Aurora Hunting with Ginnie
Predicting when you can see the Aurora Australis is a fair scientific task. In all honesty, if you plan to go and look at the beautiful stars of the Southern Hemisphere, which is particularly beautiful around the Wakatipu Basin, then try to weather proof your plans and at best have a slight hope you’ll be luck enough for the Lady Aurora to pay you a visit.
Ginnie got in touch with us to help her look at the night sky as part of her round New Zealand tour. Our weather window was small, so we watched the sky all day as well as keeping a key eye on the forecasts and we got real lucky.
The dials of the Aurora Australis forecast pages and space weather site were pointing towards a little colour in the South, which did add some excitement. Heading straight to the mountains, we saw the milky way before it set over a mountain ridge. Ginnie loved seeing the images come up on the back of the camera. She wanted to be able to relax and see the stars, listen to stories of our place and heavens and be able to have some beautiful photographs to help remind her of this unforgettable experience.
As the clouds moved, so did we. Our last stop of the night was by the side of Lake Wakatipu, where when looking towards the South you could definitely see a change in colour of the sky.
Simon and Emma kept communication open as we waited to see if the clouds would clear to enable us to go out for our session. We were fortunate the skies cleared so Simon could take me out to search the skies. Simon shot images at three different locations for me. His skill and knowledge, his willingness to teach and explain his processes and to go beyond any time parameters resulted in a fun and engaging experience. The resulting images blew my mind. Simon and Emma demonstrate the flexibility, knowledge, and skills needed to work in harmony successfully with nature.
