hanging clouds in the forest and one morning I was even rewarded with fog. If you’ve ever photographed forests in foggy conditions you actually never want to do it again without - because fog provides so much dimension.

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

So … the days went by … the pressure of producing images of all the target areas grew. We moved on to some lonely mountain gorges and I was waiting every day for a call from Christoph - who was in constant contact with the airport in Braşov - in order to get up into the sky to do aerials. But the conditions just weren’t perfect. Too many clouds.

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

During the last days of my stay we finally went up to the Leaota mountains. The Leaota peak has an elevation of 2133 meters and is surrounded by dense fir and mixed beech forest. There are almost no tourists (in fact, we didn’t meet anybody) - only a few wandering shepherds inhabit the mountain meadows in summer. The view from the top is breathtaking … 360° of forest … as far as your eyes can see. I was very happy to have great conditions with beautiful clouds and a crisp sunrise the next morning.

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

The 10 days in Romania went by faster than I could imagine and the only thing on my shoot list that hadn’t been covered were the aerial shots. On the day of my return to Germany we made a last try to get up into the air … but had to return before reaching the Leaota area because of too many clouds over the mountains. One doesn’t always get everything …

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

I returned to Germany with a huge amount of new impressions … and knowledge about a very beautiful and precious area in Europe. It’s absolutely important to preserve these mountains for future generations. And I imagine how these pristine mixed forests would look in October *ahhh*. I will be back.

http://www.equus-silvania.com

http://www.conservationcarpathia.org

My trip to Romania began very sudden and unexpected: A call from Florian Möllers and the question “Would you like to go to Romania and photograph forests in the Carpathian Mountains - in two weeks time?”

Who thought that Europe is a spoiled continent where little uncultivated land is left and only small patches of untouched nature is preserved is generally right. But Romania is an exception. Romania and especially the Carpathian Mountains are a truly wild place in Europe. A place that contains vast pristine forests that are uncut by public roads and are home to a number of precious species and the large predators as wolves, bears and lynx.

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

I didn’t need long to think about it - I love photographing forests and I had heard so much about the pristine forest areas in Romania that I instantly decided to go.
With little to no time to prepare the trip I flew to Sibiu and was welcomed by Christoph Promberger and his family. Christoph and his wife Barbara are co-founders of the Conservation Carpathia Foundation - an organisation with the aim of preserving huge areas of forest by private equity. Their ambitious goal is to create the largest forest area in Europe, a large private National Park that will allow evolutionary processes to continue without human interference and to restore the natural ecosystem of the Carpathian Mountains.

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

After communist times the formerly state owned forests have been given to their former owners, many of them don’t have any relation to it and they have immediately sold it to the huge logging companies in order to make it into money. In a country where the average salary is 200 EUR a month this seems like a reasonable decision on the landowners side. The problem is the uncontrolled logging even on protected ground. In order to stop the clearcutting in these areas they will need to buy as much land as fast as possible.
My photographic aim for that mission was to photograph various subjects in the Leaota region that spreads over about 25 000 ha - from beautiful pristine forests, mountain streams, mysterious narrow gorges, the Leaota mountain top that reaches beyond the timberline and some aerial photos of the whole region to show the huge areas of untouched forest.

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

As this mission was very spontaneous I didn’t have the choice of season - I had to go in July - and every photographer knows July is not the greatest season for forest photography. So I had to make the best out of the given situation. Another problem was the logistics of going around in an unknown place and finding great areas to photograph in a short amount of only 10 days.
I was lucky enough to be provided with two Romanian guides - Mihai and Bogdan - who knew the area well, had a four-wheel-car and tried to make everything possible. They even offered to carry my backpack. The biggest challenge for me was to educate them into my way of photographing landscape. Going up in the middle of the night - reaching the target areas before dawn and finishing at 9.00 a.m latest - as the sun was already high up in the sky - with a whole day left to scout the areas before starting to take it serious again at 7.00 p.m. until dawn. We needed some days to get on the same track.

Photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

Two harsh, scratchy notes from somewhere in the canopy immediately made me look upwards, searching the leaves of the Combretum tree for a glimpse of the long, chestnut tail.

Those notes were succour to my sweaty October brain exhausted by months of dust and increasingly oppressive heat. They meant the rains were coming!!! The Paradise flycatcher was back and in breeding!! Hooray!!

And with them heralded tropical storms, rivers of mud pouring across the maize fields, and flying ants (termites) covering the kitchen floor in clouds of delicate discarded wings each night in search of a mate.

photo: Grzegorz Lesniewski / Wild Wonders of Europe

The European swallows also arrived for the rains, their familiar high pitched trills sang at a  hundred miles an hour as they swooped through the African sky.  Late in the evening when the storm clouds piled up into vast meringues, the termites would miraculously appear from tiny holes in the lawn. Fluttering tentatively skywards, only to be feasted on by the swallows as they dive bombed the poor unsuspecting souls. A snappy click of their beaks and they were gone..

So around about now October/November, those handsome guys (the swallows) will be arriving in southern Africa at the end of their long trip south from Europe. One of nature’s incredible marvels.

photo: Sandra Bartocha / Wild Wonders of Europe

For me, here in England – my African brain needs realigning to tune into nature’s northern hemisphere nuances. Everything is fresh and wondrous – childlike and spectacular! My walks across the fields and down the countryside lanes are such a joy. I’ve discovered that the white flowers of the blackthorn bush turn into plump dark purple sloe berries!!! Who would have guessed! I scared another walker witless a week or so ago as he was sneaking around a thorny, nondescript looking bush with plastic bag in hand. Very suspicious… but he revealed to me that it was sloe time! So feeling like a true local I took heed and copied suit a few days later. We got to work in the kitchen and now have several bottles stashed away hopefully doing their magic.

A couple of weeks before I had witnessed our Swedes going nuts at our annual general meeting at Ulvsbomuren. Well not nuts per se… heh heh.. but there was a special kind of mushroom which grew beneath the old forest, amongst the huge mounds of moss carpeting the floor. They gathered handfuls of the fungi, cooking it up to take back to the city.  And each day we were fed off wonderful delights, pure and unadulterated by man.

photo: Staffan Widstrand / Wild Wonders of Europe

Wild nature really does provide. But the key is to leave some for others – two, or four legged, or no legged even. Harmony.

Perhaps then, no small coincidence that I’m writing this just as the acclaimed documentary “The End of The Line” has received The Puma Creative Impact Award, after being hailed for bringing about real change in its efforts to stop the oceans being emptied of fish. The marine environment is one aspect of European nature that we have NOT lived in harmony with. The award is perfect timing as the European union is debating and negotiating the future of our seas. Some of the reports and allegations that have emerged have been nothing short of alarming, and I’ve honestly struggled not to bombard our facebook page with all the news for fear of turning us into a purely “fishy” lobby group. But its serious stuff and if you havnt watched the film, please do!

To leave you on a positive note – From Autumn this year, the UK government now requires all government departments and agencies to source their fish from sustainable fisheries. A good step in the right direction and Iets hope this will convince many other governments to follow suit!

I just returned home from China after opening our beautiful Wild Wonders of Europe indoor exhibition in Shanghai at the exclusive Times Square Shopping Mall. The opening on June 11 left me filled with hope and a bit surprised as well. One of the cornerstones of the whole Wild Wonders project is to showcase Europe’s wildlife to 700 million Europeans and the World. This is really one of our first steps in the all important “World” section.

photo: Magnus Lundgren / Wild Wonders of Europe

There are many fantastic and highly impressive fact and figures around the Wild Wonders communication project but the launch of first out of five indoor exhibitions on our China tour has illustrated to me important evidence of the project’s international significance. The European wildlife is amazing and interesting to people way outside Europe, to people as far afield as China, and our message is applicable wherever the project is shown. “Conservation works, we just need more of it”, has the same meaning in Europe as in China. The emotional impact of our images and the clear message coming through is simply touching to see.

