Ben Wilhelmi

some colorful portraits, Tanzania

 

street photography in Cologne, Germany, 80's

 1987, I turn 18, Mom asks what nice gift I'd like. Instead of a car, I chose a camera, an excellent Minolta X700 with a 50 mm. Perfect lens to learn the basics and later improve greatly. So since I visited Mom a few times every year in Germany, Cologne, the next big city, became my photographic playground.

2 regular drunk dudes.

 

Köln is Cologne in German.

 

Cologne had a slight advantage over Belgium where I could share my pictures with friends: fashion was distinctly different. There were also a lot more of street artists of various kind. And a lot more would pour in from Eastern Europe and further when the Berlin Wall collapsed 2 years later.

ferry flight, Dubai-Zurich, aerials, part XIV

 

3 rd day, we had stayed at the nice Sofitel hotel located on the main airport. The hotel provided us a serious piece of  takeaway for the long day. We took off from cold and windy Athens early morning and flew straight west towards Brindisi, Italy, though the destination was nearby Zurich. Yes flight plans, especially in Europe, don’t always allow  you to fly straight to your destination…

some clouds blocked the view to the Piraeus (Le Pirée) but we had a decent view of the Peloponnese and the surroundings were quite clear and beautiful under the morning light.

Salamis, Corinth, Patras, Ithaca…(Salamine, Corinthe, Patras, Ithaque…) were all other famous places we flew over.

rough terrain, it seems the villages and cities can’t be built anywhere.

 

lake Natron, aerial shooting

 

one Gay Pride in Brussels

 

in 2004, experimenting with a new camera (with Kodak Portra VC 160 film)

London, street photography 20+ years ago

 

1989 to be precise… I had been mostly learning photography in the street by then. London…only 5 days unfortunately. 

Agfa films and a Minolta X700 camera.

‘

Yep that’s me, experimenting with mirrors…

 

chatting up girls…

 

snow in Belgium

 

nothing exciting for many people but I usually take my annual leave from Tanzania in April or May. For once I was home in January and the country got the coldest and harshest winter in 27 years. Here are some experiments with a smartphone.

My own Land Rover will be never see any snow, unlike this one.

 

through the train window.

 

Street photography, Brussels

 

Lace is supposedly a Belgian specialty. I admit I found this girl’s curves more interesting….

 

the legendary and wonderful Grand-Place in Brussels.

 

a Manneken Pis (litt’ the little pissing man) copy, here peeing chocolate in a chocolate shop.

ferry flight Dubai-Zurich, aerial photos, part XIII

 

 

end of the second leg, from Sharm El Sheikh northbound to Athens across numerous islands, the Cyclades.

all these islands are quite rocky, which means the villages had to be built on the shorelines. The mountain range on the horizon is the Parnetha (Parnès en français), north of Athens.

 

 

 

 

 

ferry flight, Dubai-Zurich, part XII

 

south of Athens, coming from Sharm El Sheikh

the difference of lighting between these pictures is easy to explain: when the captain was having a meal in the cabin, I could bend across the left seat and shoot towards the sun.

 

village project.

 

Athens area far away and ahead of us, near the white peak.

 

 

street photography, spring time in Paris

 

Champs-de-Mars, near the Eiffel Tower, people enjoying some puffs.

 

Prints for sale, Les Tuileries.

 

La Pyramide, le Louvre.

 

Le Pont des Arts, nice place ofr pedestrians to relax over the Seine. Notice the numerous padlocks on the fence. They express eternal love or wishes for…

 

les Colonnes de Buren.

 

les Tuileries near the Obélisque entrance.

  

Paris is peppered with many little green spaces.

aerial photography near Arusha

 

Mount Meru after a storm. The peak will show that white cap for a short time only.

 

some nice terrace fields. Not too many of them around.

The pictures below were short during one flight from Arusha northbound to Nairobi. Nice diversity of landscape!

people in the bush, Tanzania

 

even in Masai territories, soccer is the game.

