Yesterday on flight back from the Audi Medup in Cagliari I found this picture. It’s a sunset on the Hirzel one of my favorite shooting place. Right after the shooting the picture didn’t made it in to the selection of the day, would have almost deleted it, sometimes you really need to look twice before you see the real beauty.

It’s quite some time ago since I have been in Thun, it’s a interesting feeling walking around here in this town. Thun is my birth town and in some way it’s a home.
With all the travel we do, did you never asked yourseles where is home?
Good night
Juerg

6am on the Hirzel

In January I was travelling a photo-shooting I Laos, I love that country. All this national protected areas are great to go and discover the still today plenty of untouched Asiaand no crime at all.
The last trekking was unforgettable, in central Laos close to the Vietnam border we spend a few days trekking from one village to the other, all of them from an ethnic minority called Kamoung.
The image below give you an impression about how they life.

Just after I came back home I jumped again in the plane to Manaco, sailing rules training for the Swiss Sailing Youth Team.
A bit of hearing training and on the water we played the good old team race game to apply the right of way rules.
I like to do the team race exercise during trainings, first off all you can practice rules in a funny way as the goal is not anymore to win but not to have the fourth position in the race if you do 2 teams of 2 boats.

Now I’m back in Switzerland and I working on 3 main projects, setting up the Laser Europa Cup 2008 for Lugano, then the Lugano Nautica where some of my sailing photos will be exposed and the with great pleasure we can finally start the preparation of a great sailing event which will be hold again in Lugano with some big 40 ft multihull. But details about that in a few days.

Photo (c) Jürg Kaufmann / Dominique Wavre getting ready to go

Do you rember the song “Should I Stay or Should I Go” from The Clash.

Right now I’m in Barcelona and tomorrow is the start of the Barcelona World Race, 2 persons non stop racing around the world in 60 ft racing yachts. Probably a year ago these guys where thinking about going for the race.
There is no doubt this guys they go in to the adventure.

Last year in these day this was the question for me, should I keep running around as IT Management consultant having every end of month a secure check or should I go and life the passion of photography and sailing?

Some say: stay in your old job some say do it!

Since there I’m sailing and taking pictures, mostly on sailing events? And it starts to pay off, some of my images taken yesterday here in Barcelona are displayed today on many famous sailing websites.

Now the question comes up again…Guess waht? I keep going….

Enjoy the pictures:

scuttlebutteurope.com

sailingscuttlebutt.com

sailkarma.com

and thank you for all of you telling me to do it.

Jürg

She is tall, has class, a speechless beauty born almost a century ago, here name is Mariquita.

Last weekend I had a special sailing experience, no it’s not about match racing no particular move just normal sailing but on a very special boat. Was in the jury for the Monaco Classic Week and as on-board observer you have plenty of opportunities to take good shots and enjoy the seamless class of this boats. On the first day I was on Wayward an typical schooner and the last day I spend on Mariquita, a real treasure.

To see more of here, click on the picture

Jürg

Photo © Juerg Kaufmann

Tour de France a la voile, it’s one of the sailing events I always thought about. In May I got the call whether I can join the jury for a few legs, and off we go.The Jury is not very active during the day and especially on the offshore legs, so I take all my camera gear in my bag. Actually since a few months the camera bag got bigger as the other bag. I followed a few legs in the north of France with strong winds and rough conditions. What I saw there in terms of sailing is impressive; imagine racing on the beat for hours in rough sea and the boats are just a few boat lengths away from each other. Enjoy the pictures….

Photo (c) Juerg Kaufmann

A few days ago I was in Geneva at the GP Chopard, regatta sailed with Decision 35 catamarans. It turned out to be lucky weekend, the boat called AXIOM almost capsized over the bow in front of us. The sailing magazine Swissboat will publish this picture on a double page format in the next edition, and on the internet in 24h we got 10’000 visitors looking at it. See more pictures

Photo (c) Juerg Kaufmann

After almost a month in Laos, the next place on the plan was Myanmar or also called Burma. The question was raised whether I should go there and how would it be, specially due to the of the actual regime.At the end it was a unforgettable trip, the country is a must seen place, the Burmese are so friendly it would have been a pity not to go.

Haven’t seen all the country, mostly 3 areas, Yangon the capital with the Swedagon pagoda, Bagan with the 200 temples and pagodas and for sure the lake Inle. There are plenty of places to discover for the next time.

To see some of the pictures taken during the time in Burma just click on the picture and enjoy.

After almost 10 years I had again the chance to travel for a longer priod, and Laos was allways one of my favorites, so let’s pack te bag and camera and go to Laos.
Untouched nature, places and a growing tourisme, you can get the from 5US$ backpacker hotel up to the 300 US$ lodge, that’s Laos today.
The route was from north Luang Prabang down to south to Si Pan Don the palce called 40’000 islands, but even the capital Vientiane has a lot to offer.