The Shanghai opening

With the exhibition having pride of place in the huge shopping mall the opening was a great success with the General Manager of The Bund, Bill Fu, myself and Xi Zhinong (China’s most successful photographer) on stage. The Bund also hosted a fun quiz section where the audience was tested on their knowledge of nature topics and prints awarded as prizes. All the media became extremely excited when the famous Chinese actor Chen Kun came on stage to show his support and respect for our project.

photo: Magnus Lundgren / Wild Wonders of Europe

The elegant 48 image exhibition had an extra Chinese flavour in Shanghai with ten additional images from Chinese photographers. One of Xi Zhinong’s images of a kiang, a Tibetan wild ass, running at full power over the dusty Tibetan plateau made a very strong impression on me. A moment filled with freedom, vulnerability and loneliness in a harsh environment.

The Shanghai seminar

Later the same day we hosted a special seminar for 120 guests presenting the Wild Wonders of Europe project and the stories behind the images from my seven marine photo missions. Together with Xi Zhinong, we used this as the base for opening discussions about conservation through photography. The audience was very interested, asked a lot of questions and reflected a lot of concern around the situation for wildlife in China and the country’s need for more conservation projects.

The Beijing seminar

With a tight schedule to keep, I was on show next day at noon with a second seminar, this time in Beijing where the focus was on positive communication - the “light at the end of the tunnel” highlighting Europe’s Unseen, Unexpected and Unforgettable wildlife.

During the open discussion with the audience we compared the situation of nature photography in Europe and China, finally posing the idea of creating a Wild Wonders of China – another dream project for the team.

The China Exhibition Tour

Open until 23 June, there is still time to see the Shanghai exhibition with free entry to the public! The exhibition will then tour to Beijing 10 – 19 July, Guangzhou (26 July – 5 August), Shengzhen (8 – 15 August) and Chengdu (28 August – 8 September). Please visit our website for more details or contact Sheila D Wang, our China Tour Director.

We are also working to secure two major outdoor exhibitions in China. One in Shanghai and another in Beijing. If anyone is interested in joining this endeavour as partners please feel free to contact Sheila D. Wang in Beijing.

I left China with a feeling of respect for the people and their concern, love and passion for nature. It was really great to see, and many of my preconceptions of China were scrapped. Of course China has many important decisions to make conservation wise but the passion I met gave me hope. And the first step is to realise that it is not too late.

Magnus Lundgren

photo: Bridget Wijnberg / Wild Wonders of Europe

The launch was a fun celebration, “The Bottle Boys” entertaining us with renditions of pop music hits played on instruments made out of old bottles! Definitely not passé. Kudos guys! And a nice scoop for one of the main exhibition sponsors – Danish recycling company Dansk Retursystem. I was dragged away from the music for a private guided tour through the exhibition for the Minister and invited Ambassadors by Wild Wonders of Europe Managing Director, Staffan Widstrand. Staffan is lucky in having an encyclopaedic knowledge of European nature and the reactions on people’s faces is priceless when they hear some weird and wonderful fact from tongue waggling ibex to Europe’s only antelope - the endangered and bizarrely trumpet nosed saiga. Judging by the bevy of hangers on (perhaps aspiring to be Ambassadors) – European wildlife safari guides are the way to go.

That evening we had a post-launch celebratory dinner with the Wild Wonders of Europe and Life Exhibitions team in the glass pavilion. The exhibition outside began to fill with rave party goers - tens, hundreds and then finally thousands of them, as central Copenhagen filled with one massive thronging street party! Unbenownst to the organisers, the launch had coincided with the party of all parties. In one fell swoop we had reached a whole new audience - scores of young people who perhaps wouldn’t normally have considered themselves as being even vaguely interested in nature, or thought nature was too unhip for their image. It was heartwarming to watch the revellers, even in their varying degrees of inebriation, taking time to read the text and to enjoy the images! Quite a contrast to the daytime audience of young children, babies in prams, people in wheelchairs and on bicycles, young and old alike. Nature really is for all!

photo: Bridget Wijnberg / Wild Wonders of Europe

If you’d like to see the exhibition - entrance is free and accessible to all, open 24 hours a day. It is situated right in the very heart of the city, off the famous pedestrian shopping street, Stroget, and will remain on display at Nytorv until 29 July 2011.

