My Dad wanted to see the start of the Sydney to Hobart Yacht race again this year.

Unlike the last time we were there in good time this year and found a great parking spot and a fairly good vantage point of the race without too many crowds.

While waiting for the race to start the James Craig was cruising back and forth outside the harbour.





Once the race started and the boats passed the heads it became very busy both on the water and it in air with all the boats and helicopters (at one point I counted 11 at the same time) and my Dad was busy clicking away.










This year turned out to be a new course record, so great conditions all the way to Hobart.

Christmas Day we celebrated with Kims family at her sisters house.

It was the usual crowd of our familys and everyone bringing dishes to share and as usual there was a lot of different foods to try.



It was great to have the whole family together (Aiden was again eating too much).







And even Santa made an appearance again this year...Thank you so much Santa!!!!!

This year we celebrated Christmas at home with my Dad and his partner with the traditional Christmas Duck and Ris-a-la-mande.





It was Lucas' first and Aiden's third Christmas...Aiden is now getting old enough to enjoy the experience...



...especially the food



After dinner we opened presents according to the Danish tradition and Aiden was very excited about the big box from Bedstefar...



...containing a big truck.



From Mummy and Daddy he received a Lightning Mcqueen car (radio controlled).





...and also a drawing pad.





Merry Christmas...

On one of the days we took my dad to Maroubra beach for breakfast.





It gave them a chance to check out what out local beach is like and also Aiden a chance to have a bit of a play in the sand.

At around Christmas time Kims dad asked me if I could take some more photos of him and the grandchildren.

Last year I took some of him using a blue background and he asked for something similar (although I am not a big fan of blue)

Every year I like to take a Christmas family photo.

This year having my dad around meant that I could get hime to assist us with taking the photo as I needed someone to stand on a ladder taking the photo while we as a family was lying plat on a bed.

Merry Christmas 2012 Everyone!!!!

Every year some of the houses in Matraville puts on a spectacular christmas light show.

Every night there are hundreds of visitors and it is worth seeing.

Here are some of the lights from this years show.

This holiday season my Dad and his partner is visiting us from Denmark.



It has been a while since he was here and in also a while since we were in Denmark, so Aiden had grown a fair bit since.

The first couple of weeks we bought then some trips to various places such as Hunter Valley and the Blue Mountains.

One the weekends we would treat then to various dinners Thai, Indian, Moroccan, Brazilian, Aussie, Chinese etc. as well as try to make time to take them to see some of the sights around Sydney.

The first weekend Aiden was sick so we had to cancel our trip up the Northern Beaches to Barrenjoey Lighthouse so we had to stay home and let them explore by themself. On the second weekend we managed to go there and bring Aiden along as well sitting in his little backback.



It was a warm day and the climb is fairly steep so especially my dads partner was pretty hot by the time we reached the top where the light house is.






The view was definitely worth it.



Walking back along the beach we decided to make a drink stop to clench the thirst.

First of all Merry Christmas everyone!!!


With a bit of arm twisting Kim finally agreed to let me do a series of 'sexy' Santa photos.




A lot of work had to go into these couple of photos in terms of getting the outfit, but the right colour wrapping paper, wrap all the boxes, set them up to it looks nice, getting all the lighting right and not least convince Kim to do the actual shoot.

Then I had to sort out the photos I needed and then do all the editing...I think the end result is pretty good and very much in the spirit of Christmas.

And did I mention that I am married to the most beautiful (and sexy) Santa there is???

Lucas is now three months young and the other day I did a series of monthly photos of Kim and him on our bed.

Today we celebrated Aidens birthday with the family.

In the morning we all had Yum Cha and afterwards we took all the kids to Little Dynamos to play.



In the evening we had the family over for steamboat and cake. Great opportunity to take a new family photo with the latest member of the family...Emma.

Today it was one year ago that my my Mum and Aidens Grandma passed away.

I am still sad that Aiden never met her but I am hoping that he will get to know Bedstefar better as he is growing up.




I am also glad that Aiden will have a brother to keep each other company and I hope the two of them will be close and grow old together.

I still have a suitcase sitting here full of photos that I one day will get the courage tp go through...but not anytime soon.

