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Peter Berlinghof
Peter Berlinghof lives in a small town between Bonn and Cologne on the banks of the Rhine. He is a retired teacher and education authority officer. Peter has been taking pictures since the 2nd half of the 1960s. His main interests are travel und nature photography.
When people think of the Rhine they usually have pictures in mind of romantic castles, lovely vineyards and steep hills on both banks of the river. This is especially true for the Upper Middle Rhine valley between Bingen and Koblenz. Further down the stream where I live, the landscape is completely different as the river enters the North German lowlands and the Lower Rhine region begins. The area is densely populated and the banks of the river are full of industrial compounds and settlements. Not much nature is to be found. Grand scenic views almost always contain traces of human activities. It does not seem to be the favourite playground for landscape photographers.
Why did I nevertheless try to take pictures there? I have always found the Rhine kilometrage very interesting, which accompanies the Rhine from Konstanz, where the river leaves Lake Constance (kilometre 0) until it flows into the North Sea after 1033 km at Hoek van Holland. At each kilometre, there is a big sign showing the position you are at, and between the kilometre signs, there are small signs in 100 m steps.
I selected a small area between kilometers 657 and 683 with Bonn at the southern end and Cologne at the northern one. My plans were to take a picture at or near each kilometre sign on both banks of the river and to capture the images with a camera converted to take infrared pictures.
I used the resulting pictures for having a photo book printed for myself in which each kilometre was given four pages and each section started with a picture of the kilometre sign. Some of the pictures also appeared in a German Photo magazine (Schwarzweiß, issue 149).