The key message of Wild Wonders of Europe is to inspire us all with the joy of the wild and encourage a greater sense of custodianship. The exhibition focuses on celebrating Europe’s wildlife comeback with short texts that are wonderfully engaging, refreshing and educational. (Its not just about pretty pictures!!) This is the important door opener to highlight species and habitats of conservation concern, the ongoing land abandonement in Europe and the tremendous possibilities for rewilding.

photo: Florian Moellers / Wild Wonders of Europe

The Millingerwaard is a dry place this spring: The resident beavers rather paddle than dive to the underwater entries of their dens. The many Yellow irises that would normally line the banks of the ponds and abandoned quarries blossom far away from the shorelines. And the forest’s vegetation looks as if it was mid summer already.

Filming conditions are perfect though! Well, only bug-wise to be honest: strong winds, driving rain and a temperature drop of about 15°C makes us shiver and makes the local army of mosquitos hide in the vegetation. On a sunny day they would have turned the protagonists of our documentary into arm-wagging lunatics with swollen faces and crazy eyes in just a few minutes time. “The rain will add a wonderful tension to the footage”, smiles Stefan, the cameraman. Well, yeah, nice…

photo: Marc Hesse / Wild Wonders of Europe

Wild Wonders of Europe photographer Ruben Smit suggested the place. He had been filming here before. A great choice we think as we pass a small herd of Galloway cattle cows and calves munching on the lush vegetation of an open meadow. Together with Konik horses they had been introduced to the area after nature started claiming back old territory here in the Millingerwaard, close to the Dutch city of Nijmegen, which is part of the nature development project “De Gelderse Poort”. 300 ha which have been set aside as a nature reserve are owned by the Dutch Forestry Department and the companies “Delgromij” and “De Beijer”, the latter managing the reserve together with the ARK foundation since the early 90ies. After 50 years of clay extraction the reserve looks pretty wild nowadays: what has been agricultural fields and quarries turned itself into a young alluvial floodplain forest habitat.

photo: Florian Moellers / Wild Wonders of Europe

Bordering Germany the area along the river Waal is well known as a wintering ground for greylag, white-fronted and bean geese and other waterfowl. Whilst beavers have been reintroduced, Kingfishers, Golden orioles, Black terns and many other species have all returned by themselves making the Millingerwaard a wonderful example for a rewilding success story.

We are here to produce a set of DVDs that will tell the story about Wild Wonders of Europe. Eleven of our photographers and project directors will be interviewed, telling the unheard adventures of their photo missions into the unknown corners of our continent. It is a view over their shoulders, where they speak about conservation and team-work, about the focus of their photography and tech-tipps, about the “making of” of the world’s largest ever nature photography initiative and how they tried their best to turn the unseen of our natural heritage in Europe into stunning pictures.

“So much about my “very unique” approach!”, sighs German photographer Sandra Bartocha: “Did you ever try to say something clever or even inspiring in a foreign language and into a camera whilst lying on your belly in the cold and wet grass pointing your camera at something, well, not really interesting?” Luckily the team around Mark Verkerk and Ton Okkerse from EMS films manages to keep us motivated and focussed despite of the rather unfriendly weather conditions.

photo: Florian Moellers / Wild Wonders of Europe

Born and raised in Zambia now standing at the grey shores of a wind-beaten Dutch pond, Wild Wonders of Europe Exhibition and Media Director Bridget Wijnberg tries not to show that she is “f…” cold, whilst trying to look “inspired” across one of the ponds for the camera.

