GOLDEN GLOW

After a week away in hospital I arrived back to be gobsmacked by the fiery nature of our Chinese Rowan tree!  The leaves and mass of berries really glowed like a beacon in the garden.    I am particularly pleased with this as I grew it from a tiny seedling I found growing on a pile of stones!

The early morning light as it came through the trees at the end of our garden.

The sun disappears from sight, leaving a great orange glow in the sky.   Taken on holiday in the Canary Islands in 2012

For more Golden Glows go to Carmi's Photographic Challenge and see what other photographs are glowing!

STREETSCAPES

For an unusual take on Streetscapes, go toCarmi, over at writteninc and see his and other interesting photographs taken in City and town surroundings.

I live in a rather hilly town on the edge of the Peak District in the UK.   Most streets have some sort of a view of the hills, but today it was very misty, so there was no view!

This is taken from just inside the park.   None of those houses has a car parking space

  hence the cars parked right down the road.   It is also grey bin collecting day!

 This is the front of the cream houses and the back gates in the brick walls of the next 6 or so houses.   They were all built in the Victorian or Edwardian times

Another country!   Tromso in Norway, way, way above the Arctic Circle.   This is in June.

Dreary doesn't really describe this.   Its Longyearbyen, in Svalbard (Spitzbergen)   Well into the Arctic north - 78 degrees north if I remember rightly.   Just imagine what it is like covered in snow and no sun for 4 or 5 months!

Again in Norway, in Bergen.   One of the tiny little alleyways which squeeze between the big houses on the harbour-side    This one opened out into a little square, and had a very welcome coffee shop there!

FEELING REFLECTIVE

Carmi's Challenge this week is FEELING REFLECTIVE - and for some other interpretations of this theme, follow the link.  And then click on "show all posts" just above the photograph  of 'Multiples' if you don't get to the right post!.   There's a gremlin in my computer!

The rest of the college reflected in the newish building at out local College of Further Education

A very peaceful and reflective scene at the lake in our local park.   It was an unusually calm day.

Reflections in our green glass globe - actually a fishing float, found about 45 years ago on the Isle of Sky.   I'm not quite sure what it is reflecting - the front garden I think, but it is extremely abstract!

MULTIPLES

Lots of the same things massed together can make great photographs.   Carmi, over at writteninc has challenged us to come up with photographs of MULTIPLES.   Go to the link to find other ideas on the subject, but here are mine!

Stacked plastic buckets outside the sort of shop that sells all sorts of things for the home, stacked outside the shop!

Christmas tree baubles stacked up in boxes ready for the rush.

Coloured felt tip pens belonging to my Great Granddaughter

Little ankle boot wellies for not very thick mud!

LARGE STRUCTURES

 Carmi, over at writteninc. is calling for photographs of LARGE STRUCTURES.   There are some great photographs over there, do follow the link to see them.

Cruise ships seem to be getting bigger every year.   Ours from a couple of years ago is by no means the biggest now!    This is the ship at Stavanger, Norway, completely dwarfing the surrounding houses.   Bizarre, really!

The next one is a "giant's sofa" at Tittesworth Reservoir and surroundings in Staffordshire - looks comfortable enough!!

A Monument in Anglesey, Wales.   That is Mr.G right at the top!

A replica ship at the Nautical Museum in Barcelona, Spain.   It is a new museum, only just open.  But it was cool and shaded - just what we needed!

It occurs to me that you might have seen all these photographs before.   If so, sorry!   But I'm not much of a photographer of large things!!!

TREASURED

There are so many things we treasure in our lives.   Sometimes we try to hang on to everything!   Carmi this week, over in writteninc. has called for photographs of what we treasure.

There are, inevitably, pets.

This is my beloved Wags (OK, our daughter named her!)   She came as a puppy about 40 years ago and stayed with us for 11 years.   She designated herself as my dog, protected me and made sure I was in sight most of the time!   A Springer Spaniel/Border Collie cross,  when out on a walk she was never quite sure whether to round us up or retrieve us!   I cried for a week when she got a tumour and had to be put to sleep.

This photo, which is a copy of a scanned copy, and not particularly photographically good, is a very treasured picture.   It shows my parents, and my much-loved mother-in-law, plus my daughter and my parents' other two grandchildren.   The photo was taken in 1970, and sadly only the two girls are still alive.   Oh yes, and mine is the one with her mouth open!!

SADNESS

This week, Carmi challenged us to photograph SADNESSES. This was a rather difficult challenge for me.   I don't go into town very often, and we don't have many sad drunks, like Carmi found, or druggies or whatever around when I do!     And if I'm not there I can't find other sadnesses!

So I took my camera into the Park today when I took the dog out and came up with these two photos.

This makes me very sad.   Behind this fence is a bank, and then the edge of the lake.   When we first came here, it was kept mown, and the weeds were taken out, or didn't appear, and the ducks would sit on the bank in the sun.   Now our Council, Cheshire East, doesn't have the money to pay for all that to be done, and so the nettles, hogweed and other weeds have taken over.   The brushes are only trimmed  as they encroach on the path, the lake-side of them are quite untidy.

And this makes me even sadder in a way.   Obviously some money was found for a bit of new planting, in fact several small trees have appeared over the Golf Course area, but this Pieris was planted just as a particularly dry spell started, and the poor thing has died.   The Robinia next to it luckily has survived, but its a shame when plants like this die.   And that area used to be grass - but feet, both human and canine have worn it away, just because its there, I suppose.  There is a perfectly good path!

I sound like a crotchety old woman!!

Follow the link above to see other sadnesses.