Yet another hiking trip to Sugarloaf Mountain, this time with 3 little kids in tow – Vasudev, Sunayana and Abhiram. Sunayana and my two nephews are real troopers. We hiked for nearly 3 hours, and we managed to do the Orange and Red trails.
We started at the Eastview Overlook AND returned via the steps to the West view overlook point, and then wearily trudged back to the Eastview parking lot. The weather was cloudy all day and comfortable, except for a cool breeze that kept things nippy. The sky was overcast, but the light was fairly bright, perfectly even, shadowless light.
Since I had to keep 3 kids in tow, I had originally intended to carry a simple, focus-free, no frills camera like the Olympus Trip 35 or the Ricoh 500 rangefinder, but at the last minute, I decided to take something just as simple and rugged – the Ricoh CR-5 manual camera, with it’s sharp little Rikenon 55mm f/2.2 lens.
Now, the Ricoh is one of my accidentally acquired cameras, and I had not used it since I replaced the light seals late last summer. Even though the light meter works fine with the new batteries, I don’t really like to depend on flaky old light meters, and instead prefer to use the Sunny 16 rule, which works fine for me in daylight situations. Besides, since I could not stand around fiddling with focusing, I used Hyperfocal distance settings so that I could just aim and shoot whenever I got the youngsters to sit down and take a break during the hike.
Truth be told, the break was more for resting MY weary bones, since I had hiked the White Trail with Jayaram just the previous day, and it was all I could do to keep up with them. Two 4 year olds and a 9 year old have so much energy between them that I was questioning my sanity in bringing them along without another adult to help supervise and keep them on the trails.
The kids are good with hikes though – they’ve been out with me enough times. I usually remind them why it’s important to keep on the trails, and how to follow the marked Trail blazes. Thankfully, the 2 youngsters know all about trails and paths and maps from the TV show Diego and from Dora. Thanks, Nickelodeon!
The pictures were taken at several points along the Orange and Red Trails on Sugarloaf Mountain, and at the peak. As I mentioned, the light was just right for closeup color photography, although the overcast sky made the surrounding countryside hazy.
The Ricoh CR-5 is a simple, reliable, rugged SLR and comes standard with a Rikenon 55mm f/2.2 lens. Since it was cloudy, I used a Sky 1A filter to cut the blue of the UV and to provide slight warmth, and as I was using 200 ASA film, I set the shutter at 1/250 second and the aperture at f/5.6.
Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Ricoh CR-5 SLR
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Photographed with a Ricoh CR-5 and 55mm f/2.2 lens, 1/250 second at f/5.6 on Fuji Super HQ 200 film. I used a Skylight filter (very pale rose) to cut the blue and render the colors naturally.
text and images © 2007 ajoy muralidhar. all names, websites, brands and technical data referenced are the copyright or trademark of their respective owners.
Olympus/Zuiko 