Posted on June 29, 2017
The snow will melt; the tracks will disappear, the trees will bud again. Even in the 1/6000th of a second it took to record this image, all these processes of change were under way.

[I know I’m not the only one to be a little miffed that this week’s theme of ‘Delta’ is remarkably and unimaginatively similar to last week’s ‘Transient’]
Category: Weekly Photo Challenge Tagged: Delta, Snow, Weekly Photo Challenge, weeklyphotochallenge
Posted on June 22, 2017
This blossom on a silk tree is lovely now, but will soon be reduced to the dried, shrivelled state of its neighbour.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Transient
Category: Flowers, Weekly Photo Challenge Tagged: Flowers, Silk Tree, Transient, Weekly Photo Challenge, weeklyphotochallenge
Posted on June 15, 2017
This slightly blown rose was standing all alone in the nearby village of Lesterps and for some reason which I cannot now remember I was unable to get very close to it for a conventional sharp flower image.
However, by cropping as I have and retaining some of the blurred, out-of-focus background (reinforced by a little vignetting and dehazing in Lightroom) I think it stands out at least as well as it would have done if it filled the whole frame.

Category: Weekly Photo Challenge Tagged: Flowers, focus, Lesterps, Roses, Weekly Photo Challenge, weeklyphotochallenge
Posted on June 8, 2017
In the cellars beneath Épernay, bottles of champagne lie maturing in racks.

Category: Weekly Photo Challenge Tagged: Bottles, Champagne, Epernay, Order, Weekly Photo Challenge, weeklyphotochallenge, Wine
Posted on May 25, 2017
What could be more ‘soon passing…quickly fading or disappearing’ – evanescent – than a firework?

Weekly Photo Challenge: Evanescent
Category: Weekly Photo Challenge Tagged: Abstract, Evanescent, Fireworks, Weekly Photo Challenge, weeklyphotochallenge
Posted on May 18, 2017
We live in a very rural part of France, where agriculture remains a crucial element of the local economy.
As most farms remain family businesses, they are typically much smaller than the vast agri-industrial enterprises to be found elsewhere. Modern methods are used, of course (nobody uses a pair of horses for tilling any more, apart from at the annual ploughing competition), but there is still plenty of heritage, in the sense of evidence of the way things used to be done.
In particular, there is the open-air museum of rural life at nearby Montrol-Sénard, which includes this barn, still containing old cattle byres. There were some just like these in our own barn when we bought it, but they were too far gone and disappeared during the restoration process.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Heritage
Category: Weekly Photo Challenge Tagged: Farming, France, Haute Vienne, Heritage, Montrol-Senard, Rural, Weekly Photo Challenge, weeklyphotochallenge
Posted on May 11, 2017
Perfect reflections of the Pont Vieux on the River Vienne as it flows through the town of Confolens.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Reflecting
Category: Weekly Photo Challenge Tagged: Confolens, Reflecting, Reflections, River Vienne, Water, Weekly Photo Challenge, weeklyphotochallenge
Posted on May 4, 2017
In response to the theme of ‘Danger’ for this week’s WordPress Photo Challenge, here is a photograph I took a few years ago from the balcony of our apartment in Abu Dhabi.
A fire had broken out in a residential block just around the corner, and the emergency services had to evacuate some residents by helicopter.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Danger
Category: Weekly Photo Challenge Tagged: Abu Dhabi, Danger, Emergency Services, Fire, Helicopter, Rescue, Weekly Photo Challenge, weeklyphotochallenge
Posted on April 27, 2017
I have been very fortunate to travel widely – and not always on business – but the ten years we spent living an working in Abu Dhabi were particularly memorable: and, of course, completely different in almost every way to what we were used to.
On the nature reserve of Sir Bani Yas Island, in the Arabian Gulf, we went for a game drive at sunset, where I found this lone oryx, which seems to have some wanderlust of its own. There really was a yellow cast to the sky as the sun was going down.

Category: Landscape, Travel, Weekly Photo Challenge Tagged: Landscape, oryx, Sir Bani Yas, sunset, Travel, Wanderlust, Weekly Photo Challenge, weeklyphotochallenge
Posted on April 20, 2017
WordPress is marking Earth Day this coming Saturday by taking ‘Earth’ as the subject for this week’s Photo Challenge.
In the same spirit, I’m recycling – in this case, an image from a previous post. Admittedly, though, this also has a lot to do with the fact that I’m travelling this week and so don’t have access to my full photo collection.
This field is no more than a few hundred yards from my house in rural France. It rained quite heavily after the crop was harvested, highlighting the lines drawn by the farmer’s plough.

Category: Weekly Photo Challenge Tagged: Earth, France, Leading Lines, ploughing, Rural, Weekly Photo Challenge, weeklyphotochallenge