As of Tuesday I am away until September travelling to the United Arab Emirates, Spain, Italy and possibly a few other places in Europe.

Three weeks of this period will be walking the camino in northern Spain where I actually choose to be as much incommunicado as possible. And at other times Internet access won’t always be available for posting regularly to this site.

However for snapshots of life and travels in Europe you can go to the Visited Planet Facebook page as I will post there regularly. My Instagram photographs (visitedplanet) will also appear there.
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All images are purchasable through the Visited Planet database. Feel free to email Jo at [email protected] with your comments/thoughts/photo aspirations. See and learn more at www.visitedplanet.com

Langtang appealed to me as a trekking destination in Nepal this year having hiked in the Annapurna region already three times. I had heard it was far less busy than both Annapurna and Everest and its location near Tibet was attractive, along with the promise of interacting with people groups in homestays and villages. I was not disappointed. There were far fewer people on the trail and a lot of local culture and life going on to enjoy, largely thanks to it being losar or Tibetan New Year.

The Langtang track follows a river for three days up to the highest village of Khanjim Gompa at 3810m so it doesn’t get that high in altitude. The days were long but there wasn’t the up and down of the Annapurna terrain, just a gradual climb up past high alpine meadows with plenty of grazing yak, Tibetan villages and life, mani walls to admire and follow, plus plenty of snow and high mountains to ponder. I spent several days in Khanjim Gompa as there were day walks further into the valley, up high peaks surrounding us and towards glaciers that plummeted down the slopes around us. The images really tell their own story and all are available in the database.

Revealed in the early morning light – a gompa half way up the mountain behind the hotel in Khanjim Gompa. Pic: Joanne Lane, www.visitedplanet.com

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From brick workers to bustling markets and celebrations for the Tibetan New Year, the recent Cameras for Asia workshops in Nepal generated a lot of really great images of life in the Kathmandu valley. The images below were taken by children from the Children’s Welfare Centre in Godwari and the Nepal Muscular Dystrophy Foundation.

Monk novices at Swaymbhunath for Losar, Tibetan New Year. Pic: Amrita.

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Smoky cities, endless traffic jams, a hubbub of noise and pollution, snowy vistas, quiet valleys, grazing yak, butter tea, blazing butter lamps, friendly smiles … all experiences of Nepal are both intense, conflicting, variable, colourful and memorable. While my time here recently was largely spent teaching photography, with the Cameras for Asia program and therefore without time to concentrate on it myself, I did manage to take the odd image, and these are now loaded into the database and accessible through this link (see Langtang, Cameras for Asia and the Kathmandu Valley).

Here are some highlights.

Collecting water after a day’s work at the brick factory.

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Visited Planet is pleased to announce the release of 15 new greeting cards.  These are divided between a “world” series featuring Visited Planet images and a “Cameras for Asia” series with images taken by children during workshops. Sales of the latter are divided between Cameras for Asia and the centre where it was taken.

To order a greeting card email [email protected] and provide:
* Your name and the address to send the cards
* The identifiying number and quantity of cards
* Payment advice (paypal to [email protected] or email for bank details)
Introductory offer: Free postage in Australia for an order of six cards or more.

Design 2: 9 card “World” series
Card Quality: 4 colour process plus overall matt varnish on 250gsm card.
Finished size: Scored to fold to 175mm x 115mm
Blank inside.
Cost: $2 each
Introductory offer: Free postage in Australia for an order of six cards or more.

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