Visited an excellent garden centre today – Rocky Mountain Nurseries, just outside Shepton Mallet. the range of plants was amazing, as this shot of the selection of berberis shows.
I do wonder though, what on earth would possess you to put a concrete hippo in your flower bed.
As I think I noted earlier in the year, nature is full of colour schemes that look stupendous in the garden, but would cause serious headaches indoors. Like this one with shrub whose name I can’t remember 
No ,not Ian Botham. I am, of course, referring to cider apples. These aren’t cider apples but I couldn’t resist the colours, and well…you probably could make cider out of them if they didn’t taste so good you’d have eaten them before you got the chance.
In Somerset for the weekend. Went for a stroll just as the sun was going down, and what a sunset. Thought this picture captured the colour effect better than a shot of the sky – everything seemed to have been sprayed with orange and gold paint.
…is I get to see Barn Owls on a regular basis. They surely have to be the country’s most beautiful bird – I got to hold on at a hawk centre a few years back, and the subtle shades of colour of their feathers close up are just stunning.
This one was sitting on the hay feeder in the paddock next to our garden this morning. I’ve tried to catch it on camera before but usually the light has been too low, and its been to twitchy. My eldest called me away from my breakfast for this one – not that there was any competition.
I love these little bars of chocolate. Just enough chocolate to stop the craving and so few calories in each square that you can eat a dozen without felling guilty – if only.
Not that it matters because we all know that brown food has no calories, and that once the chocolate is broken like this, any remaining calories leach out.
…but not a book this time. This ‘camera’ has been sitting staring at me for some time – I’ve lost track of how long – and I’m not even sure what is on it. Have a sneaking suspicion it may be some shots from an office Xmas party in Salford.
Anyhow, though I’d take it down and give it an outing.
being a nosey kind of a soul I usually have a good study of people’s bookshelves when I’m visiting. I think they’re usually a good guide to what people like and are interested in, and like the music in someone’s car, are a real reflection of someone’s tastes. So I guess I’m taking a bit of a risk with today’s photo, because it’s my bookshelf . I leave you to decide what it says about me – although the word poser comes to mind
Sneaking up on butterflies is obviously a skill I’ve yet to perfect. The blighters dash off at the least provocation. Managed it with this one because I came up in its blind side while it was feeding – which also meant it was back-lit – which is quite a nice bonus. Pretty sure the flower was a purple loosestrife, but have no idea what the butterfly is.
On a couple of days it’s been a bit touch and go, but overall I’m quite enjoying the challenge of this. It has certainly made me think about the potential for photo subjects all round me.
Tonight I thought I’d go with my mascot – a bizarre superstition I can’t quite shake off. I've always had some odd plastic toy on my desk – for my school exams it was a plastic orang-utan, for my degree it was a small yellow elf in a glass bottle and for most of the last 15 years or so it’s been Bart Simpson. No idea where he came from any longer, but he sat on my desk during some tough years at Sellafield, and these days he sits on the desk at home.
Is it rational ? No, but I’m not planning to lose him any time soon.
Had to travel to Somerset today (and back in the evening), so grabbed this shot of a local landmark from the road between Midsomer Norton and Farrington Gurney As a small boy I fondly believed that this was a volcano (actually its mining slag from the days of coal mining around Paulton ) and could never understand why the local residents weren’t concerned that they’d end up like Pompeii.
it’s known locally as Paulton Batch, – batch being the local word for a slag-heap.
Went for a walk this evening in search of a photo. Found several, but really I was killing time as the weather conditions seemed ideal for rainbows. My patience was eventually rewarded, and I even managed to avoid being caught in the shower. Foreground was a bit rubbish – cars and car park lamps - so I pointed the camera skywards to get this, with just enough of the hotel to give some scale and to ground the image.
If I was to ask which part of a strawberry plant is red, chances are most people would plump for the berries – which is fair enough. But as autumn approaches, the leaves of strawberry plants also take on a gorgeous red tones which I’ve tried to capture here.
Sadly the background leaves a bit to be desired as I needed to be somewhere else in a hurry. perhaps I’ll come back to these in a few days.
Well eventually I had to face up to it. We have 300 vinyl albums and a similar number on cassette and we never get to listen to them any more,so I’ve bought a USB pre-amp and started the slow and tedious job of converting them to MP3s for the ipod. Thought I’d do a commemorative shot for good measure.
This mug has been sitting on this self-same ball of wire in the garden centre next door for over 2 months now. Obviously it’s not happy being ignored so I took pity on it and paid it some attention.
Glorious Saturday! Went to Keswick for a stroll around - the people on the pitch and putt course caught my eye. Challenging lighting though as its essentially into the sun.
Saw this on the evening walk and thought it would make an interesting abstract when converted to black and white.
