Leire Galarza and Mònica Bedmar on scrambled eggs, strong hearts and their new zine ‘Sea You Soon’

The best bit about Sunday Mornings at the River is the people we bump into on our zine printing quests. And sometimes when we are really lucky, we bump into a couple of them at once, as was the case with Leire Galarza and Mònica Bedmar. Leire and Mònica are not just friends, they are also both photographers and occasional adventurers. Both of them were born in Spain but have been globetrotting quite extensively before they bumped into each other in Barcelona. With a new zine in the making and an upcoming show in Barcelona, we decided to have a little chat with the girls about ‘Sea You Soon,’ double exposures and scrambled eggs on toast.

Sunday Mornings at the River #3

This is our tribute to Sanne, who collaborated with us on the first two issues of our magazine before she set out on a new adventure in a Belgian biology lab (we bet she looks really good in a lab coat).

The third issue of our magazine is all about leaving. This little zine is filled with photos of cars, the great outdoors, camper vans, pretty people floating on their backs. This issue features some of the works of Théo Gosselin, a French born photographer who spends a lot of his free time on the road with an international band of misfits, but it also contains works by Julie Tingley, Sanne Poppeliers, Abbie Calvert, Maddie Joyce, Alexandre Furcolin Filho and Brian Bielawa.

The photos in this issue make you want to pack your bags and set out to seek new horizons.

A Man went up the Mountain by Rebecca Rijsdijk

The immigration officer reminds me of a good cop on Hill Street Blues, that’s why we picked his queue. When he asks us whether we’re married I tell him no, “but we are a couple” and apparently we were very successful photographers too. Classic. Lied my arse off before even officially entering the country. When we walk toward the luggage belt I grab his hand, the last time I had done that was eight months ago, just before we broke up. “I am sorry I told him we were a couple.” He smiles, thank God he smiles. It’s a genuine one because his eyes smile. “It’s okay,” he says, and I let go of his hand.

We made another zine. ‘A Man went up the Mountain’ is a collection photos Rebecca Rijsdijk took on a roadtrip in the US. It is a story about a lost love, with the great American West as a backdrop.

Sunday Mornings at the Thames

A while back we loaded our mobile bookstore with a bunch of girls, a collection of zines and plenty of beer to get us through the weekend to set off on an adventure across the sea. After spending some time in the, to us, most exciting city in the world, we decided to stay and are very happy to announce we are sharing a studio space with the legendary Roberto Rubalcava in London.

The Silver Beach

We spend our last days in Miami, in a tiny art nouveau hotel with no airconditioning, which I loved because it meant we had to go to the ocean to cool off. I got stung by the octupi that were thrown against the sand the first day we were there. We knew they were there, people were avoiding the water, but the sea was so blue that I could not help myself and I found myself surrounded by water and stingy sea creatures, salt on my lips, my friends safe on the shore, his eyes on my face.

The Sacred Valley

By the time we arrived at the sacred valley I was too broke to join my friends on a jeep safari. It was okay, because I would rather die of thirst in the desert than go on a jeep safari with loud Italian tourists, or any tourists at all really.

No Man’s Land

Had it not been for someone needing to pee real bad, we probably wouldn’t have left the car at all. We were crossing Death Valley in order to get to Vegas. I was tired, fed up about being around other people all the time and in desperate need of a quiet place to think.

The Giant Forest

The Sequoia trees humbled me, to say the least. I had never seen a more enchanted environment as I did while walking amongst these giants. The light was magical, as were the skies. They say Holland is famous for its specific natural light, however looking up at the clouds hovering over the American valleys was, well, something else.

The Grey Mountains

I was sat in the biggest plane I had ever been on, with three very excited travel companions in the seats behind me and one very tired one in the seat next to me. I flew to the US with my former boyfriend and a couple of his friends. We had already booked the trip before our split and figured we might as well just go ahead with it. We were supposed to get married in Vegas, but decided to add an extra day in LA instead.