April 2026

Vietnam is well known for its history, culture and food. What is less known is its unique nature and wildlife which is threatened by habitat loss and unfortunately also still by poaching for food and medicinal purposes. During March and April 2026 I visited several National Parks (Cat Tien, Bach Ma, Cuc Phuong, Van Long) and other protected areas from South to North in search of some of Vietnams often rare and endangered species. In particular were we looking for primates such as three Douc Langur species and the rare and critically endangered Tonkin Snub-nosed monkeys.
But we also encountered many other very interesting animals and plants, for example the rare Sapria himalayana, a relative of the more known Rafflesia flower.
If you are interested in the promising conservation efforts and results about the Tonkin Snub-nosed monkeys, visit this link.
Visit my new Vietnam Gallery here.

April/May 2025

During two weeks last April and May I visited the Galapagos Islands, a place that I wanted to see since a long time. We sailed on the ship “Samba” and had the chance to visit most of the islands. The amount of wildlife on Galapagos is overwhelming and so was the amount of photos that I took during the trip. It is unique, that the animals on Galapagos are not afraid of humans and one can get very close to them. Also I was very surprised about the beautiful landscapes of these young islands, shaped completely by volcanism. A paradise for photographers!
A new photo gallery is now available about Galapagos Islands. I will add more photos soon.

January 2025

A place that I wanted to visit since a long time is the remote island Alejandro Selkirk, which is part of the Juan Fernandez Archipelago about 780 kilometers west of the Chilean coast. The group of three islands is a National Park and it is very interesting because of its rugged landscape and high endemism of its flora and fauna. Other than the main island Robinson Crusoe, Selkirk is not permanently inhabited. Only during the lobster season a few fishermen with their families live there.
Last January I had the rare chance to visit this island together with a group of photographers and ornithologists which wanted to study and photograph the 5 endemic bird species, that can only be found on Selkirk.

I produced a short documentary about the expedition which is available on YouTube:

December 2024

In December I spent a couple of weeks in Antarctica on board the MV Argus. We had two helicopters on the ship and did several spectacular flights over the snow covered mountains and glaciers. To see the famous Lemaire Channel from the air was a highlight of this trip.
New photos are at the Antarctica gallery, including a rare shot with three penguin species in one photos.

October 2024

I visited the Tambopata Reserve in Peru for the first time in 2016. Since then I could not get the place out of my mind. I was so impressed with the nature that I even published a small book about my trip. So in October 2024 I finally could visit again this marvelous place, Amazon rainforest at its best!
This time was equally amazing, but at the same time climate change was visible. During the 10 days it only rained once and the temperatures were close to 40 C.
One of the highlights was the encounter with a massive aggregation of hundreds of colorful morph caterpillars clinging to a tree. I had never seen something like that before.
There was also a crested eagle nesting. Even though the chick had already left the nest, one day I was lucky to see it back on the nest, where a parent had left some food.
Enjoy the latest photos from Tambopata and more.

October 2023

In October my new book “Very Large Telescope – 25 Years VLT” has been published by the German editorial KOSMOS-Verlag. It is a large format book (30x30cm) with 228 pages, where I present 250 of the best and most interesting photos that I took during my over 20 years that I worked at the Paranal Observatory. It has views of the magnificent night sky of the Atacama desert and shows historic photos from the construction of the giant telescopes. There are chapters about science operation and discoveries, maintenance work on the delicate giant mirrors and modern telescope technology. It also shows the Atacama desert with its very specialized flora and fauna and unusual and extreme weather events. Finally the last chapter gives an introduction to the future project, the “Extremely Large Telescope” (ELT) of nearly 40 meters diameter, that is currently being built on a mountain close to Paranal.
The book is in German language and available at Amazon.