In the final interview session Ruben Smit feels reminded to Serbia’s alluvial forest when wading through a beaver pond explaining how he took split level shots of leeches and other critters during his Wild Wonders mission to Gornje Podunavlje at the Croatian border.

photo: Florian Moellers / Wild Wonders of Europe

The day ends in the “Wilderniscafé”, where a hot chocolate, some Beerenburg Schnaps and wonderful asparagus soup convince us to believe that the day was not too bad after all…

On Friday, May 20, we will be filming at Kootwijkerzand in the Veluwe nature reserve. Stay tuned!

A truly global Top celebration of photojournalism and powerful imagery.
All around in the hall were sitting several of the legendary Directors of photography and Chief editors from the magazine over decades, an impressive array of its most famous photographers ­ new and old ­ a lot of NGS staff and a number of leading figures from the international photography scene ­ like Cristina Mittermeier, Jenny Nichols and Mark Christmas from the ILCP, Jean-François Leroi from the Perpignan Festival, and an impressive number of ILCP fellows, including WWE photographer Christian Ziegler.

A number of strong slide talks and presentation were shown, the one touching me most was by Lynsey Addario, who showed a powerful series of striking photojournalistic shots from the women of Afghanistan. Very moving, upsetting and thought-provoking.

And so was Mark Leong’s very well photographed story about the apalling illegal wildlife trade in Asia. Very potent stuff!

Finally a selection of British photographer Don McCullin’s best work from five decades, mostly from war scenes and conflicts - in Northern Ireland, Cyprus, Biafra, Kongo, Vietnam etc. Almost all of them now iconic classics.

Many of the people that I met attending the seminar also had lots of spontaneous praise for the Wild Wonders of Europe project and described it as a ‘role model’ of how to do conservation photography in the future.

Staffan Widstrand

I am starting to be used to roam the streets of big capitals looking up for anything wild between buildings and urban parks. But as usual, the difficulties in shooting urban wildlife is to get the authorizations first. After several weeks of emails, phone calls, we finally got the permission to photograph in the Vatican’s garden.

But with the scheduled exhibition right ahead and the short delay I could only shoot for 2 days and in fact, 2 mornings, as the garden is closed the afternoons.

The garden is around 24 hectares and very tidy. We can’t really call it a « Wild » place. But nevertheless, I could count 22 species of birds in or flying over the park. Within those species, the Blue Rock Trush (Monticola solitarius), the peregrine falcon and the Monk parakeet (Myiopsitta monachus). Originally from South America, this colorful bird is very easy to spot with its high pitch sound and its massive nest.

Most of the interesting wildlife is in the northern part of the garden. An unreachable stip tiny patch of uncut long grass and wild flowers is hosting the first insects of the season , the green woodpecker comes regularly to try its luck in the woody area. The Vatican’s garden is a perfect exemple that if you leave a part of your backyard’s mower-free-zone, you’ll see a much richer biodiversity than on your tidy lawn.

From the garden I had a good view of the famous St Peter’s Basilica where at least two couples of kestrels had done their nests. I even saw a pair mating on the holy place! Surely, it is not on Notre Dame de Paris that I would’ve witnessed that kind of behaviour! Haaaa, Italians’ Amore…

Laurent Geslin / Wild Wonders of Europe

We had done quite much mountain climbing in couple of days, so had little heavy legs in friday morning.
There was no mountain climbing scheduled on friday, only hide photography, looking for capercaillie and traveling to Alladale… so nice little recovering day.

The day started with hide photography. It was little quiet at first, but after an hour the birds came. All at the same time! Same pattern was repeated at the whole morning.
All birds always came at the same time. So there was really quiet times, but also times for real action. We got good pictures of Great Spotted Woodpecker, treecreeper, Chaffinch etc…

After we had our dinner, we went to find the capercaillie. We had been quite lucky since this, but you cannot always win! So we didn’t found capercaillie this time.

When we came back to Pete’s, we started to pack our bags, because it was time to move to Alladale. After couple hours driving, we arrived at Alladale, and all those landscapes looked quite nice when looked through Finnish eyes. Nice rivers flowing between beautiful cliffs, and mountains one after another. The Ghillie’s rest looked very nice and the landscapes around it too, but there were some clouds on the sky.

