Me, not at work

There is a finite chance not to find me in my office. In this case I might be travelling somewhere (see below) or reading (apart from the obvious places to look for inspiration, I can wholeheartedly recommend rummaging through 'Great Science Fiction & Fantasy Works' for a thorough review of books which are first and foremost good books and secondly SF or F).

Otherwise I like taking pictures (and manipulating them if this results in a more pleasing image–so be warned); below there's a selection for your viewing pleasure (and it affords me the delusion that I have actually brought some order into my unsorted collection of pictures). A number of pictures can also be found in my picasa web album or on my flickr stream.

Mountaineering top site menu next

	Wind River Range, WY A 11 day trip into the Wind River Range, one of the remotest wilderness areas of the Rocky Mountains. Under Peter's flawless leadership, the seven (and later six) of us hiked (leisurely, though backpacks were in excess of 30 kg) into the Bridger Wilderness to Baker Lake and setup our high camp at 11,700', almost on the Continental Divide and under the unwavering watch of Yukon and Klondike Peak. We climbed Klondike Peak (13,114' or 3997 m) via Sourdough Glacier, and then sadly retreated back to civilization but not without taking in as much of the beauty of this rather pristine landscape. Alas, the ice probably won't last until the half of this century. See also Yoav's photo album (pretty good pictures taken with a disposable camera) and Chris's album.
	Großvenediger/Marmolada In July 2005 Thomas, Moritz, and I climbed Großvenediger (3666m) in Austria's Hohe Tauern, and the neighbouring Keeskogel (about 3200m) to take pretty pictures. After that we went to the Italian dolomites, in order to find good weather, good coffee, good food, and also climb Marmolada (3344m) by the (easy) via ferrata on the west ridge. Panoramic images were prepared with Hugin and PTmac (both are graphical front ends to Panorama Tools).
	Hochkönig Testing winter equipment on an easy peak in the Berchtesgadener Alpen, the Hochkönig (2941 m) near Salzburg. This was a winter tour but not on ski (which any normal person would have chosen) but on snow shoes. Well, when I do something similar the next time I will have learnt proper skiing by then... but the snow covered mountains and ascending the summit in moon light was very beautiful. Panoramic images and pictures by Moritz and Oli. (2-4 April 2004)
	Piz Palü Traverse over Piz Palü (3901 m) in the Swiss Engadin. This was a three day tour in July 2003 together with Thomas and Moritz. The weather was amazing, at least as long as it had to be... You can see Piz Bernina in many pictures but deteriorating weather and (I have to admit) our own exhaustion prevented us from storming this beautiful peak. Well, one should do it by the Bianco crest anyway :-)
	Sierra Nevada After a bit of conferencing at Bionanotechnology 2003 (Granada) Jonathan and I took the opportunity to hike the highest peaks of continental Spain, the Sierra Nevada–up to 3400 m. I can only recommend this to anyone who likes to bivouac under the Milky Way and who wants to see the sea in the distance while walking through snow under a cloudless sky.
	Mer de Glace Glacierwalking and -climbing on the Mer de Glace near Mont Blanc plus some climbing across cliffs and echelles, which Tom, Thomas, Moritz and I undertook in September 2002. It is a sort of diary with pictures taken by Moritz and me of the seven days that we spent circum-hiking this wonderful glacier. There are also links to the full set of of pictures taken (almost 500 altogether). It is written in German, but hey–you can always look at the pictures.
	Karwendel A tour of three days climbing the ferratas in the Karwendel range over Innsbruck, Austria (August 2000). Moritz and I were incredibly lucky with the weather. We could sleep under the stars on the mountains and even on the very summit of Erlspitze (ca 2560 m). Truely beautiful it was! Besides, we found out that 1 l of water per person and day is definitely not enough if you cannot find any water...

In principle, there should be sections for every mountaineering tour since 1999, but the older photos are on paper, and scanning is a bit bothersome. In the early summer of 2001 we climbed along the Heilbronner Höhenweg (Allgäuer Alpen). Moritz and I started our annual alpine meetings with a memorable 2-day tour across Watzmann in the Berchtesgadener Alpen.

Rock climbing

Purists call this sports climbing (as opposed to "real" traditional rock climbing). On sports climbing routes someone else has already glued bolts into the rock, which the climber uses to clip the rope into to protect oneself. In trad climbing, one has to place temporary protection using various devices such as slings, "friends", "nuts", etc, and then clip into your own protection.

