Out of Your Tree 2 – A page from the diary of Photographer Dominic Lee, Priory Studios

Thursday, Apr 29th, 2010 in The IPWS Blog by Dominic Lee | 2 Comments

Frank Quinn in South Georgia & Rob Lee in Argentina.

Traveling to Antarctica with my 16 yr old son Rob we first spent a week in Buenos Aries, with an overnight stay at The Iguazú Falls on the Brazil-Argentina border, it’s the widest waterfall in the world (featured in the Mission, Moonraker and the most recent Indiana Jones movie). It was particularly spectacular due to recent heavy rain and the trips out on the walkways were so breathtaking that it has to make it into the “Top 10 Things to See Before You Die” list.

Although I have to admit that sharing the experience with my son Rob made it extra special for me. I still recall being well chuffed when my Dad took me to the top of Nelsons Pillar (age 10) before the IRA in their infinite wisdom, blew it up!

Anyway the Rio Iguazú was too fast and dangerous to take out the boats that day so we crossed over the border to the Brazil side and took a helicopter flight for a bird’s eye view and that was also amazing plus the cameras don’t get wet!

Hotel overlooking Iguazú Falls

Back in Buenos Aries our Argentinean friends took us water-skiing on The River Plate and that’s Robs main photo in the book, the reason he has such a big grin on his face is because I had failed several attempts to ski while he made it on the first attempt. Robs text page in the book is a shot of Iguazú Falls from the Argentinean side.

At the end of the week we met up with the rest of the Irish “Beyond Endurance” team for a 3 week trip to Antarctica.

Visiting Shakleton's Grave

. Flying from Buenos Aries to Ushuaia (known as The End of the World) at the southern tip of Chile and there we boarded our ship MV Ushuaia, first stop the island of South Georgia.

On board I met Frank and Maura Quinn over lunch and Frank told me he would be the second Publican ever to walk across Sth Georgia. Tom Crean did it in 1916 with Shackleton & Worsley

Frank Quinn with inset of Shacketon

I immediately thought this will be a perfect candidate for Out of Your Tree 2. Frank had brought a few cans of Guinness so I’m thinking Diageo can’t refuse to sponsor the book with that photo in it. I was wrong, they did refuse (in spite of the fact that I’m donating all proceeds to The Irish Cancer Society) so I later digitally changed the pint of Guinness to Rockwell Water who very kindly obliged by buying 30 copies of the book for 1000 Euro.

The photo of Frank is taken at the same spot where Shackleton, Crean & Worsley rested before making their final decent into Stromness Whaling Station. The now decommissioned station can be seen clearly next to our ship waiting for us in Stromness Bay. Franks text page is a shot of him & other team members during the 3 day hike over Sth Georgia from King Haakon Bay.

We then continued on our journey to Antarctica.

Dominic and Rob Lee travelling in the Antartic

While Rob spent many a day leaning overboard “feeding a penguin called hughieeee” it was none-the-less a truly wonderful trip and I’m so pleased to have been able to include six of the photographs in Out of Your Tree 2.

The book contains about 200 photographs of people engaged in their hobbies and is available for E25 with all proceeds going to The Irish Cancer Society.

Finished Image of Frank Quinn from Out of Your Tree 2

Robert Lee doing his thing for "Out of Your Tree 2"

Order your copy online from www.cancer.ie or Priory Studios

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