Before the last day of summer ended, I decided I wanted to prove to myself that summer hadn’t been all bad and that there had actually been some rather splendid days in the sun. With this in mind I went back to a group of images I had taken recently during one of Dunedin’s finer spells. John's Blog https://blog.caswellimages.com/ The latest print price guide: https://bit.ly/3oLw9OI
Another wee trek I had taken in the sun was to adventure across the rocks beyond the St Clair Salt Water Pool at low tide. This is usually an area covered in water and pounded by swells as waves break on the point. However on one such occasion with the sea calm combined with a low tide, I spent an enjoyable hour scrambling over the rocks. It was during this time that I came across something altogether unexpected. There, sitting attached to a rock, surrounded in seaweed sat a plaque to Rex Von Huben. Just who Rex was I wasn’t sure, but clearly he must have been a person of note to be remembered in such a way. I decided to find out. A short time later, having left the rocks behind and thanks to the wonders of Google, I discovered that Rex Von Huben was one of New Zealand’s earliest recognised big-wave surfers in the deep south who at the age of 43 lost his life in a car crash in 1998. The following year, as a memorial to Rex, his widow Lorraine and friend Kyle Davidson organised New Zealand’s first big-wave surfing event the following year called the Quiksilver Rex von Huben Big Wave Challenge. And if I learnt nothing else during summer, that was good enough for me. John's Blog https://blog.caswellimages.com/ The latest print price guide: https://bit.ly/3oLw9OI
I’d spent the previous day doing my best baked lobster impression. At some point before midday I had covered myself in sunscreen, sat back in a deck chair and opened a book. There I stayed for many blissful hours enjoying every second in the Dunedin sun. I had found myself curiously fascinated by author Patricia Cornwell who was providing a portrait of a killer. Her theory was that German-British painter Walter Sickert was the elusive serial killer Jack the Ripper. The strangely intriguing aspect of this book was not that Jack the Ripper had been uncovered, but the fact that we were to believe that an author had succeeded in unraveling a mystery that had baffled experts across the world. Now, twenty four hours later and with Dunedin’s summer sun having been replaced with low cloud and rain, my intrigue into Patricia Cornwell’s theory had been replaced with confusion. This left me with three choices. The first was to persist with Cornwall’s wildly speculative theory, the second was to use the book as a doorstop, the third was to walk in the rain around the Botanical Gardens. I chose the gardens and now have a very useful doorstop! John's Blog https://blog.caswellimages.com/ The latest print price guide: https://bit.ly/3oLw9OI