Just goes to show that there are potential photos everywhere if you have the inclination.
I think this place is unique - in the UK at least. The shot is taken from the minor road between Orton and Shap, which is sandwiched between the two carriageways of the M6 at this point. You can just about see the northbound section on the left and the southbound on the right. I don’t know of another stretch of motorway with a minor road between the carriageways.
I even managed to find an obliging sheep to make the picture look more rural.
A pleasant evening so went for a stroll around the edge of the hotel. The original arboretum obviously extended well away from the hotel grounds themselves because this delightful specimen tree is growing in a field several hundred yards up the road. At a guess I’d say it was some kind of cedar – but I don’t honestly know.
Travelled from Trawsfynydd to Oldbury this evening. Now normally I would head for Bala and pick up the road to Shrewsbury and the motorway, but it was a nice evening, and I had nothing else to do so I switched on the sat-nag to see where it would take me. The answer was a tour of rural Wales down through the Brecon beacons and on to Monmouth.
Took this shot in the delightful little village of Tretower which has an old fortified manor house, Tretower Court, as well as this castle. Extensive info here if you're interested.
Overall the trip didn’t seem to take much longer than the normal route and it was certainly much more scenic, although I wouldn’t fancy it on a wet winter evening.
had a near miss tonight. got back to my room at about 11:00 with a pint more of Ye Olde Dragon Cyder inside than was really good for me and suddenly realised I hadn’t taken a photo.
So with apologies for the unimaginative content – here’s a picture of the bed. It had the advantage that I could place the camera on a table so I didn’t have to worry about unsteady hands.
Number 1 daughter has spent the afternoon dyeing number 2 daughter’s hair ‘Hot Magenta’ – commonly referred to as raspberry. Looks pretty good to me, and No 2 daughter is clearly delighted, and has dashed off down the village to show her friends.Think the overall effect on ginger is quite subtle, as the piccie shows.
I’d do the same to mine if I could find any hair.
We have a rather large buddleia blooming vigourously in our garden, which means it’s butterfly and moth time. the red admirals are not very obliging, but this (unidentified) moth posed quite happily for several shots.
Long trip back from Swindon today. Fortunately someone else was doing the driving for the first half.
‘For every raw obscenity, must have its own amenity, its patch of shaven green’
John Betjeman
C’mon guys, you must be able to do something more imaginative than adding a fountain to the entrance of your soulless business park.
Yay! Back on the road, just to prove I’m back at work. Tonight it’s the Holiday In at Swindon again. Taking photos in hotel rooms is getting more challenging by the visit, but hopefully this is a little different.
… because they must have seen us coming. As part of our trip around Cairo we got to visit a perfume blending house. As usual with these things it was a (very) thinly disguised opportunity for the local salesman to extract as much money from my wallet as possible while being completely charming – which he was. The upshot being that we now have a collection of perfumes that smell – for the most part – pretty much like some of the stuff we wear anyway, together with this device to make the house smell of orange blossom. It was thrown in as part of the haggling, and a good time was had by all I think. And now I’m the proud owner of an elephant shaped oil evaporator – three cheers for kitsch. Wonder if BP have a use for it.
On a side note, they served us some hibiscus tea, which was the first time I’d ever drunk it – very pleasant – hoping I can get it in Sainsbury’s.
Home again – lawn mowing completed, major weeds removed, laundry going through the system. Thanks to Rhiannon and Ashley for making a sterling job of looking after the house in our absence. The quality of the water in my fish tank is better than it has been for weeks – I obviously need to take tips. Marmalade has obviously missed us – at least someone did.
The good old Solway even put on a special sunset for our return.
Well a second visit to Charles de Gaulle in a month did nothing to change my mind about it being the most soulless airport on the planet. That said it did give mye the chance to photograph some planes rather closer than I could normally get. There’s a limit to my geekiness so I have no idea what make or model this is.
Back to Cairo today. Had a lovely picnic under the starts in the foothills last night, but today is going to be more desert and Arabic films. Actually, in spite of the rather boring sandy bits, the mountain scenery on the first leg of the trip down to Sharm-el-Sheik is pretty stunning. (Especially if you tart up the contrast in photoshop 
Wandered down to the cash machine to get some more baksheesh and came across this chap on the way back. Camels appear to be inveterate bin-ratchers – this one helped himself from the dustbins and skips along the main street as he went. I’m guessing they’re trained to come home when they’re bored, because our guide told us they cost about 15-18 months of a typical wage – so you wouldn’t want to lose one.
Yay! Tourist madness this evening – we get a camel ride. Was expecting to be taken into the desert but they turned up outside the hotel and we went for a plod along the beach, had Bedouin tea (tea with thyme and rosemary and lots of sugar – tastes much better than it sounds) and then had a gentle plod back.
