Mawbray before it rained!

A morning walk before it began to rain ...Nothing much to see as it was low tide, but good to be out ...it was misty moisty and then the fog came in with a noticable drop in temperature and then the rain. The pebbles jammed in the groynes, as always, provided something to photograph! 

Back to Buttermere

With a poor forecast it was back to Buttermere for an 'atmospheric' walk round the lake. All the snow had gone, but the hail showers persisted. 

The lone tree was well in the water!

A Dipper was not for moving ! 

Red-breasted goose - North Cumbria

Given the weather was particularly foul today we nipped down to the coast near Abbeytown, to try to catch (not literally and no pun intended on foul!) the red-breasted goose. Thankfully it was showing well and it briefly stopped raining enabling some long-distance photography. Many thanks to the birder for letting us view it through his scope. The goose was in amongst a flock of Barnacle geese with a few Pink feet.

Collagraph experiments

For once I decided to go and be taught how to do collagrpah properly - although I do collographs I have always used the sticky foil to seal the plate and wanted  to see how much difference using shellac would make to the detail obtained in a print. So thanks to Linden Print Studio I spent a lovely couple of mornings playing. First learning point - sounds ridiculous, but when transferring a tracing use a coloured biro to go over the back so you can see where you have gone over the line....too many years of primary teaching where you just turn it over and use the same pencil! Secondly, rub and then remove some vegetable oil on the plate - to ease transference of ink. We used Calagio safe wash for ease of cleaning - apply with a toothbrush then rub in and remove. A simple margarine tub holds newspaper/yellow pages (chopped up) nicely. Make sure everything is really well stuck down with PVA - especially lichens before sealing the plate and seal the edges and back too with a minimum of two coats. I shall definately be doing more and using the big press although the Xcut Xpress does the job well enough. 

The plate after inking up and cleaning.

Aughertree meltwater channel print.

Botallack mines plate after inking and printing. 

Botallack mines

Grune Point

A refreshing walk around Grune Point - not much to see: teal, wigeon, redshank and distant geese. 

Looking back into the Lake District.

A splash of colour - Yellow Brain fungus (Tremella mesenterica) 

Looking up the Solway Firth.

Towards Anthorn.

Towards Scotland...

Happy dog ..again! 

 

Red Pike

We had planned to go from Buttermere, along the shores of Crummock and up beside Scale Force onto Red Pike (which we did), then along onto High Stile, High Crag, Seat and back down Scarth Gap. The forceast of showers of hail, merging with blizzards on the tops didn't disappoint..so we did the sensible thing and turned back at the summit of Red Pike as we could barely stand and the cloud level was lowering. A great day though and good to be out with both Molly and Tom. 

Deceptively calm!|

Heading above Scale Force and towards Red Pike.

Getting a tad blowy! Red Pike in the middle.

Looking across the Buttermere Valley.

Red Pike summit.

Looking towards High Stile - the point of return as we could barely stand.

High Stile and spindrift.

Tom enjoyed photographing the Fir Clubmoss...

..and Alpine Clubmoss.

Rocky, who was a complete idiot all the way up - bouncing backwards and barking for a substantial proportion of the way, decided to try and hide from the spindrift and wind. 

Hoar Frost

A cold, but glorious afternoon in the hoar frost at Wedholme Flow today. 

Dodd wood and summit

I was so tight for time this morning but managed to squeeze in Dodd, even if I had to run down! Spectacular views and well worth the effort ....

On the way up...no inversion, but a gorgeous day! 

Bassenthwaite ...beginning to freeze.

Rocky on the summit.

Looking over Derwent water and the Coledale round.

Looking north...

Skiddaw...

Happy dog! 

Cracking views ...

Looking west ...

Plenty of frost...

Mist on Derwent water .