Question: how would you reduce that kind of flaring effect?
Perhaps I should just take a beginner's course before I start bothering people here...
Basically, that's scattering off and between the surfaces of the individual lens elements within the lens (as far as I know!). High-end lenses are designed to avoid it, use all sorts of funky glass and special coatings to reduce the amount of flare from bright patches and correct for other things. (I'm having a sudden crisis of confidence that flare is the right work now. Oh well.) They don't always succeed - even some very expensive lenses can need careful handling to avoid it.
If your camera can't handle it you need to avoid the bright patches when you can.
I don't see the point of moving towards expensive equipment if I can't make decent compositions in the first place...
Anyhow, you'll just have to talk to Mr Sun about the whole scheduling thing.
A lot of landscape photographers talk about the early and late hours of sunlights as being the magic times for photos. That or an overcast day: trying to take photos in midday sun is hard work.
