A couple of years ago, I wrote an article about a friendly face from the past. We knew her as Aunt Rita – an artist, a wife, a mother, a world traveler, an adventurer and a lovely woman.

Aunt Rita and her family lived on a Chinese junk, The Amoy which was moored in the harbor of New Rochelle (NY), a few blocks from where we lived.

Since my article appeared, I’ve had several email exchanges with Aunt Rita’s family which in turn made me go hunting for this classic painting that she gifted to my mother years ago.

I remember her painting vividly since it decorated our childhood home for many years. And when my folks moved to their new home, the painting was part of their spare bedroom.

Mechanically, this lens has high quality optics; manual internal focusing (lens barrel does not extend or retract as it is focused) and automatic indexing so that the camera can determine the aperture setting.

While it is possible to mount this combo directly onto a tripod, a more practical solution is to use a gimbal mount.

Here’s one that I use.

With the arrangement, you can now frictionlessly tilt, swivel and pan the camera and lens combo to take aim of your subject.

Newer Nikkor lenses owe their intelligence to a tiny CPU which controls the exposure settings. Since this lens does not have a CPU, you must “register” this lens to the camera by setting its maximum (widest) aperture. The Tools menu has an item for doing this.

In either case, you rotate the aperture ring on the lens to the desired lens opening. In “M” mode, you also dial in the camera shutter speed. In “A” mode, the camera automatically sets the shutter speed.

You’re all set to take aim, carefully focus and fire away. Here’s a few of my first shots with the lens.

The least enjoyable part of the trip is getting there. It’s an all day affair starting with a short hop from our home in Grand Rapids to Chicago followed by a very long, 9-hour flight from Chicago to Honolulu.

Clouds covered most of the flight path to the islands. These sparkling beaches of Oahu (to the right) are about the only sites that we see along the way and this only upon leaving Honolulu on a 45 minute connecting flight to Kona.

And owing to a six hour time difference, we arrive in time for dinner.

Being in the middle of the Pacific, there’s water galore everywhere. The next morning, with our snorkeling gear in tow we head down to one of the local beaches.

For this trip, I’ve taken a camera that can be used underwater. I’ve never invested the thousands of dollars needed for a “real” underwater outfit, but this Olympus Tough 6000 will do the trick.

The Big Island is surrounded by shallow reefs lined with coral. Many of the popular beaches attract bathers for this exact reason. The coral is teeming with tropical fish and wildlife just a few feet below the water’s surface.

Without heavy scuba equipment and expensive deep water photo gear, my small, relatively inexpensive camera makes it possible for me to record these amazing wonders of the ocean. Here’s some of my “catch” made simply by gently kicking my flippers, goggles and snorkel facing downward and camera in hand.