Marston Moretaine Woods Walk

           Once again, the call from beyond the confines of the house beckons, and the sun has warmed the air and banished any of the possible remnants of frost. In this time of isolation it requires little to tempt me to grab my camera once abluted and breakfasted, and head for the door. Nor is there a need to drive anywhere; I am fortunately blessed with parks and open spaces and I can travel light by selecting the LUMIX camera and my two closeup rings, and head off out..

          Closing my garden gate, I turn left, out towards the main road, and once it is safe to cross it, head off to walk to the edge of the village, where I take the path that skirts the edge of fields with hedgerows either side, and within thirty yards, the camera has found varied colours and shapes of leaves that bear the mixtures of varied Autumn hues from the still remaining greens mixed with elements of the true Season’s bronze and gold. The all important seeds for the coming year are also on show, hanging in anticipation that winds will aid their further dispersal.

          Every so often the sun is momentarily covered by passing clouds, but predominantly the sun is shining and enhancing both the hues and textures that bring joy to artists and photographers. Time passes, and particularly at this time of year the ever-changing angle of the sunlight means our view of the scenes can appear and disappear in instants!

          Luckily for me, there is a bird that shares my joy of these moments and is delighted to let me know and, anyone else within hearing distance, by shrilly sharing these moments by singing its little heart out; an energetic Robin! It even ensured it was able to reach a varied audience by flitting between different vantage points!

I Revisit a Park Just North of the A421

          I headed across the A421 to visit the woods beyond. Once parked, I took the soft case from my LUMIX FZ10002, leaving it behind in the car’s boot, and hung the camera around my neck. On this occasion I am travelling light, very light! Not even my monopod. Locking up the car, I take to the long dark tunnel of trees into the open air beyond, occasionally stopping to capture images along the way that caught my eye.
          Currently, the weather seems somewhat unsettled, and slightly less clearly season defined, but I did find metallic green flies, at least three species of butterflies, Red Admiral, Meadow Brown, and some others that I could not immediately identify. Variegated leaf colouring and backlit leaves also attracted my interest, as did a fair number of small, or simply young hoverflies. Beyond the woods, in the open area of the park, the wind had picked up, and despite taking several of the paths in hope of further interest, I was disappointed, as nothing much caught my eye, and therefore my camera — the rest of my walk yielded only fair weather clouds, the green winding paths and one long, lightly leaved and bowing branch framing the curving metalled path.
          I had gained the exercise, enjoyed the fresh air, and was impressed yet again by just how versatile this small camera is and fully justifies my decision to purchase it — it does not replace my more expensive kit, but when travelling light, fully earns its place amongst my heavier and pricier cameras.

Wood Near Steppingley

It is more than a year since I visited the woods close to Steppingley, and the last time it had been so wet that I had been unable to reach the top of the hill where I had earlier taken a landscape photo from the edge of the woods. This time it was the polar opposite it was so dry that you found yourself walking through sand, the approach starts wide and potholed, but once you enter the woods the track narrows to become a heavily rutted path, and so you just have to park the car as there is insufficient room to turn around.

The path twists and turns as it winds upwards and although there were avenues off to the right I knew I had to keep to the edge of the wood to reach my destination beyond a long dead fallen tree. The path tends to be concave with gently sloping sides occasionally crossed by roots, or carved into twin tracks from the passage of tractors and Land Rovers. I met a few people as I climbed, but as the day progressed I met more, some with dogs, some couples, and some cyclists, but no horses. I enjoyed the various views the paths offered, the backlit leaves that glowed in the spring sunlight, and the small young leaf clusters that sprung from the trunks of some of the trees.

The only sadness was that where there had been two wooden post structures making a gateway the posts that had been to the right now were placed with the other on the left, so the view of the fields beyond was no longer framed as before. The view has lost its symmetry.

Snow

Tuesday's weather forecast clearly stated that wintry showers were likely in the Chilterns, especially on higher ground, but that it would not settle. In this area they got it wrong, it gently settled and being very wet it stuck well and my pampas grass bowed down reverently by way of acknowledgment. It was nightfall before coverage was good. However, I did try capturing the effects in darkness with and without the assistance of flash.

Wednesday morning was bright and crisp, and I had set my alarm for a slightly earlier start, first wakening in lightening darkness and glanced at the alarm: it read 5 o'clock, so I closed my eyes and decided I would get the extra sleep. The next time I came to it was very bright and so I took another look at the clock, the alarm was still set, but it still read 5! Confirmation that my clock battery had failed came when I looked at the computer – it read 10.10!

All was not bad news, the view through the window showed snow barely melting. A few Grape Nuts and milk down to simulate breakfast and I gathered a few flash card, a camera and two lenses and I was on my way towards Peters Green via East Hyde where I stopped for a quick few shots across the dip and showing the melting snow on the distant hillside with long winter shadows of the trees.

In Peters Green the snow was still pristine, with streaming oblique sunlight giving a beautiful crispness to the snow with strong backlighting to leaves. I spent some time here, finally attracting the curious attention of a young lad home from School half-term, who asked what I was doing. He seemed satisfied by my reply that I was taking beautiful pictures! Before driving off, I knocked on the door and showed him a few images on the camera review screen, and he concurred they were good.

Although I took a few more images, before returning to process them, it was amongst these I felt I may have captured this year's Christmas card.