When in a place that defies the “Thousand Words Rule” sometimes its better to just let the photos do the talking.
For all the reasons I am not a writer, the greatest failure comes to mind when I see things like this:
There are just no words.
And I’m definitely not a sucker for sunrises… still, there’s just a raw beauty in this stuff.
An honest, unadulterated beauty.
Keep in mind, my friends, that all of these photos are taken on the same day. The day beginning with a morning walk to the tip of the Island where there is an island a few hundred feet off shore.
I would say its an “easy” walk considering the wave break is barely a foot under the water, but… its no normal sandbar. Walking in the slick rock saturated by sea urchins made the walk… beyond difficult.
So, with a few sea urchin spines in my heel and one in my hand, the workday really began with a ferry around the island in a handmade, wooden boat…
…to Madame Bernard, one of the only other significant villages besides Cacoq where we had spent the night.
At this second small village, this day brought the fishermen and sailors from around the area to the major marketplace – only a bi-weekly occurence. They come in droves.
Sailboats…
…canoes…
…and boats powered simply with a long pole.
Hundreds descend upon the market bringing their weekly crop and hoping that they will not have to take any back home at the end of the day.
.
Images only tell a small fraction of the story in places like this. If a picture is worth a thousand words, the marketplace in villages like this put the whole encyclopaedia to shame.
Images are everywhere. Constant. From all directions.
And all of these images, I just don’t want to touch. No editing. Straight from the camera to Lightroom, a quick border/stamp added in CS4 and upload. I love seeing these images and knowing that those chaotic moments frozen in time were real.
Unadulterated, honest, natural.
[[[There is a part of this story in this part of this day that has been omitted for a separate blog post. It deserves its own space. For that, stay tuned.]]]
Like the islands, barely named and locked in time 100 years ago, 200 years ago, 500 years ago… the fishermen move with the season and the patterns of their intended catch.
Some fish from the island’s shores. Most tempt the seas and fish from their lightweight skiffs.
As weather-beaten and rough-and-tumble as they are, these fisherman feed the island and the surrounding mainland, an area not always farmable due to the flood plains and sandy soil, day after day and week after week.
So, we stay with them to tell their story.
The stories are everywhere, stay tuned…
-noah d.
.
PS: Note this is Part A. Part B is a biggie, I promise.
