I was watching an early morning TV show yesterday morning called ‘Breakfast’, and they were reporting the weather from a place called Birkenhead in Auckland. The view looking across the water towards the Sky Tower and the Harbour Bridge looked very appealing so I decided to jump in my car and check it out for myself.

This was taken from Hinemoa Street, where some of the boats are kept. The one in this photo was sitting on the sand, waiting for the tide to roll in. The rest of them were stacked up on the shore, out of action. It was extremely windy while I was there, which made it quite a challenge to take a steady photo, even when using the tripod. I ended up using the ‘continuous shooting’ feature with AEB for the 3-shot exposure, as I didn’t trust the stability of the tripod alone due to the wind.

In this photo, you can see two of New Zealand’s most iconic landmarks – The Sky Tower and the Auckland Harbour Bridge. The bridge was opened on 30th of May 1959 and it took over 200 workers around 4-years to build. When it was first built it only had four lanes, but after a few years they needed to make the bridge bigger to cope with all the traffic, so they added two lanes to each side. The new lanes were called “clippons” because they were made in Japan, shipped to New Zealand on huge ships and then clipped into place with huge steel pins and rods. It turned 50-years old in May of this year, and has had over 50-billion vehicles cross it during that time.

As for the Sky Tower, weighing in at over 21-million kilograms and standing at 328-metres tall, makes it the 12th tallest tower in the world. You get stunning views from the top, and can also look through the glass floors, straight down to the ground below. It has been designed to remain essentially undamaged during storms with winds gusting to 200 km/hr (125 mph), which can result in sway at the top of the concrete shaft of approximately one metre. We had a lightning storm here in Auckland the other night, and a few bolts hit the top of the tower, but fortunately it has a purposely-designed copper pole on the top to absorb the electricity.


EXIF Data:
Image Quality: RAW
Device: Canon EOS 450D
Lens: Canon 75-300mm f/4-5.6 lll USM
Focal Length: 75mm
Aperture: F/22
Shutter Speed: 1/100s, 1/400s, 1/25s
Exposure Mode: Manual Control
Metering: Spot Metering
ISO Sensitivity: ISO 800
Date Taken: 1st July 2009, 10:24am

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