A Walk on the beach

A walk on the beach at East Mersea on Sunday morning gave the unexpected opportunity to watch some exciting sailing boats in action. There were a variety of lightweight craft sailing in a stiff breeze - whether the GBR on some of the sails was significant I don't know. The were all out from Brightlingsea which has certainly been to home of Olympic medalists in the past.

When the boats had sailed away I experimented with the reflection of the watery mid-morning sun on the sea and the salt-marshes; these two shots were taken from the same spot about 30 seconds apart

Finally some typical salt marsh (Salcott) at low tide later in the day - it all brought back happy memories of swimming and mucking about in boats in these creeks as a child.

Somerleyton Hall

A stately pile near Lowestoft made for a pleasant Sunday afternoon trip. The gardens contain some fine trees an excellent yew maze. The house is open, but photography is forbidden inside.














How should I convey the size of a sequoia? I tried the distant shot, but that lacks scale...

I tried looking up the main trunk - that's better, but still only hints a the size:

I tried it with people to give a hint of scale, but that meant that the overall height of the tree is lost.























So I went in close and just tried to show the enormous trunk in relative close-up:
















 
The topiary yews around the gardens were very smart and this double archway particularly caught my eye

















I'm not sure what the topiarist had in mind here, but the geometry caught my eye:


















Can't resist a passion flower:

Beth Chatto's Garden

Well, I've been inactive for far too long. A combination of post wedding syndrome and finding myself working for a living - far too stressful!

This weekend we ventured down to the East coast to stay with a friend in West Mersea and managed a visit to Wivenhoe Quay and Beth Chatto's Garden.

The garden was glorious, but the pollen count was high and I certainly suffered in consequence.

I decided that I should try to avoid the preponderance of green except where it was the main subject of the picture. I think that I succeeded some of the time!