A Large Day

Actually, it was a very large weekend. In my little corner of the world we still celebrate Queen Victoria's birthday on the weekend that includes, or lies before, May 24th. It's an excuse to wet a line and bend a few elbows; to get out in the country and have a boil up. This was a rare confluence of events as we had great weather and enough wind to keep the flies away, and a massive iceberg floating out the bay.

This gigantic block of ancient ice was ponderously making it's way back out the bay. Winds were high, and whipped melt-water and steam off the surface.

The bay holds reefs and shoals that have sunk many a ship, and our floating iceberg came upon a rock. Over the space of the evening it grounded and twisted, the forces of wave and tide and wind torquing through the center. The back rose, the center sank, the nose lifted.

We had no moon that night, but before all was fully dark I was able to try a long exposure

of the two pieces as the berg broke apart. While the camera was on a tripod, and I used a remote shutter release, the wind blew so hard that there was no way to keep the camera fully steady. The lights on the other shore trace a feather into the shot.

The next morning some anticipation woke me at 5. The sky was tinged with yellow, and the two massive blocks were parted. The bow well out the bay, floating aimlessly and in it's way, somehow forlorn.

The stern still firmly anchored on the rock...