Today was Aidens second birthday...time flies!



We had a Birthday cake for him with the family and sang Happy Birthday and let him blow out the candle.

Today is a very unique day in that the planet Venus passed over the disc of the Sun. The next such passing wont happen for another 105 years.

And it is even more interesting since we recently returned from Tahiti where Captain Cook observed the last passing several hundred years ago.



Here in sydney it was a very cloudy day, but I did manage to snap a couple of photos using a very powerful lens covered with dark filters. It is a planet Venus at the 7 o'clock on the sun in the photo.

Bummer...I had to return the camera yesterday. It was driving me mad with back focusing...not what you would expect from a $3000 camera. Hopefully they will be able to fix the issue, but unfortunately they are saying that there is a 21 day turnaround. The focus was 5cm off which is critical especially then taking portraits.


I did however manage to take a couple of photos that were ok and a bit of video with it on Sunday inside a very dark ten-pin bowling place (it was Kayla's birthday party) with all kinds of weird lighting. I was shooting at insanely high iso (12800) and I must say that I general I was pretty impressed.



Especially impressed with how fast I could shoot with lots of kids running around. They are totally usable for my blog and online posting although I wouldn't enlarge them. There was a lot of noise at these high ISO's, but most of it could be managed to a certain degree in Lightroom.






Later I was shooting with KC's camera at the lunch table...there was more light and I was strugling with taking photos using natural light.

Today I picked up my new camera. It is the new Nikon D800 and is currently one of the most sought after cameras on the market.

I have been wanting to get a full frame camera for some time now and this was the one for me to get...the reviews are excellent.


I pre-ordered it shortly after is was announced and has been waiting for over three months for it to arrive...but it is finally here.




It will be a steep learning curve to get used to all the new features of the camera and it will be a sad goodbye to my almost 10 year old D50 entry level camera.

I am now moving from 5 auto focus points to 51...from 6 Megapixels to 36 megapixels...max 1600 ISO to 25600 ISO...no bells and whistles to having features such as Video, Timelapse, HDR, face detection, live view, aparture preview...and the list goes on...



The D50 has served me well, but it is definitely time to move on as the technology has advanced so much. Not sure what I do with the old camera...but I will most likely end up selling it.

It is Autumn here in Sydney and today the forecast was for 19 degrees and sunny...the first cool'ish day here. In the morning we went with Kims family to the cemetry to visit Kims mum. After this we were planning to head up to the Blue Mountains to Mt Wilson to visit some of the private gardens to take photos of the Autumn colours and get some new family photos of Kim, Aiden and I.


When we arrived it was really windy and only 7 degrees (later it dropped to 5 degrees). We had dressed for the cold, but Dylan who had joined us on the spur of the moment was a bit underdressed and cold so he borrowed a spare jumper I had with me. We immediately found a pile of leaves and they started having fun throwing them up in the air.








We decided to visit the Yengo Sculpture garden and the owner came to greet us, tell us about the garden and charge for the entry.











The garden was very nice and the colours were awesome.















There were lots of sculptures hidden around the garden.



Dylan got a bit upset because we had to scold him for running around (this was a private garden so deserved a bit of respect), throwing pebbles, thrashing my camera gear and keeping to run into the frame of the photo I was trying to take. I had also been trying to get a bit interested in what he is seeing around him to learn more things and asking him if he was interested in some of the lookouts to experience one of the most beautiful places in Australia, as well as look at the things in antique shops etc., but he was totally dis-interested..."you can drag the horse to the water, but you can force it to drink".



After the garden Aiden was really tired and cold and we were getting hungry, so we decided to head back and stop along the way for lunch. It was good timing as it started to rain a little. I decided to drive on the great western highway as there were more options for food and I though it would be quicker getting back...turned out everyone else had the same idea so it was at a crawl.

Today Kim and I went to the Lyrics Theatre to see the 'An Officer and Gentleman' musical.

It was a remake of the 1982 movie, but on the stage.



It was ok but nothing special. The acting and singing was great, but the screenplay itself as well as the music/lyrics could have been more original and the stage setup was pretty basic.

Kim is pregnant again and we are now halfway there and on Monday we went for the halfway scans (due late September).