 

2 Sonjo ladies getting prepared for a photo.

 

ferry flight, Dubai-Zurich, "Gosex', part XI

 

from Sharm El Sheikh to Athens, 2nd day of ferrying the Twin Otter over some Greek islands. We were skipping the jet stream but still tooas dreadful and the Twin Otter, not the fastest plane ever built, was dragging facing up to 80 mph winds...

Flying instrument flight rules, even in good weather, requires the use of virtual waypoints across the airspaces. Usually made of 5 letter words that are easy to pronounce no matter what your native language is. Gabso, Avatu to name a few in Tanzania. But in Greece there was a surprising GOSEX!! A touch of naughty humor from the Greek aviation authority? In Belgium, and probably most other countries, keep on dreaming to get your airplane registerd with the SEX letters...

Near Iran, there was a beacon named 'Lamerd' ('the shit' in French with a slight spelling mistake but the sound is perfect)

 

The famous Santorini (or Thera) island. A tremendous volcanic eruption in the 19th century changed the world weather pattern for some years!

 

ferry flight, Dubai-Zurich, part X

 

coming from Egypt, here are the first Greek islands.

Crete and a beautiful snowy crest.

 

 

 

beautiful cars on US roads

superbly restored Corvette, Route 66.  (Leica M6 and Kodachrome film)

 

a decorative fire truck, Death Valley.

 

Karine shooting too a rare Chevrolet Bel Air 1956 I think, an unusual mix between coupé and station wagon, Taos, New Mexico. Still  bit of work to perform on the paint.

another Bel Air in Taos, fully restored.

Taos again, a Chevrolet Impala I’d say.

 

Santa Fe was an open museum too for vintage cars.

street life in pictures, Nairobi

 

I had dropped the airplane for inspection so I came back to Arusha by bus. The exact same trip I had done in 1999 for my first visit in Tanzania.

As usual I had bribed the driver to have the front seat with more leg room and a large window. Perfect position for street photography.

 

Since the usual landlines were notoriously crap, non-existent, unreliable in Africa, cellphones have been seen a blessing and the continent is picking faster than any other place in the world. This man has even 2 phones.

Paris in B/W photography

Spring in Paris, "à la Doisneau", that is a with an old Rolleiflex camera, his favorite. 

ferry flight, Dubai-Zurich, part IX

 

Over Egypt the weather was overcast. We just saw nothing but a bit of both coasts. Bad luck.

me in the Twin Otter cockpit.

 

Suez coastline.

crossing a military Hercules C130.

Cairo, the Pyramids, the Nile…whatever we missed the whole lot. Here is Alexandria and the Mediterranean sea.

 

and ahead on our track, some hours later over the blue waters, here is Crete. With snowy caps! European winter coming…

ferry flight, Dubai-Zurich, part VIII

 

From Sharm El Sheikh, we flew to Athens. Winter in Greece was said to be cold…I haven’t travelled in Europe in winter for more than 10 years. Cold temperatures tend to be some vague memories. Bracing myself…

 

Flying at 16.000 ft over the Sinai peninsula, this peak is either Mt St Catherine or Mt Sinai.

 

It looks like a harsh environment but nevertheless an interesting variety of landscape. I didn’t get bored watching below the wing.

crossing into the Suez gulf. The famous canal is located way up north, out of sight.

 

Reaching the Egyptian mainland.

with a 12 mm lens, I could capture both the peninsula and the mainland.

New York City, street life

 

the so-called Naked Cow Boy who is now suing a so-called Naked Cow Girl on the ground she copied him too much.

 

Street life in Arusha, driving and shooting

 

driving in traffic jam, at slow pace that is… (Mom keeps an eye on me heehee)

another spelling mistake with Led Zep’. Another one is Led Zepperlin.

 

selling peanuts in small paper cones.

 

our green oranges.

 

trendy couple.

 

cop sealing a ride.

ferry flight, Dubai-Zurich part VII

 

 

leaving Sharm El Sheikh early morning (Ras Mohammed on this old map). Personally, I wouldn’t consider going to this place again for my own holidays…I’m not a beach bummer anyway but there are definitely better beaches than this! Resorts after resorts on miles and miles. No idea where the village or town is located but far anyway. There is no place to walk around but the long ‘promenade’, elsewhere you feel in a post war zone being rebuilt. Only men are allowed to work there it seems. I much preferred the atmosphere in Dubai, definitely!

