Travelling in Europe

Around the World in Ten Photos (3)

Blogging challenges, Travelling in Europe

Several of you guessed yesterday‘s photo was of the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, though if you recognised that monumental woman as a Damián Hirst, you weren’t letting on. Unsurprisingly, all three of you who knew the view can find your way round the north of England.

OK. Where today?

The photo was taken at this time of year. That’s all I’m saying.

Andrew of Have Bag, Will Travel invited me to join him and other bloggers to post one favourite travel picture a day for ten days without explanation, then each day, nominate someone new to join in on the same terms. Sarah, of Travel with Me: any chance you’d like to join in? No pressure if it’s not for you, but you are well-travelled! Link back to this post if you decide to have a go.

Around the world in ten photos

Travelling in Europe

There’s this blogging challenge doing the rounds. I don’t know where it started, but it’s already made a showing with Brian at Bushboy, with Su at Zimmerbitch, and then yesterday morning with Andrew at Have Bag, Will Travel. And he invited me to be next.

This is how it works. Person Number One posts a different travel picture on ten consecutive days. And on each of those days, they ask a fellow-blogger to join in too. So on Day Two, Persons One and Two post a picture, and each invites another person to join in. On Day Three …. you get the idea. I can’t fathom how to do the maths, but it seems to me it wouldn’t take long for a million people to be involved. Any ideas about the numbers involved, anybody?

So I’ll post a photo each day for ten days. No comment, no strapline. If you want to guess where it is, tell me in the comments, and I’ll reveal the answer the following day. As today is a Monday, we’ll make the shot one of a window. I think this one’s quite hard.

Who next? Life … One Big Adventure. Do you fancy joining the party? No pressure if you’re not interested. Please link to me if you do decide to join in, just so I know.

Travel Challenge

Monday Window

Monday Window

Square Up

Life on the Ocean Wave: the good and the bad

Travelling in Europe

We’re going on two virtual trips today. You might not want to come on the one where I took the featured photo. It was a channel crossing we made a few years go. Expected duration? An hour and a half. Actual duration? Six miserable hours which you can read about here. This shot shows the view as we neared the harbour in Boulogne.

Mainly though, a trip across the Channel – even the North Sea – can be part of the holiday. A chance to enjoy views of the waves, the sunrise and sunset, the salty breezes whipping at your hair. And that’s why I’ve chosen shots taken while at sea for Jude’s challenge this week: waves. After my nightmare voyage, I’ve preferred gentle rippling water playing with reflections from the sun, and vessels heading across the endless waters. That’s my kind of sea trip.

2020 Photo Challenge #43

#Kinda Square

Patterns Through the Window, on the Wall

Blogging challenges, photography, Travelling in Europe

Look out of that window.  Who wants to go out unless they have to?  Instead, I’m inside and cosy, seeing if I can find photos that fit Jude’s 2020 Photo Challenge for February, Patterns.

I decided to go with the built environment.  I looked not for deliberately created architectural motifs, or applied ornamentation, but for reflections, distortion, or for other elements that weren’t intended as the main event.  Except in one case, where reflection and baffling the eye was definitely the main story.  Which one was that do you think?

Sightseeing in Granada by looking at, rather than through a window.
The new entrance to the V&A, London.
Glimpses of El Escorial, Seville, from the balustrades by its water features.
Garden at the Gasholder development, Kings Cross, London.
Reflections at Canary Wharf, London.
Office windows in Brussels, Belgium.

 

This challenge was provided by Jude, of Travel Words.  

‘Wish You Were Here’

Barcelona, Blogging challenges, England, London, Travelling in Europe

Summer used to be a time for postcards.  Sending them.  Receiving them. Receiving was better.  What to say to your friends and relations with only such a small space to play with?  ‘Wish you were here’ maybe?

The views were standard, wherever they came from.  The castle.  The cathedral.  The fisherman’s cove. The crowded beach.

Today I’m reviving the tradition, but with a different angle on the standard shots.

St. Paul’s Cathedral, seen reflected in Angel’s Wing (2000) by Thomas Heatherwick, Paternoster Square, London.

The Leeds-Liverpool Canal passing under a bridge near Gargrave.

The Port Olímpic area of Barcelona seafront, reflected in nearby buildings.

Hull Minster, as seen in a nearby office building.

An honest view of a British holiday? The countryside near Penrith on a soggy Sunday.

This is my contribution to Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #59, Angles. Leya so often joined in when I was contributing to the Ragtag Daily Prompt that it seems only fair to return the compliment.  Thanks, Leya!

 

Dirty Dutch Coaster and Other Ships

Blogging challenges, Travelling in Europe

Travelling from Rotterdam to Hull the other week, on a grey and breezy North Sea crossing,  I spent hours on deck, enjoying the busyness of the cargo vessels puttering back and forth, back and forth across the steel-grey waters.  I was reminded on John Masefield’s ‘Cargoes’ – the last verse of it anyway:

Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack
Butting through the Channel in the mad March days,
With a cargo of Tyne coal,
Road-rail, pig-lead,
Firewood, iron-ware, and cheap tin trays.

My memories of our trip are of grey seas, grey skies, grey industrial coastal landscapes, grey wind turbines.  With red highlights –  those busy ships: the cargo of lorries on our ferry: and an almost lurid sunset.

Click on any image to view full size.

Linked to Debbie’s Six Word Saturday, which I’ve been following for a while.  Time to join in!

And also an entry for the Which Way Photo Challenge.

A new angle on a ferry trip

Blogging challenges, Travelling in Europe

Coming back on the overnight ferry from Rotterdam to Hull last week, I had a lot of fun playing with my camera.  Most shots celebrated the sea, the shipping, the grungy industrial shore side, and I’ll share some of those soon.

But as the sun was setting, my eye was caught by these passengers on the decks above.  They didn’t know it, but I thought they made quite fine silhouettes set against the angled railings of the deck.

My response to today’s Ragtag Challenge: Angle.

Click on any image to view full size.

The rapacious stillness of the heron*

North Yorkshire, Travelling in Europe, Wildlife

Herons seem to be a part of our lives.  It’s a rare week when we don’t spot one flying languidly along the river, or waiting on an exposed rock for the next snack.

Wherever we travel, we can go heron spotting.   We’ve seen them in Dordrecht in the Netherlands, Córdoba in southern Spain, l’Albufera near Valencia, and Busan in South Korea.  Town and country: herons are there.

Fishing in the canal at Dordrecht, the Netherlands.
A heron at sunset on the Guadalquivir, Córdoba.
L’Albufera, Valencia
Flying along the river at Dongnae, Busan, South Korea.

We see them as we walk along the path towards West Tanfield, and spot them on the garden pond.

The other day after a stressful week, I needed a bit of space.  Nosterfield Nature Reserve just up the road was the answer.  I walked along the wetland paths watching water birds courting, feeding, simply being there, standing motionless or swimming peacefully.  Quiet fields formed the backdrop.

Nosterfield Nature Reserve, spotted through a hide.

I went to the farthest hide.  I became transfixed by the under-stated drama being played out between a heron and two or three egrets.  They were fishing.  All plodded gracefully in and out of what humans might see as each other’s personal space.  They didn’t care or even seem to notice one another. They simply co-existed, fishing.

This is what first caught my eye….and then I zoomed in closer…..

This series of pictures might not seem that different one from another.  They’re a record of a simple afternoon in the lives of a heron, three egrets ….. and me.

Click on any image to view full size.

* The Crow Road: Iain Banks