Faroe Islands puffins

Description

Hear the behind the scenes story about this image:

Read the behind the scenes story – audio transcribed:

So I’m obsessed with puffins and I have, kind of by osmosis and reading about them just being immersed in nature magazines, have picked up on the fact that there is this island in the Faroe Islands, called Mykines where there is a population of maybe like 8 to 11 people and a seabird population of up to a million birds.

And a lot of those are puffins. And the pictures that I could see were very much you would get to the cliff, sit and then the puffins would just be around you and it just felt like an absolute dream. And the Faroe Islands were somewhere that I’d always been interested in visiting. I think we went in maybe 2017 or 2018.

And, the only way to get to this tiny island was either by boat, which for me, at that point in time, I’d always struggle with motion sickness. So a 45 minute boat trip was something I really wouldn’t have chosen to do. But one way was also by helicopter and the Danish government subsidised helicopters to increase accessibility to the smaller islands and so it worked out, they did them almost as like a kind of erm weekly release where locals would have, the first access and then any that were left would go to visitors and so I waited up til like, the midnight release of the day that visitors could access them and managed to get two tickets and they worked out at 12 pounds each to to travel to the island.

And so, because I could get one way, not on a boat, and I thought I might be alright in a helicopter for a short amount of time, we booked them. And off we went.

And so we had the most incredible day, sat on the cliff tops watching the puffins. We popped back to one of the only places, I think there’s one place, maybe two. I think it is one predominantly place you can stay and we had a bit of dinner and then we went round the cliffs again, at sunset, which is when I caught this puffin picture. And it’s my all time favourite picture of puffins because I was just focused on the puffin, that’s on the right hand side. And in the split second that I was taking the picture, the second puffin came into land and it looks like it’s about to hug the other puffin, doesn’t it?

It’s just got its wings open. It’s got that kind of like embrace, feel there and that soft, very romantic pink sky in the background. And I just could not believe when I looked at it in camera on the back of the screen there, that this was a shot that was inside my camera. Because you can’t ever imagine taking a photograph like this.

And it’s just moments like this, like, really move me in nature, where it’s a split second thing and it’s just absolute luck on your chance in that moment, on that day that you capture it and it’s you that got to capture it and so, this is the image that I really, really treasure and I absolutely adore. So it’s been a joy to include it on these 40 frames for 40.