Kalymnos

Rock climbing (and swimming and tanning and eating and hiking) on the beautiful Greek island of Kalymnos, May 2005. See the pictures taken by Paolo, Shiva, Jen, and myself. This was a massive group enterprise, comprising 12 combatants: Hollye, Wendy, Jeff, Jen, John, Sarah, Shiva, Shahru, Vaughn, Dustin, Paolo, Oli.

We stayed at the Hotel Plaza, Massouri, which I can only recommend (pool, beach, great view, close to the major crags, not expensive, nice rooms (once you got rid of the mosquitoes)). The Rock Climbing Guide of Kalymnos by Aris Theodoropoulos was very useful (and you can buy it anywhere on the island...)

Railay/Thailand

Given the great success of the Kalymnos adventure, Jeff, Wendy, Hollye, John, Sarah, Paolo, and Oli decided to go for more exotic climes (or climbs?) in August 2005. The destination was the Railay pensinsula on Thailand's western coast. And as it befits travellers to an exotic (and foreign!) location, we came back with plenty of photographs.

Finale

John, Paolo, and I made good use of cheap Ryan Air flights to Genova, and climbed and dined for three days in Paolo's old hunting grounds of Finale–2000 bolted pitches, many of them multi-pitches, and all of them with a grand view, captured in the pictures by John and Oli (October 2005)

Some useful resources for rock climbing appear to be theCrag.com, the Rockfax database, and the UKClimbing database.

Other travels

	Iceland Three wonderful weeks in August/September 1996 with my brother Nik touring through the wilderness of Iceland (pictures, maps and postcards only). From the sea to snow covered mountains, the biggest glaciers of Europe, to barren volcanic lands... and hot springs to relax in at the end of the day. I should come back to lie in a hot stream, drink a beer and watch the Northern Lights all night... (Left: Joekullsarlon. All © 1996 Oliver Beckstein)
	Rocky Mountains and Canyonlands Werner, Tine, Matthias, and I visited Volker in Boulder, CO, in summer 2002 (during the Football World Championship in the States). We drove into the Rockies and then into Canyonlands (UT) and Arches national park. These pictures are scans of photographs and not very good, I am afraid.
	Boston Being an academic is good, as it allows one to go to conferences such as Biophysics 2004 (in Baltimore) and then visit friends in Boston. A very nice town, with lots of opportunities for panoramic images. (Left: Boston at night with the Prudential building and Hancock Tower. All © 2004 Oliver Beckstein)
	California After the Biophysics conference in February 2005 and having finished my thesis a while ago I deserved a few days out, which I spent exploring California, mainly San Francisco and Yosemite valley. (Left: The golden poppy, emblem of the Golden State; in the background the Golden Gate Bridge. All images are Copyright © 2005 Oliver Beckstein.)

Architecture

Merton College: Panorama of the new T. S. Eliot Lecture Theatre.
New Biochemistry Building: Panoramas of the ground and first floor and the SBCB Unit's lab space. (Find the Easter eggs...)

Random bits'n'pieces

Oxford: Town & Gown

Photos from the last few years living in this quaint town–welcome to the Ivory Tower. Pictures of colleges, pictures of the town; and some random bits and pieces...

(Left: DPhil graduates waiting for entry into the Sheldonian Theatre; taken with my Nokia 6230i on 22 Oct 2005)

Unsorted views from the UK

I haven't done as much travel in these Isles as I would have liked to but some pictures came out of it nevertheless.

(Left: The lake at Blenheim Palace in autumn (panorama stitched from pictures taken with a Nokia 6230i).)

Lake District

A few pictures and panoramas from a typical day in the Lakes in autumn 2005. The food at the Drunken Duck Inn is highly recommended.

(Left: Langdale, seen from Black Crag (350 m))

Afterthought

One is often wondering why, at times, people divulge personal matters on so called 'home pages'. Sometimes, I guess, the answer is, that the visitors are only shown what they are supposed to see, despite appearances. That is, the author is shaping the image of himself in the mind of his visitors (or more prosaically: he is pretending). Or he may simply think that what he presents might be of interest to others (or wishes that it be so) or will delight them as much as it delighted himself. Though–when all is said and done–only for the visitor this is to decide....

Legalese

Unless otherwise stated, all images are Copyright © Oliver Beckstein. My images are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 England & Wales License. If you use my images I'd appreciate it if you told me. For commercial use you must contact me (read the licence, please).

Last modified: 2008-09-20 by Oliver Beckstein

Me, not at work

Mountaineering top site menu next

Wind River Range, WY

Großvenediger/Marmolada

Hochkönig

Piz Palü

Sierra Nevada

Mer de Glace

Karwendel