Christmas at the in-laws’ in Morecambe ends with this nice little scene, photographed from the front room (hence through glass, explaining the blotches of yellow light below the sparrow on the right — they are reflections).
*Burp*. And I cooked, too. Happy Christmas to one and all of you.
Christmas Eve. Ignoring the typically apocalyptic weather forecast (as I have all year), I went on walk #77 of my Lake District project and despite a breeze that could be called ‘bracing’ and the odd hail shower, I had a thoroughly good time on Scout Scar, a limestone outcrop to the west of Kendal, Cumbria. And managed a couple of decent photos too. The rest will be up on my other blog soon…
I am not fully certain of the identities of these hills by the way. I think the one on the left is called White Hill, and the horizon is formed by the Three Peaks of Yorkshire, melding into one at this distance but I am sure the step on the right must be that of Pen-y-Ghent or Ingleborough, with Whernside the rise in the ridge in the centre. But I could be wrong.
Visiting the in-laws’ for the annual Christmas stuff. This square sits beside Lancaster Town Hall, the large building in the background, and is attractively lit for the season — suitable accompaniment to the showing of It’s a Wonderful Life at the nearby cinema, another annual tradition in our household.
Sometimes one just has to return to a theme. Taken from near my sister’s place in Sabden, Lancashire, where we went today for a pre-Christmas gathering.
Thanks to the valley wall to the south of the town, Hebden Bridge gets an earlier sunset each day than the planet’s axial tilt otherwise decrees; and today is the earliest of all.
Clare awaits the emergence of our son, which like all things he has done his whole life, will happen in its own sweet time. One way or another, two weeks off for the lot of us.
I’ll post this now partly because I am on a machine that works properly (not consistently true for me at the moment, nor will it be until into January now), but also because the sun has long disappeared behind clouds: this beautiful morning light was, unlike on Tuesday, all we got today. So I doubt I’ll get a better shot later. Having done this walk a lot, I know where the sun shines in Manchester city centre on a winter’s day by now, and at around this time on Oxford Road/Oxford Street (its continuation), it shines right down the road as if it was the avenue of a stone circle like Avebury. In fact, considering it’s the solstice on Saturday, perhaps I am on to something there.
Maybe I have seen apple blossom flowering in north-west England, in December, before. But if I have, I didn’t photograph it. Well, there you go. It’s been mild…
(POSTSCRIPT: my mother, fount of knowledge on all things botanical, suggests this is probably a winter flowering cherry. So there you go. It’s still been very mild, however.)
Glorious day today. Had to go on a tedious errand to Halifax today but the weather was so nice that I took the opportunity to drive the scenic route home and capture the first real landscape shot to grace the blog for a while.
