Dusk, Camp Bay and rock pools

What a wonderful evening for a Diamond Harbour Camera Club outing...

Camp Bay, near the mouth of Lyttelton Harbour is a gorgeous spot; sheltered at times but at others open to the elemental forces of punishing waves and winds that blow in from the east.

The foreshore here is strewn with ancient basalt lava flows, perfect for mussels, pipis and other kai moana to claim as their own. So thick are the shellfish that it's easy to assume the rocks you are clambering over are onyx black - only on careful inspection do they reveal themselves as being covered by bi-valves.

My previous blip visit here saw the tide retreating, whereas today the tide was coming in thick and fast. I had to be quick to ensure that I had an escape route over the rocks, but thankfully I secured safe passage under the watchful eye of a small colony of pied shags, happily roosting in the tall macrocapa that line the bay's eastern fringes...

(To capture this image's silky smooth sea and to control the relections in the rock pools, I used a combination of circular polariser, 10 stop ND and 3 stop gradient filter)