In saturday morning, we decided to try first with red deers. Our guide Munk came to pick us up, and we headed to another glen where the red deers should be. Suprise suprise, it was raining again, but we got many nice red deer pictures. We also photographed wild boars in Alladale, and got quite a many different kind of pictures about those beautiful animals. In Alladale we also saw couple of elks, and got pictures of those too. Unfortunately, the time goes fast, and it was time to head back to Pete’s in sunday afternoon… luckily with some of thousends of pictures richer.

We didn’t found the capercaillie last time, but we decided to try one more time before we went back to Pete’s. In this time we were more luckier, and we did managed to find that capercaillie.

Lots of pictures and many new species for us to photograph, but it was sunday, and it was time for us to move back to southern UK for the Epson UK printing day. After we had played billiard championchips of the Ballintean, Pete drov us to the Kingussie train station. We had sleeper tickets for night train, so at the monday morning we woke up in London.

Scott Frankham from Epson UK was waiting us in Apsley train station, and we walked with him to the new Epson UK office building. First we studied how people see colors, color management, and things like that. After that, we printed some of our pictures with Epson Stylus Pro 3800 series printer and tried learned things in real life. We had many different kind and size photo papers available, but as everyone knows, the bigger is better… so in A2 size we printed. Those new Epson printers can deliver such a breathtaking image quality! Of course the imagefile has to be very good also, but that wasn’t the problem because we both had Nikon D3s DSLR-bodies that can produce very good image quality even at the low light! With the D3s’ Nikon had also loaned to us the very best of their lenses like AF-S 14-24/2.8, AF-S 70-200/2.8 VR II and AF-S 500/4 VR. We both used those equipment in really a hard weather conditions, and they worked like a dream! After a week of hard wind and rain, I can say that those new Nikon professional equipments are really really weatherproof.

After Epson printing day, we both headed to the airports to catch our flights to home.
- It’s always nice to travel, but it’s also great to come home!

Janne Heimonen & Marcus Valeur / Wild Wonders of Europe

Coastal Marine Life and a Submerged Mountain around Faial & Princess Alice

Stuff! There is an abundance of “stuff” on the pavement in front of me. The sun shines in a soft pre-morning way on it. I am waiting for Norberto, sometimes referred to as the diver in the Azores, by a steep and winding road in Horta. We have not met since 8 years. Waiting makes me a bit bored and I spend the time viewing, with concerned eyes, all my “stuff” dragged down from the second floor.

My thoughts drift and I visualize an equipment diagram. Where does the curve effort meet the curve benefit equipment-wise and where am I on this diagram?

I shift my thoughts to the other side of that coin and realise how dependent I am as a diver on my regulator and other dive equipment supplying me with gas on every breath. A life support system, for real. I think about all the effort made by so many people to place me in the Azores in front of an amazing sperm whale of the deep. There and then my camera’s shutter must operate accurately on every frame and the lens must perform tack sharp images all the time. No second chance, no moments that can be repeated. In my mind it would be an insult to “the joint effort made” not to use reliable equipment. I sit down on one of the hard cases and take a sip of my coffee. I look at the mountain of equipment again. Instead of hostility I feel warm inside.

A deep voice startles me from behind with a “Hallooo, Magnus!”. I swing around and he looks the same as all those years ago. Deep and vivid eyes, big salty beard, a rugged charisma and a pair of flip-flop shoes. Norberto instantly says: “This is my dog Simba. It is a very nice dog. Let’s go to the marina!” We load everything into his small car and Norberto, myself, his nice dog Simba and all my equipment drive down to the famous harbour of Horta in Faial. It is time for a week of underwater photography around Faial with Norberto.

The marine life in the middle of the Atlantic is not only diverse but also very numerous from the tiniest critters like nudibranchs and ghost shrimps through a versatile fish soup of wrasses, parrotfish, moray eels and pelagics up to the great mammals, rugged reptiles and sleek elasmobranchs that roam this coastline. A busy place and as a photographer it is easy to get overwhelmed and unfocused. My method is to evaluate every subject. Either I skip it or go all the way with it. Simultaneously - I know, I am a man and it sounds unrealistic - my brain should shoot sketch shots of the surroundings, finding new subjects, backgrounds and scenery for coming dives. I am amazed - it worked pretty well!

