Bill Ford-Smith
Visiting Himeji Castle in Japan.
A UNESCO World Heritage Site and also known as White Egret (or Heron) Castle, Himeji Castle is one of the more memorable places to visit in Japan.
Afloat
Afloat is a bronze sculpture (by Hamish Black) installed in Brighton, on a breakwater near the Palace Pier; it’s one of my favourite bits of art. On a rare trip home earlier in the year, it would have be rude not to take a stroll down by the seashore to admire it… The sculpture is based on the shape of a globe where the…
Motherhood
Visiting Toronto Zoo during the Thanksgiving weekend was perhaps not the brightest idea I’ve ever had – the place was uncomfortably busy, with rather a preponderance of morons banging on the glass to try and get the animals to do something (what kind of idiot does that anyway?). However, in amongst all this was the rather touching sight of a mother gorilla with her…
Rhamphorhyncus
This is a close-up of a well-preserved Rhamphorhyncus from the Royal Ontario Museum; it’s from the Middle Jurassic, so it’s at least 161 million years old. Rhamphorhyncus was a pterosaur (so, not a dinosaur, as any fule kno) – apparently, the name means ‘beak snout’. This particular fossil came from the Bavarian Solnhofen limestone (noted for its beautifully preserved fossils, including Archaeopteryx) and is…
ROM
The Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) is one of my favourite places in Toronto; the recent(ish) refurbishment included the addition of the Michael Lee-Chin Crystal – whilst I’m not an architecture fiend, I feel the modern addition works extremely well with the fabric of the original building and makes for a great exterior, leading to the wonders within.
People too?
It’s difficult to do Orang-utans justice in just a few lines; they have such intelligence and depth to them – I still recall being taught about their behaviour, when I was at university and eventually reaching the conclusion that you can make a very good case that they are people too – admittedly, hairy orange ones. When you meet their eye or watch them…
Crocodilian
This rather splendid fellow is a resident of Toronto Zoo, although I’m embarrassed to say that I can’t remember the species – it’s some sort of modest-sized crocodilian, possibly an American Alligator. One has to be very careful when visiting zoos in Ontario: mainly due to a lack of serious regulation, a lot of them are apparently very sketchy in terms of animal welfare…
The complete banker
In recent years, bankers have tended to acquire a level of desirability roughly equivalent to syphilis, certainly in the UK and other countries that took a beating from the recent financial crisis. This may well not be an entirely new phenomenon, however: when walking around downtown Toronto, people tend not to look up; it’s worth breaking that habit when in the vicinity of the…
Visiting Albion Falls in strong sunshine.
Albion Falls is one of the more beautiful of the many waterfalls that cascade down the Niagara Escarpment in and around Hamilton. Rather than being sensible and waiting for good lighting, on this occasion I was there close to midday and had to deal with bright sunshine making the scene hideously contrasty (I also had to frame the shot carefully – there…
Bill Ford-Smith 