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Sunkist Bay

What an appropriate name for this wonderful beach here at Beachlands, Auckland, New Zealand.  Such a lovely peaceful place to take a stroll or just sit and watch the waves.  Surprisingly close to Auckland, yet it feels like a million miles away.  The first image in this post looks in the general direction of Auckland City.  In fact, around the headland to the left you will see Pine Harbour from where there’s a regular ferry service into the heart of Auckland.

Looking towards Auckland City from Sunkist Bay
Looking towards Auckland City from Sunkist Bay

But looking at the views (and did you notice how crowded the place is) it’s hard to believe you’re so close to New Zealand’s largest city! The second image shows the public boat ramp with Waiheke Island in the background.

Boat ramp at Sunkist Bay
Boat ramp at Sunkist Bay

Not got a large boat? No problem. Just bring your kayak and set sail from the beach. The owner of this kayak had been doing a spot of afternoon fishing from this yellow boat. Something nice for dinner? Hard to beat fresh snapper 😉

Fancy a bit of kayaking? Maybe a visit to Sunkist Bay is what you need!
Fancy a bit of kayaking? Maybe a visit to Sunkist Bay is what you need!
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Rather special …

Sunrise at Sunkist Bay

It was a glorious morning and I was there to not only see it, but able to take photographs of it too. It’s not that many years ago that I’d see a glorious sunrise through my car windscreen on my way to work. No time to stop and enjoy, had to get into the office and start work. Thankfully those days are long gone! Now I have the opportunity to not only enjoy watching the sun rise, but photograph it too.

There’s an app I have for my Android Phone called Sun Surveyor. This is very helpful to decide times and locations for sunrises (and sunsets for that matter). Using this app I could see where the sun would rise in relation to the trees at this particular Beachlands location. There’s a number of trees, with a gap through which you can see the water, and … according to Sun Surveyor, the sun would rise through this gap. The next shot taken with a wide angle lens, gives a better idea of the trees that frame the view.

Sunkist Bay Sunrise

Somewhat tricky to determine exposure with scenes like this as some areas are very dark whereas other are extremely bright. In situations like this I always use LiveView and the histogram. Sometimes I’ll take several images at different shutter speeds and then blend the images together to ensure I don’t lose detail, but for this shot I was happy to have the darks as dark as they are.

Oh, want to see more of the house that has these gorgeous views?  Take a look here.