Marco, Norberto’s divemaster and a skilled diver and spotter, was assigned to be my buddy. Meaning he is the poor guy I will wear out. The week passed very fast for me but I guess it was slightly longer for Marco. He showed me the dynamics of the coastline. A big cave filled with freezing cold water, a shipwreck cluttered with thrilling macro subjects and a gargantuan stingray guarding it. We investigated seamounts in the current, discovered the never ending rocky shoreline and of course we explored, my favorite, the sandy plains. As a photographer I could stay for months and much more.

One day the weather “allowed” us to go for a hidden gem. A place as mystical as far away from Horta. We set out to find the peak of a huge underwater mountain 85 km straight out at sea - the Princess Alice bank! The rocking hours to reach this place quickly disappeared in a haze as I grabbed the anchor line and descended. I passed straight through a dreamy school of game fish. The deeper I got the bigger the amberjacks became. After a couple of minutes I could see the top of this mountain and the amberjacks were over one meter long now. Out of the blue a massive school of barracudas swept by and as this striped curtain moved away the bank was there in front of me.

The water is nice and blue and a bit warmer than closer to Faial. The top of the seamount is at 35 meters and most of the dive is deeper. My limited bottom time is like a whip and I force myself to patience. Firmly I tell myself - Do not stray and do not search! A couple of very bulky stingrays come around and one of them runs me over like a territorial statement. I stay my ground and a short distance away some moray eels are swimming around outside their lairs. Maybe searching for food. These beautiful yellow-patched species are called marbled or Mediterranean moray. I feel a rush of gratitude being here.

I constantly scan the water column above me to see if my main target, the manta or mobula rays, will appear. Already my dive computer is using a bad language at me and with regret I start the long and slow ascent. A big manta ray swims into view as if it knew I was leaving. I swing around to keep my reference, there is the line. Two huge stingrays rise from the rocky seamount and the three rays perform a dazzling dance in the blue. I stay a few extra minutes and clueless to why the benthic stingray mixed with the pelagic manta in the blue I finally make my way up to the boat.
The rest of the day we spend over the seamount looking for devil rays, Mobula tarapacana, to appear close to the surface. The devil ray looks like a manta ray but it is smaller and thinner, growing to a maximum wingspan just over 3 meters. The water is still too cold to get the gathering of Mobulas, according to Norberto. We do a second dive and the same fantastic scenery re-appears but no mantas or devil rays come around.

After two weeks of pelagic free diving in the dynamic blue south of Pico and one week of thrilling scuba diving around Faial it is time to head back home. I leave the Azores worn out, but worn out in the best possible way. Hard drives bulging with RAW files, a heart filled with emotions and an even greater fascination of Azorean reality. The Azores are a Wild Wonder of Europe and let us keep it like that.

In a way personal positive experiences in nature is like a conservation act in itself. Happy memories, affection, compassion and emotional links helps us to make every day decisions in a better direction. So everybody – no matter if it is just outside your doorstep or distant - visit our inspiring European nature as often as you can.

I want to send my big thanks to the crew and management of Wild Wonders who shows knowledge, courage, backbone and passion for the important conversation of European wildlife. I am proud You put trust in my work.

Best fishes,

Magnus Lundgren / Wild Wonders of Europe

The Atlantic Ocean covers 20% of the earth’s surface and is the second largest ocean in the world. On average it is the saltiest major ocean with surface water salinity in the open sea ranging from 3.3 to 3.7% by mass. The Coriolis effect circulates the North Atlantic water in a clockwise direction, whereas South Atlantic water circulates counter-clockwise. The Atlantic Ocean appears to be the second youngest of the five oceans. Apparently it did not exist prior to 130 million years ago, when the continents that formed from the breakup of the ancestral super continent, Pangaea, were drifting apart from seafloor spreading.