Neidong photo trip - go for the waterfall, stay for the bugs
Tuesday, April 1st, 2008
Last Saturday, I went to Neidong National Park, south-ish of Taipei. I went on a photo trip with a handful of co-workers in our photo club.
The night before, I went to Indian, a dinosaur/cavemen/native american/what? themed restaurant to eat and drink with Amy and everybody. I needed to take my scooter home so I could drive it out to the Xindian MRT station to meet everybody, as I needed to get there by 6:30AM, before they opened(I think they open at 7). We had 2 mini-kegs though, so I had to wait a while before I could drive my scooter home, so I ended up looking around the RT-Mart nearby until they closed. Awesome!
That morning, my alarm woke me up at 5:40AM. I had gone to sleep at 1AM, and I’d been tired from sleeping badly all week anyway. >_< I woke up fine though, got ready, and drove down to meet them. It’s not the first time I’ve had to get up ridiculously early - there have been plenty of times where I’ve drank with Fred ‘n Kevin, slept 2 hours, then left for our international flight which we COULD NOT MISS.
So, of course, I ended up falling asleep repeatedly in the car on the way there.
The park was pretty neat - it’s famous for its triple waterfall, lush greenery, and general nature-ness.
Lots of people were there exercising, including one guy who appeared to be doing air humps, an exercise that seemed to be good for men.
Some other people were meditating or sleeping, which is pretty much a form of meditation anyway.
On the way back to the car, we stopped to take macro pictures of a bunch of bugs, where I learned that I can “convert” my lenses to take macro photos by getting some extension tubes. However, it’s still difficult to take pictures of ants that WON’T STOP MOVING, and you also have to hold the camera closer than you would hold a magnifying glass, like less than 3cm from the bug.
I also managed to take some panoramic shots, which I stitched together using Autostitch, which is pretty sweet.
So, after spending about 2-3 hours in the park walking around and taking photos, I meditated repeatedly on the way back home.