Bedford Park Visit — Riverside

          I had no visitors coming over, so it was not a difficult decision to take a walk in a park with a camera! On this occasion I made the conscious decision to use the one lens for anything that I decided to attempt to capture, and my decision proved to be the wrong one very early on, as I noticed a few of one of my favourite insects; the hoverfly. And using this bulky lens was hampered by both its weight and inadequate close focussing, but having made the decision, I was now going to accept it! However, because it was still small in the viewfinder, and the insect itself had its own flight plan, that did not involve waiting for a photographer to do his bit, I was also hampered by my puny efforts to achieve focus before it moved off! Also, though it was sufficiently unfazed by my presence, it had no need to keep its eyes on me! So, adding insult to injury it only presented its rear view to me! In order to remind me that I should only consider my macro lens for that type of shot, I decided that despite my dogged determination to keep making attempts, I would display a couple that at least were in focus as an aide-memoire for the future.

One other feature of this set of images was my ongoing interest in patterns made by flowing liquids, especially when these manifest due to restrictions, hence the shots of powerful burbling water at drops in water-level, or the more relaxed ripples, when the flow was more gentle. Dragonflies and damselflies also catch my interest, but they were guarded from my proximity by abundant intervening nettles and a steep bank, but they were not so distant that they were impossible to record in acceptable detail.

At the end of my time by the river, nearby human activity caught my eye, and in particular one boy with his family who was a tad nervous of standing on his paddle board and I felt his lack of confidence was his downfall. Had I been asked, I would have suggested he tried again, but his family seem not to have offered this suggestion! So, I captured his success at creating splashes whilst paddling his board. My suggestion would have been, never be fazed by failure, and try, try, and try again! Avoid accepting defeat whilst learning. But, thank you for giving me some especially pleasing action shots!