Via Ferrata - Thones The via ferrata is an hour’s drive from Geneva and for the most part is a fairly easy ferrata apart from the last bit where you negotiate an overhang.
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Via Ferrata - Les Baumes du Verneau
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Via Ferrata in the mist
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A short helicopter flight to a mountain refuge in Aosta, on the Italian side of the Mt Blanc. Good fun, walk to the glacier and back. I also tested my Iphone 4 phone.
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In the valley close to Champéry there is a via ferrata. Via Ferrata are routes passing on rock faces thanks to the help of metal pedals, hand and foot pedals and bridges. On this Via Ferrata you climb up vertically and horizontally depending on the moment. Some obstacles are easier to get past than others but overall it’s good fun. One of the things you should take the time to watch, especially on a rainy day is the way the water erupts out of the rock. The first waterfall reacts to what the second waterfall higher up spews out. It’s fun to watch how much power this water has.
On Saturday I went with a Glocals group up to Vex in the Valais for a short hike. We passed by the thermal pools before heading up to a village where we had some lunch. after that we kept going up towards another village before catching a bus back down.
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Yesterday I tested the Olympus camera during a rafting trip down the Dranse river in France.
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Disclaimer: These are thoughts, rather than a well structured post. Ridley Scott wants your user generated videos for a film “A Day on Earth” and whilst people are hyping this idea as something new the concept is an old one. Dziga Vertov had an idea that he would capture Life Unawares. Eventually he would end up with an experiment in six reels called “The Man with the Movie camera”. It’s aim was to show Soviet Russia as it was. It was an experiment in editing and in story telling. Skipping ahead you also have the Cinéma Verité movement, where the camera and micro trottoir would go out into the street to interview people and find out their opinions on a variety of topics. I would be more specific but I haven’t watched the film in a long time. What I do remember is the Eclair camera with “crystal” sync sound. Technological innovation freed the camera operator and sound man to continue experimenting. Today everyone has a video camera. Everyone has one on their phone as well as their photo camera. Life is constantly being documented in video form. 24hrs of video are uploaded a minute to youtube. video recording is an everyday part of life. I’m sure we will see a great diversity of moments, some births, some sailing, some rock climbing, some sporting event and more.I haven’t taken a look at how long they want the finished result to be. Seesmicers have had fun with this idea already. We had hat days, we had other events, we would go out with the cameras and film. With Qik too we did this. There is nothing new about the process. There is only a far greater ease to share the material internationally and collaborate. As a side note we still remember Pangea day, another event with the same line of thought, but where people presented finished products rather than moments.
Every sunday I try not to use the car at all. As a result I went for a walk through the local countryside and experimented with the new camera. I was looking at the streams but they were quite low, not such a great opportunity to test the underwater part. [flickr-gallery mode=“photoset” photoset=“72157624577824618”]
Here are some images of the Paléo festival. These pictures were taken with the Nexus One [flickr-gallery mode=“photoset” photoset=“72157624569201440”] And these pictures were taken with the Stylus tough 8010 minimu tough 8010. [flickr-gallery mode=“photoset” photoset=“72157624567505952”]