We climbed to 16.000 ft again. Not a bad altitude for shooting either, but 10.000 or lower is still more convenient.

looking north north east towards the Aqaba Gulf.

here is the desert, the Sinai.

Desert but mountainous.

This would be the Mt Sinai or Mt St Catherine, topping at 2285 or 2604 m respectively. Hard to locate for sure as these are not  free standing mountains, the area consists of a large range of peaks and ridges. Supposedly Moses was hanging around here to get the 10 commandment tablets and got lost for 40 years (men, reluctant to ask for directions…). I agree it seems difficult to find a track in this relief.

 

Far ahead the Suez Gulf and the Egyptian mainland.

 

Tanzania, portraits in the bush

 

ferry flight, Dubai-Zurich, stopover at Sharm El Sheikh, part VI

 

leaving Saudi Arabia on the Red Sea. Up north lies the Aqaba gulf towards Israel.

 

the Red Sea on the Arabian coast

 

Room with a view at the Hilton on the beach. Yes the Hilton, pilots flying in Tanzania (and probably elsewhere too)  can keep on dreaming…

 

we came out of Saudi to arrive at Sharm el Sheikh. I’ve got no religion but I was quite excited to spot Mt Sinai the next day

We came out of  Arabia near Dhaba. Mt Sinai stands at 2604 meters according to this old map. Old map which explains why Sharm is not shown. It is nowadays located at Ras Mohammed at the southern Sinai peninsula tip.

In the Sinai, there is a djebel Katherina on this French map. On our English version flying map, the French spelling was used: Ste Catherine…one of the oldest monasteries till in activity dating back  from the 6th century. Interesting that the Christian name stayed on.

 

See some pilots can talk about something else than aircraft and women!

 

De Havilland Twin Otter or DHC 6

ferry flight Dubai-Zurich, part V

 

I once spent 2 weeks in the Libyan deserts, on the deck unfortunately. I’d love to have seen those landscapes from the air and compare with Saudi Arabia (pictures below) or the Sinai (soon on the blog). Deserts are far from being boring when one takes time to observe.

The Twin Otter we were ferrying is in perfect condition, that includes the windows which are scratch free and neutral. That is no ugly greenish or bluish hues to ruin the pictures. Those windows look like the ones on cars: large, and the whole pieces rolling down in the door. Too bad we were flying at 16000 ft, that is close to 5000m, and the outside air temperature was at -15 C…I doubt my captain would have appreciated me opening the window to let the cold air rush in, not to mention the noise as well. Worse in Europe the temperature went as low as –25 C. The water in the back of the aircraft even froze though we were confortable with the heating in the front.

Belgium: beers and sense of humor…

just a little break from the ferry flight pictures.

I always eyed suspiciously the marketing punks, always ready to sell  their products under false and gross pretenses, nothing new there. But in Belgium and other countries, it seems some of these guys have tried a bit too much of their product before going to the brainstorming meetings… I was in Belgium for a few weeks this winter and here are a few examples….

 

Of course Danish elephants are famous, every Dane has got one in the garden…

whereas the Belgian bush is equally famous for being more dangerous than any African bush… but at 12% alcohol content, that must be one of the strongest beers.

 

Pink elephants are guaranteed with this beer! Family business since the 17th century? I should invest in beers, it seems like a good idea…

 

Kwak seems to be  a family name but not a Hollywood kind of scene name… and Malheur? That means ‘unhappiness’!

 

Dutch language for ‘triple carmelite’, what for? For the triple grain selection in the recipe probably. Also since the 17th. Belgium has also a surreal touch in that monks have produced beer for centuries, and not only one convent, rather dozens of them!

 

Brigand? Sure we’ve still got many of those brigands alongside our roads… in politics yes but they don’t dress like that anymore.