Marion’s camel decided it had an itch and she fell off while it was scratching – fortunately it hadn’t stood up yet! Surprisingly easy to ride although I suspect these are the equivalent of Blackpool donkeys rather than Red Rum.
Horizon is a bit wonky on this shot as I had to take both hands of the saddle and twist right round to take it.
Tonight we’re in Dahab – famous for it’s laid-back hippy ethic according to the guide books. Not sure what that means but it’s certainly true that the market stall holders are less (make that much less) in your face than other hotspots, that people don’t hassle you for tips and that they all took friendliness to a new level. It’s about an hour up the coast from Sharm.
There was also an excellent selection of eateries along the front, most of which offer Bedouin style dining and genuine Egyptian food as well as the usual tourist fare. Funny Mummy’s is perhaps the most famous example – as seen here, with floor cushions and low tables. Absolutely delightful and you could get a reasonable meal and drinks for three for well under £20. After an excellent day snorkelling at the Blue Hole what more could you need?
PS: If you get to the Blue Hole I can recommend Sinbad’s for equipment hire and food.
Today we travelled to Dahab on the Gulf of Aqaba – by coach – a journey of a mere 9 hours. Actually it passed quite quickly. The scenery was not exactly riveting for most of the trip – consisting largely of sand – but there was some interesting mountain scenery for the last couple of hours. We also got to watch a couple of films in Arabic – as far as I can tell such films consist of women in headscarves being kidnapped, and then spending considerable amounts of time shouting at men with guns before nearly everyone gets shot, blown up, torched or killed by random falling objects. I guess it would have helped if my Arabic was up to working out what was going on.
Anyway – here’s some sand…
It’s fair to say that last nights sleeper train was not as comfortable as the first time. We were in the last carriage which bounced around like one of those bucking bull games you see at fairgrounds. As a result we decided to slob out by the pool all day rather than attempt to absorb more culture. A good choice – the pool at the the Oasis was excellent - as was everything else, including the restaurants. At night time they even floated a little fountain display into the middle of the paddling end of the pool
The floating hotel we’ve been occupying for the last couple of days is now tied up in Luxor. Can’t fault it really. The crew are excellent, the rooms are good and the food is pretty good – even if it is a bit international. Not seen stuffed quails on a buffet before though.
Our guide told us that typically these things have around 75 bedrooms – which means a maximum of 150 people – and around 80 crew members. At that ratio of crew to guests it isn’t surprising that the service is good.
Wonder if we could get one on Preston Brook as an alternative to the usual places around Daresbury?
So here we are – supping lemon tea on the sun deck and watching Egypt slide quietly past on either side. Wonderful. All it needs now is some moustachioed Belgian in a white suit to accuse me of murder!
Ooh the pain! A 02:30 alarm call this morning so that we can join the convoy at 04:00 for the three hour trip to Abu Simbel. Journey there was like taking part in the Wacky Races, with loads of crazy minibus drivers vying to be first at the site.
And the temple really is BIG! Ramses II clearly thought that bigger was better and biggest was best. This seemed to extend to families as he had at least 8 Royal Wives and 48-50 sons and 40-53 daughters (presumably he had some non-royal wives as well!). You can see some of the kids standing between his feet, and there’s a whole temple next door dedicated to his favourite wife Nefertari.
Ok – so now we’ve left Cairo and taken the sleeper train to Aswan. Not the most comfortable of the worlds journey’s, but not bad on the whole – and a lot easier than travelling during the day.
By mid-afternoon the temperature was well high so grateful for the shade inside the temple. These hieroglyphics look like they were carved yesterday rather than 2500 years ago. We probably wouldn’t have them at all if not for a project which cut the temple into 40000 blocks and relocated it above the waters of Lake Nasser.
The guy in the picture is Ayman – our excellent guide for the Nile leg of the holiday.
This has to be one of the most impressive religious buildings I’ve been in. The design means that the open space under the main dome (which rises to 52m) is even larger than a big cathedral, with far fewer pillars to block your view – and the atmosphere was much less formal than I expected – although perhaps because of the number of tourists. We even got stopped by a couple of Egyptian guys who wanted their photo taken with some European tourists!
Our chosen holiday was the Grand Egyptian Adventure, run by Egypt Uncovered, which started with a couple of days in Cairo to cover the Pyramids (well some of them) the Sphinx and the Cairo Museum with King Tut’s treasures. We’d been warned that the Pyramids are not really in the desert, but I was quite surprised by how much ‘in town’ they really were. Anyway, here we all are, several steps up the Great Pyramid of Cheops – it’s about 09:30 and the temperature is in the mid-thirties already.
And just for fun – it’s the cheesy tourist photo of the day! Ouch – mind that point.
