Tag: River Tyne

Faces in a Crowd

On Tuesday, Country Mouse (me) went to the Big City (Newcastle). Big cities are busy, full of life, of people. And that’s why I was there. A friend in my fairly-newly-joined photographic club had offered to take me in hand, get me over my diffidence in photographing people I don’t know, and communicate as well his affection for black-and-white photography. Newcastle was the place to go.

We started in the station. We walked along the banks of the Tyne. We criss-crossed several of the seven – yes seven – bridges spanning the river between Newcastle and Gateshead. The shots we took there are for another day.

We took pictures of bridges, buildings, windows, shadows, gulls, pigeons, statues, rotting wood, city swank and urban decay. And we took shots of people click on any image to see it full-size.

Man meets sheep
The two of us take our last shot of the day -reflected in a shop window.

It occurred to me that I might get away with offering these for John’s Lens Artists Challenge: Faces in a Crowd.

Snapshot Saturday: a Good Match for Newcastle and the River Tyne

The Millennium Bridge, looking along the Tyne towards the Sage concert hall and the Tyne Bridge.
The Millennium Bridge, looking along the Tyne towards the Sage concert hall and the Tyne Bridge.

We were in Newcastle last weekend, and we spent much of our time admiring the fine buildings of the city centre, and mooching about the Quayside.  That Millennium Bridge! What a perfect match for its surroundings.  It links the proud Victorian architecture of Newcastle with contemporary work housed in the Baltic Centre just on the Gateshead bank of the River Tyne.  Its clean soaring parabola provides a perfect complement to the more long established city bridges.

‘The bridges over the Tyne between Newcastle and Gateshead are justifiably famous. They are not merely bridges, but icons for the North East. Over the years the single (Georgian) bridge existing in the early Victorian period has been joined by six others. First the High Level Bridge, giving the river its first railway crossing, then the Swing Bridge (replacing the Georgian bridge), and the first Redheugh Bridge, replaced twice, to be followed by the King Edward Bridge and the most famous of them all, the new Tyne Bridge. After many decades came the Queen Elizabeth Metro Bridge and finally, in 2001, the Gateshead Millennium Bridge opened to provide a stunning pedestrian and cycle link between the redeveloped quaysides on either side of the river. In the space of less than a mile seven bridges link Newcastle with Gateshead.’

From ‘Welcome to Bridges on the Tyne‘

The Baltic Centre and the Millennium Bridge.
The Tyne Bridge seem from the Millennium Bridge.
Dusk at the Baltic Centre.
The Tyne Bridge, the Baltic Centre and the Millennium Bridge.
Looking along the Tyne from the Baltic Centre.

A response to this week’s WordPress Photo challenge, ‘A good match‘.