Have you ever met an online friend in person? If you haven’t, I encourage you to try it. You might be a little nervous about how it is going to work out, but you will likely discover that your online friendship and interests translate into real life meetings naturally. That’s been my experience anyway, and I’ve now met quite a few of my online friends in person as we travel around Europe.

The London photowalk was a great way to meet a few photography friends at once. Justine, Laura and Christine joined Kirstin and I for a few hours of walking and talking last Sunday. I’m thinking we should call them phototalks, because we talked about photos more than we took photos. It was chilly so we popped into a cafe for some hot chocolate for a while, and later finished up with lunch.

A few hours with some fellow friends who love photography was heaven. We talked about cameras and classes and what we love to shoot. We talked about our families and kids and jobs and current events. They already started talking about where to go for future photowalks, and I’m sad I won’t be there!

Below are a few of my favorite images from the photowalk. I’m happy to have these images, but I’m even happier that I now have a real world connection with more of these wonderful women photographers. Justine, Laura, Christine, Kirstin – thank you all for coming! Links to their photos can be found below.

We met at the Greenwich train station and started through some of the old brick houses. I wonder what’s up in this attic?

The Greenwich Circus is beautiful, I love all of the shades of brown.

Along the way we found some nice color, and texture. Justine had fun peeking in to see what was behind this broken window.

Christine must have been attracted to the brick buildings too, stop by her blog post here to see her photos.

We stopped to talk equipment now and then, it was fun to see what everyone had. We had quite a variety among the five of us. Below Justine and Laura admire Kirstin’s tiny Lumix.  Kirstin has another photo of us talking cameras on Flickr here (scroll down to the comments below her photo).

We climbed to the top of the hill in the park (not sure which one it was!) to the Royal Observatory. I enjoyed the mpressive views of the city and another wonderful English sky.

But the best part of the Royal Observatory was visiting the Meridian line. Greenwich Mean Time ring a bell for anyone? Thanks to Kirstin for capturing the moment for me.

One of the things I wanted to learn from Kirstin was flare – she’s a master! Thankfully the sun decided to appear for a few brief moments for some instruction. I think I figured out my big problem – I need to learn to use the Live View mode on my camera because I need to shoot into the sun. Below is an image straight out of my camera using live view, I didn’t even know how to focus in this mode at the moment I took it. I kind of like the tilty-out-of-focus-odd-composition though, as a memory if nothing else.

We ended up at the naval college, which is where many movies are filmed since it still looks like the 19th century with no stoplights, etc. Gulliver’s Travels and The King’s Speech are two recent films that had scenes shot here. My favorite part was this collonade. I loved how the light was streaming through, and the light/dark contrast of the columns. Laura has another image of this same location on her blog here, Justine’s is here, and Kirstin took one of all of us shooting this area that is really fun (linked above).

We stopped for lunch after this and then went our separate ways, although we’ll stay connected online. Another great day, bringing my online connections into the real world.

So, where shall I go photowalking next?