It was taken just outside Toulouse on the All Blacks' tour of France in 1981, when there was no rugby ball in sight.
"It was of a young All Black Andrew Donald walking with a little old lady in her late seventies down a muddy country lane," Bush (79) told the Otago Daily Times yesterday.
"She looked as though she had stepped out of the pages of Hansel and Gretel stories. The cows followed her.
"If I hadn't been on a rugby tour, I wouldn't have visited this farm. It was just one of those days when it all clicked."
This picture is one of the 106 rugby photographs included in the "Hard on the Heels: Peter Bush - Capturing the All Blacks" exhibition that opens at the Otago Museum today at 1pm. It covers the first 60 years of his photographic career.
Bush, New Zealand's top rugby photographer, played senior rugby in Auckland but was not keen on photographing rugby when he joined The New Zealand Herald 60 years ago.
"I would rather be playing the game," he said. "It was not until I returned from a stint with the army in Malaya that I got a better feeling for it."
Bush enjoys photography because "it gives me a ticket to tour the world" and go away with All Black teams.
"I have enjoyed travel all my life," he said. "I thought it was a good arrangement. I could photograph the game I love and can travel."
In the early days, Bush had to wire only three pictures from a big overseas game.
"I sit alongside younger guys today who have sent away 30 pictures by halftime," he said. "I'm not a technocrat and find the new digital world hard to keep up with."
Bush started photographing rugby in 1949.
"In the early years, there would only be three of four photographers at a test match in New Zealand," he said. "There was no television. It was your world."
When television started having an impact in the 1960s and 1970s, the press photographers were sidelined.
"When it comes to coverage, we are behind the fence and TV is in front of the fence."
The equipment has also changed.
"It's like being a stagecoach driver arriving at an international airport and tying up beside a 737 aircraft and being told to fly it out," Bush said.
When he started, darkrooms were essential, but today photographers have a tiny card that can hold 500 images.
"I used to go to a game with four rolls of film with 30 shots on each," Bush said.
"I used to try and hold a few shots back in case they scored near the end of the game."
Bush was noted for running up the sidelines to get the best shots and always had sweat rolling off his face during a game.
He will be in action again during the Tri-Nations series and the Rugby World Cup.