Everything is on track and looking good so far (5 fingers and toes etc.). For the first time we were able to tell the gender of the baby and it turns out that we are expecting a little brother to Aiden.

This means that Aiden very soon will have someone to play with here at home.

Today was Anzac day. We decided to use the day to explore some of the local area in the National Park on the other side of Botany bay near Kurnell.



It was very windy (Aiden wasn't happy with the wind). The walk along the coast is easy an quite scenic. There is even a small lighthouse about a kilometer down the track and the rocks have cook textures.

During the day at the Entrance we made a quick trip up to Norah Head light house to scope it out.

Later that evening I headed up there in the dark to take some star photos.

The conditions were perfect with the Milky way clearly visible and I good some great shots. Here is one pretty much straight out of the camera that requires just a little more processing.





As I walked from the gate to the lighthouse (about 700 metres in pitch darkness) with my torch all hell broke loose suddenly when I rounded a corner.

I heard people scrambling in all directions through the bushes falling over branches. I used my torch to have a look and saw these 6-7 kids running away...obviously they were sitting there smoking weed and got a freight.

Later in the evening they walked past me as I was taking photos and one of them said 'Man, you gave us a freight...we thought you were a cop'!

The Cherry Blossom season is about to start here in Sydney (does that mean spring is here) and the first flowers are out. Yesterday I brought my camera along when picking up Aiden from daycare and managed to take a couple of photo along the way.



I may try and take some more photos over the next week or so. Kim mentioned that she would like to hang one of the photos on the wall.

We are in the process of doing some large prints...I have already ordered the first one which is a glass print which should arrive next month.

I love the new camera...it performed abosolutely amazing on the weekend when I did a photoshoot with the family. The 36 Megapixels mean that every detail such as pores in the skin, hairs etc. is visible and sharp.

This photo below shows one of the photos of Chong and Emma zoomed in at 100 percent..the small photo on the left shows the original photo.

A couple of months ago Chong and KC had a new addition to their family.

Last week they asked me if I'd take some photos for them. It was a good chance for me to have a play with the new camera as well as some light setups.






Emma was very good and only had one 'accident'.



It was also a good practice session for when our next addition arrives in a couple of months.











I love the new camera, the details are absolutely amazing in the studio and the autofocus is accurate now after I had it fixed by Nikon.

Yesterday I went to a work conference where at the end of the day they offered us to do some site visits.

I was fortunate enough to visit the satellite tracking facility in the Northern part of Sydney. The company I work for owns a number of satellites (at a cost of around $400 million each) and they will be launching their 10th satellite later this year...the 'O10'.


This photo is from the control room where they look after all the locations, transponders and media broadcasts from the satellites.




It was interesting to be able to see the raw/unedited broadcasts from areas such as the London Olympics, the conflict in Syria etc.


The actual electronics was equally impressive.






I even found the box that currently is receiving all the media broadcasts from the 2012 London Olympics.






This is the Satelite Dish controller...On the display you can see the current position of the dish (and from that you could probably calculate the location of the actual satellite).




Outside was the array of dishes.






Most of the satellites are being launched from French Guyana by the European space agency.

A couple of days ago it was my birthday...I wish it was my 27th...but it wasn't!

Kim took me out for dinner on the day itself to a nice place at Circular Quay...very nice, but absolutely freezing and windy in there.





Day after we went out for dinner with the family to a Japanese restaurant and they ordered a shameful amount of food!

After the dinner we went back to our place for cake.

Aiden is a big fan of the Thomas Trains, so a few weeks ago when Kim saw some vouchers for the Train Shed she bought some tickets.

This morning we went out there with the whole family to go riding on the trains. Aiden was very excited...to the point where he didn't want to get off the train.



The kids had 5 rides each and they also had lunch and scones provided for us.







Aiden had to check out anything that remotely looked like a train (looks like he is taking a wee here).




It was also a good day to try out the new camera (just came back after 5 weeks in the repair shop for recalibration). Kim was using it most of the day and said she loves it compared to my old camera.


On the way in I had seen a signpost towards the Warragamba Dam. This is where 80-90 percent of Sydneys drinking water supply comes from.

