Ahh April, a time of fervent activity usually for myself and the world around me, as we magically crawl out of the gloom and doom of the dark, wet winter months, into spring with its Blue skies, longer days and warmer weather. I looked to capitalise on this month with a trip to Gdansk on the baltic sea, to try and capture a little taste of this little hidden gem of a city.

Gdansk itself is a fantastic destination for a photographer like myself, with an old city brimming with photo opportunities at almost every turn. The colours and shapes of the buildings coupled with the cobbled streets, old churches and harbour-side make for some interesting street images. I was lucky that the sun was shining for most of my stay which made the colours pop throughout.

Of course no spring time is complete without the pink blossom that bursts from the seemingly dead and bare trees throughout the temperate world, with Gdansk being no exception to this rule. I wanted this year to try and create a more dynamic image using the blossom as the focus and having a more interesting backdrop to set the colours off. I think this year I managed to pull this off, with some really pleasing results with some interesting backdrops available to me while traveling around.

After exploring the city, I travelled to westerplatte, about 15 minutes by taxi, to the scene of the first battle of world war 2.

I also used the tram system that runs from the city centre to the baltic coast, and the seaside town of Sopot which boasted europe’s largest wooden pier.

The pier itself made for some nice simplistic images with lots of straight lines and a clean blue and white colour palette that accentuated the occasional bursts of red, yellow and orange.

As well as the street photography opportunities, I always carry my long lens with me, and with Gdansk being on the coast, I was able to spend some time capturing this as well. On one such occasion I came across a male and female Goosander. They were just close enough that I could photograph them as they fished in the frigid surf near the rocks close to the shoreline.

At the end of my trip I spent a day in my favorite woodland on the hunt for all things natural. This time the trip was a little less fruitful than previous ones, with the forest oddly quiet however I enjoyed my time here as usual and did manage to get an image of a woodpecker getting its nest hole ready for the breeding season.

This image below is also as close as I got to getting a photo of a White stork on this trip. with the birds deciding to be very shy this time around.

The final images won’t win any awards but I have included it anyway as it was a new species of bird for me to both photograph and see. This little bird sat high up on an electricity pole for just a few seconds, giving me time to frame him up and getting a couple of shots before he was gone. I actually find the composition quite interesting and different so although the bird itself isn’t anything special, I like the overall aesthetic of the image.

And that’s it for April. A fast becoming favourite month of the year, which always seems to deliver me some memorable moments and some great photographs. Next month I am off to Slovenia so let’s hope there will be some more interesting photos coming my way in may..

FIN