Around Annapurna 2008: Day 4

Donkey train crossing a suspension bridge. Nikon D300, 10.5mm, 1/320 f/9, ISO 200

April 19: Tal - Danaqu
We had a short trek today. We arrived in Danaqu about lunchtime, and we learnt that there was a Tibetan festival in town. So we stayed for the festival, and for the night and had the best apple pie of our trek there.

Tibetan horsemanship. Nikon D300, 18-200mm at 170mm, 1/250 f/8, ISO 200.

The advantages of being able to work quickly with the D300’s Program Mode are too great to ignore and I’ve been ‘learning’ to use it. It’s not as straightforward as you might think. In general, it works well at ISO 200. However, if the ISO gets bumped up or if you use the popup flash, the maximum useable aperture shrinks. What’s up with that? It beats me why Nikon did that, but it’s counterintuitive, as either or both of those conditions are likely to occur in low light, and that’s when you probably would want to use larger apertures.

Trekkers permit checkpoint. Nikon D300, 18-200mm at 18mm, 1/20 f/3.5, ISO 200.

I’ve been training my thumb to work the Program Shift Mode (changes the shutter speed/aperture combination) on the main command dial and my index finger to work the exposure compensation on the sub-command dial. I find the Matrix Metering has a slight tendency to overexpose in high contrast conditions, and I’ve set the camera to Easy Exposure Compensation, so a quick flick of my index finger nudges the exposure back.

looking on at the Tibetan festival. Nikon D300, 18-200mm at 200mm, 1/40 f/5.6, ISO 200.

New Tibetan Guesthouse: Rooms *** Food *****