Marston Meadow Photo Walk

  It took till the afternoon before the weather improved enough for me to contemplate a walk outside with a camera, and I knew that the further I ventured, the return trip became more compromised, but the attraction of being outside won the day. I headed for the road towards the station. On my right was the entry to the expanse of lawn due to become a garden of Remembrance and the extension of the nearby graveyard.

I spotted that on the far right, there was now the sight of flowers for lost loved ones, and presumably the first graves, and a man was making his way towards me from that area; he appeared to be a possible sexton returning from that site. We had a short chat, before I returned to the roadside path and after a further walk along this path, I took the opportunity to cross the road, and enter the park.

I took a different route than normal, by following a path that entered the woods, which I found soon entered a large expanse of enclosed grassland that I had never visited before; I made a note of this as a place to bring my grandchildren in the future. I learned it had been named as Marston Meadow. It was an opportune moment for the cloud cover to open and for the sun to come out.

When I was young I was led to believe that a profusion of berries at this season was a portent of a hard winter, but of late this has not proven to be valid for it is quite some time since we have witnessed a hard winter after such a precursor! I believe that the power of such a fierce force would be most welcome to counter the spread of Covid this Winter.

I made the most of the opportunity of the light and colour I found whilst in this area, especially as there were very few sharing this space; one exception being a lady exercising her dog by using a thrower to propel a tennis ball some distance ahead, and her charge returning it eagerly for a further chance to retrieve it! It turned out from our subsequent conversation her husband was a keen photographer. We chatted for a short spell, until I broke off because some features in the hedgerow caught my eye, and we parted, but not without my sharing my business card details in the hope her husband's shared interest in photography might mean we might meet in the future.

Two highlights for me in terms of images were the powerful cloud structures I captured, and the seriously powerful thorns on some rose branches. A while later, I felt the drops of rain arrive, and the clouds darkened noticeably, I took the opportunity to hide my camera beneath my pullover, but brought it out twice more for the capture of two 'fairy rings' and the unfortunate demise of my right boot which slowed my progress of retreating from the park!

Brisk and Blustery Brogborough

Having watched my delayed recordings of the Malaysian Grand Prix, seen the promise of real competition for the Mercedes Team by Ferrari, and the impressive performances of Kimi Raikonen; the Toro Rosso Rookies, Carlos Sainz and Max Verstappen and the excellent win by Sebastian Vettel, I felt enervated by the desire to take advantage of the high, but blustery wind that beckoned from beyond my windows. I knew it was a chance, but I reckoned that such a wind would entice the Windsurfers likely to jump to get to the lake.

As I came along the road from Brogborough village I saw no one had ventured onto the lake, and I did wonder whether I had made a mistake. I pulled into the car park, got out of the car and battled against the onshore wind and spotted a lone windsurfer just setting off. This did not seem a promising start! Especially as the few breaks in the cloud cover I had seen on my journey up the M1, had disappeared completely, and the rain had restarted. I watched a while before going to the car and getting the camera and tripod set up, if just one man went out I might yet get some pictures.

I readied my gear, set the ISO to 640 and using Aperture Priority set f/8 to give me a chance to stop the action and a bit of leeway for me to keep the subjects in focus! I took a groundsheet  to sit on and set the tripod at its lowest, but with the legs a little wide to give me some stability, and attempted to get the groundsheet down without it getting blown away, and sat down to set it all up. I did get a few shots off, before the wave of rain headed ominously towards me in a white haze, I hastily packed the tripod back up and headed for the Portakabin and rest area. I had no hands free, so was very grateful when one of the windsurfers generously opened the door for me.

The small group within all gathered at the windows to watch the squally rain lash against the panes, we also watched one of their number assemble his sail outside in his normal clothes get a drenching such that he was going to have to step into wet clothes when he finished surfing! Fortunately after about ten minutes the rain abated, so I went back out.

The sun did appear very occasionally and I was rewarded by one man doing several jumps, so my journey was far from a waste. When I left there was just one back out on the lake, but the cold had penetrated my body and my cough had returned, so packed the car and set off back home.