Hà Giang Landscape

OK, time for some variety. Hà Giang not only has wonderful people, it also boasts a very impressive karst landscape. It's a rugged mountain landscape, characterised by conical mountain tops. The highland close to Dồng Văn is a good example, have a look at the Google Maps satellite image below.

Despite all that natural beauty, I did not take many landscape pictures, because it was permanently hazy throughout our trip. Leading to very boring even grey images. There were a few exceptions, where the haze actually lent a beautiful atmosphere itself. The shot above is an example.

It was taken at the green arrow in the satellite image below. It's taken in South East direction, so you'll need to move the map to see the mountains it depicts.

View Larger Map

On the map you can see the strange karst landscape in the highlands. Think Ha Long Bay without the water. Or, as far as I can judge from pictures, from the more famous karst in Yunnan, China. (The border to Yunnan is about 2mi away from this point.)

Start

Yet another blog. What to expect? For now, I'm not making too many promises, let's just see where this is going, if anywhere. I'll try and post here somewhat regularly. Mostly a picture with a brief associated story. I seem to gravitate towards landscapes and architecture. You'll see few holiday snaps or other personal stuff here. And no HDR, wild colours, and vignettes.
But enough talking already. Starting with a really old picture. An old favourite, and a scan from slide. It's a bit small, because IE butchered the scaling, and I don't want to assume you have a huge screen. Click the picture for larger sizes.

This is taken during the Blüemlisalp Traverse from the summit of Wyssi Frau (3650m) in Berner Oberland in Switzerland, looking towards Morgenhorn (3623m). You can see two groups of climbers following us; the first of the second group of 3 is just entering the light on the lower part of the ridge. (And note his shadow way below!) I think this must have been around 8am one day in July 1986(!).
We started the traverse in the Blüemlisalphütte (2840m) around 4am, climbed Morgenhorn, traversed to Wyssi Frau on the ridge you can see here, and from here continued over an even more exposed ridge to Blüemlisalphorn (3663m).
I'll post some more later, or see the links on this Flickr set.