Category: Photography

Travel Theme: Pathways

Posted on Posted in England, Photography, TravelTagged , , , , 17 Comments

Dartmoor National Park has over 450 miles of permitted access footpaths. You will find gentle strolls with fabulous views and rugged long distance hikes for the intrepid. Wildlife is abundant, there are quaint villages, old stannary towns, bronze age burial sites and lots of legends. I have explored many areas but there are a few places that I will always go back to, Scorhill and Houndtor are top of my list.
The paths in my photos, are narrow tracks worn into the grass that have been walked for centuries. Houndtors rocks are a climbers paradise and you will find someone dangling from a rope on most days! Once you reach to top the view opens out towards Haytor, Dartmoors most visited site, and in the valley below are remain of a medieval village. It must have been a bleak place to live back then.

I have posted quite a few times about Dartmoor, see my tag cloud for more and join in with Ailsa’s theme at http://wheresmybackpack.com/2013/05/24/travel-theme-pathways/

Weekly Photo Challenge: In the Background

Posted on Posted in England, Photography, TravelTagged , , , , , 32 Comments

‘In the Background: The places that we pass through day after day, or even once in a lifetime, leave in their small way, echoes and traces of themselves upon us. But so often when taking self portraits or pictures of friends, the places themselves become a soft blurred mush of indistinct semi-nothingness, the limelight stolen by our smiling faces. In today’s challenge, let’s turn the tables. Take a picture of yourself or someone else as a shadow, a reflection, or a lesser part of a scene, making the background, or — as in the example above — the foreground, the center of attention.’
Of course I don’t get it! But here goes anyway. Join in with the challenge at http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/05/24/weekly-photo-challenge-in-the-background/

Thought to be early 16th century. I'm convinced its older.
Thought to be early 16th century. I’m convinced its older.
Through the wavy lines.
Through the wavy lines.
Red cliffs background
Red cliffs background

Thames Barge Vigilant, Connections

Posted on Posted in England, Photography, TopshamTagged , , , , , , , , 19 Comments

Imagine being six years old and setting off to work in 1908. I compare my little granddaughter who is five when I think of it. Talking to a friend at work recently I learnt that her late grandfather was a ‘Barge Gypsy’. A what? I asked her.
Apparently Charles Willoughby Garner started work on the Grand Union Canal, just six years old. His job was to guide the horse along the canal bank as it pulled the barge owned by the Bromwich’s, his grandmother’s family. The barge carried grain, coal and wood, presumably towards London as the canal runs 130 miles from Birmingham.
Charles stayed with the family barge until he was fourteen and then moved on to be a tug man on the Thames.
The First World War began a couple of years before and thank goodness he was too young to be called to arms. He had a very important role during wartime, guiding boats in under darkness, and when the bombing was happening he would be away from home for days on end.
Charles stayed on the Thames until he retired aged 68. The Bromwich barge was last seen and catalogued as sunk at the bottom of a Manchester dock yard. I wonder if Charles knew that when he died in 1979. I’m sure he was justly proud of his part in Britain’s maritime history. Thank you to Michelle for sharing his story.
If you have been following Lucid Gypsy for a while you’ll know that I’ve been posting about the restoration of a Thames barge, Vigilant, here in Exeter at Topsham Quay, who knows, perhaps Charles even sailed on her. Yesterday I popped down to check her progress.
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Stern in the Topsham mud.
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Preparation.
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She comes with her own garden!
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Looking good on the port side.
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Wonderful curves.
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Traces of colour to her bow.
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Imagine how beautiful she will be in sail, I can’t wait to see her.

Related posts
https://lucidgypsy.wordpress.com/2012/12/29/vigilant/
https://lucidgypsy.wordpress.com/2013/03/20/vigilant-revisited/

Postcard from the River Exe and its barge project

Weekly Photo Challenge: Escape

Posted on Posted in England, Photography, TravelTagged , , , , , , , 41 Comments

This week the theme of the photo challenge is ‘Escape’ and Cheri Lucas Rowlands says
‘Depending on your current mood and headspace, or time in your life, this word can evoke different emotions and conjure a variety of images. Maybe the end of your semester is near, and you yearn for vacation and release: the desire to disappear and run away, the need to unplug and shut off. Or perhaps you imagine quite the opposite: Lost in a maze. Stuck in a room, feeling boxed in, with the worst company. Frustrated in your own thoughts, wondering what to do next.’
The photo I have chosen shows someone escaping into meditation, I wonder where he went.

Imagine

Join in at http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/05/17/photo-challenge-escape/ as usual.

More Orang Utans

Posted on Posted in Borneo, Nature, Photography, UncategorizedTagged , , , , , , , , 13 Comments

I just wanted to highlight Isobel’s post that I re-blogged this morning, it’s something that I feel passionate about so if you could just take a look at these beautiful creatures and go over to sign on the link from earlier it would be wonderful. http://isobelandcat.wordpress.com/2013/05/14/save-the-orangutans/

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We like it here, but it would be better if there was enough food and nice trees deep in the forest.

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Here is our forest

My cousin is hiding up there, he has darker fur than I do because he chooses all his own food!

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This is a friend
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Will you help to make sure that the baby grows up to have babies too?

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Can you see all those rows of trees? They are taking over our habitat and we need help so that we can survive.

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With credit to Ross and Lori Hall and Lindy Campbell who took some of these photos while I was too ill to hold my camera!

Weekly Photo Challenge: Pattern

Posted on Posted in Photography, TravelTagged , , , , , , , 54 Comments

Sara Rosso says ‘Pattern. Patterns are everywhere. Patterns are sometimes intentional and sometimes accidental. They can be decorative or merely a result of repetition, and often patterns can be in the eye of the beholder to discover them.’
I love patterns of course,it’s another reason to photo graph details. Here are my choices.

Join in at http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/05/10/weekly-photo-challenge-pattern/