This morning it was a beautiful winter day here in Sydney and we decided therefore to go duck feeding in Centenial Park with Aiden and Dylan (I was supposed to have been doing a course, but it was cancelled).

Aiden eventually figured out that it was fun to tear off small pieces of bread and throw it in the water for the ducks and swans to eat.



I showed him how to hand feed the big swans with a flat hand, but he still didn't like them much...and even less so when one of them stole his bread after sneaking in from behind.



Stupid Swan!!!!



But eventually the swan apologised and he was happy to feed the smaller birds.



Also the pond is full of fat eels (and on one occation I have seen turtles there). Some of them would surface to try and steal the bread from the ducks.

Yesterday we went to Emily's birthday party in Centennial park. We were there on time at 10.30 on a very cold morning (it had been 7 degrees overnight) but there was no-one else there...the host and the birthday child turned up two hours later (I cannot stand people who consistently have no respect for other people time).

We had brought Aiden tri-cycle that he got as a birthday present from his grandma last year.



We also spend some time exploring the forest next to the playground.

My mum and dad spent some time in Sydney over christmas and New Year.

While they were here I raught my dad how to absail.



And for Christmas I gave my parents some tickets for the Sydney Harbour bridge walk (they gave Arumi a ticket too).

My brother passed away in the end of 2002. He had been suffering badly from his disease for almost a decade and eventually it got the better of him.

I still miss him a lot even though we weren't close when he was alive....but I still feel him close to me to this day!



I still light a candle for him once in a while.



His two biggest wishes in life was to become a professional tennis player...he was a pretty damn good player and I never played against him because I didn't have a chance.



His second biggest wish was to get himself a girlfriend. This is one of the last photos that was taken of him.



I still blame the psychiatric system in Denmark for what happened. They were too focused on treating his disease with medication and never paid any attention on teaching him to live with his disease and provide quality in life.


I still love him very much and I really miss him. I also regret that I wasn't there more for him.



He always looked after me and he has never hurt anyone.





This is the last family photo that was taken.



I would appreciate if you click here to see some of the photos from my brothers life: May he not be forgotten

Before Claus became ill, he was a rising star in the world of tennis. He was featured in the local newspaper as Amtsmester - he came first in the local "Amst" - level similar to state-level.

Claus loved being out in the wind and the sun. He was also prone to seasickness.

Claus and my family came to visit me in Australia in 1999. I think he liked it here - warmer winters and friendly people. I really like the top middle photo, of Claus eating oysters. He looked very happy. They did a lot of sightseeing here, and even visited my apartment on Narrabeen beach.

The following are the last photos that were taken of Claus, on one of our sailing trips.

My brother had schizophrenia, and he passed away not long after his 33rd birthday.

I love my brother, and I regret not telling him this. My girlfriend tells me that Claus knew I loved him.
I am not convinced of this, so I wrote him a letter, in the hope that he will read this, wherever he is.

There is so much I wanted to say to him.

I want to remember him when he was not sick, when he was happy, and when I was last in Denmark in June 2002. I want to remember him, as you will see him in these photos.

My Big Brother . . .








Created: 8 Oct 2002 Last Updated: 24 Oct 2002

On the way back from Denmark we made a stopover in Singapore to have a look as well as do some shopping.

Here a photo from Little India in Singapore.

We surprised my Mum by turning up in Denmark before her 60th Birthday.

She had a big party where a lot of her friends and family turned up.



While we were there we also got to visit some of my friends and family as well as do a bit of Sightseeing in Copenhagen and Legoland. Click here to see more photos from: Mums 60th Birthday/Slideshow

Over the Christmas holidays we went for a drive through some of the most scenic parts of Australia.

First we drive down to Melbourne and then along the Great Ocean Road to Adelaide.



The sunsets were spectacular.



We then continued up to the Flinders Ranges and along the way had a look at cave paintings.



In Broken hill we went down into the old Daydream silvermine.



We also had a look at some of the Desert Sculptures



Along the way we saw some Australian Wildlife. Here a wombat.



And here a possum.



Lots of Koalas



And here one very angry Lizard.



And of course some Emus.



We were camping along the way.



Click here to see more photos from Driving in Australia / Slideshow