Thoughtfactory: The Littoral Zone

The close-up photo below is from a recent early morning poodlewalk with Maya amongst the coastal rocks between Petrel Cove and Kings Beach lookout in Waitpinga on the southern Fleurieu Peninsula: 

We  usually walk along the coastal path from Kings Beach Lookout towards Petrel Cove 40 minutes or so before sunrise.   Then we make our way back along the rocks after sunrise with the sun behind us.   There is only the odd dog walker on the coastal path  or a solitary fisherman on the rocks at that time of the morning. So it is easy to be in the moment whilst amongst the rocks.  

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The Littoral Zone  project has been on hold in  2023.  The previous  Ephemeral post was in May 2023 after a 5 months hiatus. Then there is nothing until September -- a 4 month gap. So that is  one post in 9 months. What's more there were large gaps between posts before that. 

The two pictures in this post, which  were made in May 2023, pick up where I left off through reconnecting with the Japanese aesthetic concept of mono no aware. It's a return to familiar ground. 

The basic reason for the hiatus in 2023 is that I lost my way - or ran out of puff. The initial motivation was  a blog of photos and text linked to poodlewalks as a supplement.  Over time  it slowly evolved from a blog to a project that  connected the photos of the littoral zone that I made whilst on my daily poodlewalks to Japanese aesthetics.  The blog  became  a way or means for  me to work out  how to do this. 

What appealed about Japanese aesthetics was that it was based on the world of flux that presents itself to our senses being the only reality: there is no conception of some stable Platonic realm above or behind it.This  appealed because the littoral zone was a world of flux and it connected with  the process metaphysics in western philosophy  -- eg., Nietzsche's rejection of Platonism's two worlds  and his idea of the will to power  that sees the world as comprised of dynamic active and reactive forces in tension. 

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The macro picture below was made in the  early autumn of 2022 when an occasional  low tide made it   possible to walk with the poodles along the coastal rocks of the southern Fleurieu Peninsula in the  late afternoon.  It is a followup to the picture in  this post which was made around the same time.  

It was not often  in autumn that this kind of seaweed was left stranded on the rocks from the tide.  The rocks  are usually clean.

These coastal walks were micro ones that are similar in form to the micro bush  walks.  An hour's  duration, slow walking, concentrated seeing,  making photos. 

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Autumn has arrived at Encounter Bay. I've started to return to walking amongst the coastal rocks with Maleko  on the late afternoon poodlewalks. This return happens when there is some cloud cover,  the light is soft and there are photographic possibilities.    

These walks are still infrequent. The morning cloud usually disappears during the day and the afternoons are  clear and sunny. The strong coastal winds that marked the summer months have eased.  

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The macro picture below of cuttlefish shells is from a recent poodlewalk amongst the coastal rocks with Maleko. It was  in the late afternoon just prior to  the Xmas/New year holiday break.  

I was on the lookout for dried out salt ponds amongst the coastal rocks at the time.  However,  as the weather had been cool,  overcast and windy, with  only  the odd  bright,  sunny days with high temperatures, the  salt ponds were few and far between.