The places in this post felt unreal, and the colours of the lakes didn’t necessarily look healthy. The first was an old mining site on the Spanish side, where red water among old car tyres would hardly earn the title of “beach of the year” in the Lonely Planet. From above with the drone, though, it revealed a strange beauty of its own.
At sunset and again in the morning
The two other mineral lakes surprised us. We reached them shortly before sunset and were so thrilled that the next morning we drove back an hour from Huelva for sunrise. From the shore they looked boring – no textures, no colours. But with the drone above the lakes and the camera pointing straight down: pure amazement. One lake had almost dried up, its bed coloured in shades of yellow, orange and red, the water a deep dark red. The neighbouring lake had a white shore and turquoise-orange water, as if someone had thrown a paint bomb.
The mineral lakes’ play of colour from the air
These plays of colour from the air are among the pictures that stayed with me for a long time – and that make me want more.
Headframe, ruins and dark water – an old mine near Huelva.Red water between old car tyres.Blue, white and rust-coloured spoil heaps of the mine.Two round basins and a dark waterhole.Orange to black water between pale banks.Black water, an orange shore and three small roofs.An orange-red pool on pale ground.A tongue of orange water, car tyres at the edge.Dark red water at the white-veined shore of the mineral lake.An orange front beneath a shore patterned in pale blue and peach.Ochre and pale blue streaks above a dark red band.A blue branching pattern on yellow ground.A branching blue rivulet across yellow-white ground.Pale blue crust above yellow, orange and dark red – as if someone had thrown a paint bomb.A white shore with a jagged yellow fringe and a turquoise patch.A yellow fringe, once vertical, once horizontal.Yellow streaks on white ground, a small turquoise swirl.A narrow yellow-orange stripe with a fringed edge.A yellow band and fine channels in the white shore.White shore, orange and turquoise beside it.Yellow, turquoise and orange above a curving dyke.Dark red to violet water by the white shore.Pale blue and ochre crust, a blue rivulet at the bottom.A dark band snaking through yellow and white.Yellow channels flowing into a pale blue basin.A pale blue pool with a light stripe, yellow and dark red beside it.A long pale strip through pale blue water.Tracks between red water and cracked yellow ground.A dark red stream winding through cracked orange earth.Radiating cracks and tightly cracked yellow crust.Branching blue channels in an ochre expanse.A blue delta and dark veins in cracked orange ground.