 

No comment…

 

The Beer Temple in Brussels! Hey the legend says Belgium has got 800 different beers. That helps to survive in this surrealistic country. Surrealism was invented in Belgium but it looks it didn’t require much effort to figure it out… and it still goes on: 2 different tribes, no government for more than a year, a pissing baby, champions of compromise (well until the non government thing that is), a dull monarchy, a country that ‘owned’ Congo a country 80 times bigger and which was often managed by criminals…(seriously a lot of baddies were given a second chance and encouraged to go out there to avoid prison or scandals if the priest position was already taken by an older brother).

all these pictures shot with a new phone, just for fun and test. That Samsung phone is champion for crappy ergonomics but the photo function saved it from dummy crash testing against a wall.

ferry flight Dubai-Zurich, part IV

Saudi Arabia, more diverse than just plain sand dunes and desert.

that greenish tone was recurrent but only on small patches.

 

ferry flight Dubai-Zurich part III

 

over Saudi Arabia.

ferry flight, Dubai-Zurich part II

 

so one day in January, I got a phone call to ferry an aeroplane from Dubai to Altenrhein-St Gallen near Zurich. Within a few days I was in the United Arab Emirates, no way I was to miss a chance to fly over new countries on a new type of aeroplane and as a copilot for a change. The Twin Otter is one of the best bush aeroplanes ever, about 19 seats, 2 turbine engines but a sturdy fixed gear for rough terrain. The reason to go to Europe was for maintenance and an engine overhaul. At 170 mph in cruise, we’d be far behind a Boeing schedule so 3 days are required for such a trip, one way.

Sharm El Sheikh was our first night stop, about 10 hours away from Dubai. The seats had been removed to make room for 4 big extra fuel tanks. We had plenty of food as well

So one early rainy morning in Dubai, yes in Dubai, misty and raining, we took off in the clouds and headed straight east at 16.000 ft, which is quite higher than my regular cruising altitudes in Tanzania.

The Persian Gulf was mostly covered by clouds as was Saudi Arabia, too bad…

The wind was to be awful for the next 3 days, up to 80 mph headwind sometimes! Since we were flying on strict instrument rules and specific slots, it was not easy to chase better levels to avoid that wind.

 

Dubai is located just next to Sharjah on the very right side of this map.

 

The weather finally got better nearing the Arabian Coast. We had overflown Qatar and Barhain airspaces but no bit of terrain was to be observed…

Interesting waves, those sand dunes are spreading on the eastern side of Saudi. A vast expanse of them. I felt sorry for the citizens down there, look carefully on how the sand is covering the properties. Some fields are nearly invisible. It must quite a mission to shovel away all that sand on a regular basis…

 

There can be no road no village to be seen for miles and miles. Then suddenly one little human settlement with no road. Or a road can be seen, just a thin black ribbon lost in that vast expanse seeming to connect nothing.

 

Nearby the great Nefoud and Djebel Chammar, those circular crop appeared all of a sudden, thousands of them spreading as far as we could see. For some reasons, some crops are not complete and show that pacman aspect.

quite suddenly again, the terrain changed again from Djebel Chammar all the way to the Red Sea.

those mountains are extremely photogenic and colorful. Death Valley came to my mind many times.

ferry flight from Dubai to Zurich and back

 

so I’m back in Tanzania after 6 weeks. Here are some random pictures of the ferry trip, I’ll be more specific in the next posts.

 

over the Persian gulf.

 

circular crops over Saudi Arabia.

 

A desert similar to Death Valley, still in Saudi Arabia.

 

Mount Sinai, Egypt.

 

The aeroplane to be ferried, a De Havilland Twin Otter or DHC 6, here being refuelled in Sharm El Sheikh.

 

Gulf of Suez, Egypt mainland on the left, the Sinai peninsula on the right. The canal is located much more to the north, we didn’t overfly that landmark.

 

Over Greece. Snow!

 

fields in Italy.

 

The beautiful lake of Como at the foot of the Alps, Italy.

 

Crossing into Switzerland.

Bad weather before landing near Zurich.

Some icing at 16.000 ft.

 

Snow and artistic patterns over Serbia.