In the treeless prairie, many birds resort to nesting on the ground, hidden among tufts of grass or buried under bushy shrubs. The western meadowlark is one such bird, and one of my favourites to photograph in the spring, when its cheerful flute-like song bubbles across the prairie.
Antarctica is a continent of superlatives. It’s the coldest, windiest, driest, iciest, and highest continent on Earth, surrounded by the stormiest ocean in the world. But Antarctica is more than a list of intimidating adjectives.
As I write these words I’m parked in a Toyota Land Cruiser above the muddy banks of the Mara River in southern Kenya, just a few kilometres north of the Tanzanian border.
For nearly an hour our rubber zodiac headed into the icy teeth of a polar wind, steadily bucking across the angry surface of the Arctic Ocean. Time and time again, our rounded bow plowed into curling waves, pelting us with sheets of numbing salty spray.
Last winter, in Florida, with snow on our boat dock and the neighbourhood children playfully tossing snowballs at each other, I went swimming.
