2011/09 – New Camera Old Habits

29 Sep

Vendersheim/Rheinhessen

Vendersheim/Rheinhessen

Sept. 2011

I love my Lumix LX1 camera. I’ts been with me for the last 8 years and I feel it has taken a million pictures. Truly a workhorse. In a week in Cuba I used to take 2500 to 3000 pictures.

So I felt it would disintegrate any day now and started looking for a similar small but excellent camera I can use at ease without any pretension of doing a professional job.

Thanks to Dave I found a worthy successor, another Lumix, this time the TZ22 which is the same size, has a larger monitor and a multitude of new features like GPS and face recognition.

In fact, it’s so advanced that after reading the manual for several hours I just gave up and will miss on many of them for the easier Intelligent Automatic it has built in. I felt it has more electronics inside than a B-747 had 30 years ago ……

The zoom range from 24 to 380 and a HD video mode makes it also a very handy tool.

I will take it on my next trip Cuba, spending a relaxed and interesting 5 weeks there during Oct/Nov this year and look forward to good results.

These are some test shots from the last few weeks at home.

We had relatives visit us so we took them on a Rheingau tour visiting Rüdesheim, Schloss Vollrads and Eltville plus many good vineyards. Great weather here too, sunny skies and warm to mild temperatures.

Which made the last few events we had an outdoor pleasure.

Reiner cooked up a truly original Kesselgulasch for us, a fantastic dinner washed down with lots of beer, red wine and finished off with Barak Palinka Hungarian Schnaps.

The last pharmacy smoke was also celebrated outside – I smoked the new Sancho Panza Escuderos, ER Germany, a remarkably excellent cigar which I can recommend for immediate pleasure or laying down. I wish all Cuban cigars were as first class as these !

A trip to Belgium to visit good friends and pick up good beer ( named Jean Nicot and specially made for cigars ) is next and then preparations for Cuba will start.

This new Lumix will be in my bag for sure.

Nino