Red Tulips Below the Zabarwan, Srinagar

I went up to the tulip garden in Srinagar on a late-April morning, when the beds are at their fullest. It sits on a slope above Dal Lake with the Zabarwan range right behind it, and that morning the tops of the hills were wrapped in low cloud.

The red blocks of tulips run in long rows straight toward the mountains, with bands of white further back. It's a busy place in season — you can see people wandering the paths between the beds — but framing it at 23mm and f/8 held the whole sweep sharp, from the nearest flowers to the hills.

I'd wanted to catch this garden for a while. The bloom only lasts a few weeks each spring, so the timing has to line up with being in Kashmir. This year it did.