Sunny Spring Days on the Ffestiniog

It really did feel like Winter went on forever; I tend to feel a brightening of my spirits when a bit of sunshine lets me get some nice steam railway pictures.

"Blanche" running-round at Harbour.

Fairlie and "Prince". Some day, I'll visit and be able to get some pics of the little England-tank loco on its own... every visit since its repaint into green, I've only seen it sandwiched between other locomotives...

What a difference a couple of days made... some traditional Welsh weather, with it looking more like October. "David Lloyd George" looking great as ever.

Jumping back to the first day from this set, for a nice shot over the Cob.

 

Plas Newydd; The House

A little companion piece to the previous post; a few shots around the house at Plas Newydd.

Lovely details around the place.

Always on the look out for a nice Grandfather clock (one of Ben's relatives used to make such timepieces, so he has an eye out for one of his).

Lovely chandelier, though assume it's a swine to dust.

Interesting ceiling. 

 

Plas Newyd... the gardens

Just some pics from a few weeks ago, during a family trip out to Plas Newydd, Anglesey.

We've been here a few times, and the gardens are just a really pleasant place to stroll around on a warm afternoon.

There's a lovely walk through the woods, with lots of ferns and boggy areas.

The wilder areas contrast nicely with the more formal gardens near the house.

A lovely splash of colour in the beds.

 

Blossom in the Spring

The recent return of the nice weather has seen us out and about a bit more. Well, we need to keep up the exercise, and it's more pleasant to have a stroll in the Spring Sunshine than it is when battened-down against the wind and the rain.

A benefit to Spring walks are the rather prettier surroundings. The blossom was particularly impressive this year, and it seemed like the months of dead trees came to an end with them all springing into life in a matter of a few days.

It would have been a shame not to snap a few pics.

 

Criccieth Beach in early May

Back in early May, I (Ben) had to go get some reference pics around the beach at Criccieth, for an upcoming model project.

This involved getting some detail shots on the shingle itself...

...including the driftwood...

...washed up rubbish...

...sea defences...

...and the promenade.

The project is a build for one of the railway mags, so I also had to get some detail shots of the railway. Not massively successfully however, as circumstances meant I was down there at sunset, and was losing the light a bit.

That said, it was quite a nice sunset.

Class 158; I really, really need to work on photographing these this year, before they get replaced by the horrible new Class 197's.

 

Sent to Coventry

Rarely have we visited anywhere which looks more like it sprang from the pages of a classic Ladybird childrens book. It's almost like a caricature of the 1960's.

Of course there's a reason why everything is a bit 60's concrete brutalism, but we wont get into the politics.

We'd got a morning for a stroll around the city following the Stoneleigh garden railway show. The weather was mice, and the city quiet on a Sunday morning,

If anything, the place was a little too quiet; nobody seemed to be in a hurry to get up and open the shops.

Again, Ladybird... looks like this ought to have a caption like "let's go to the shops with Mummy and Bill the Dog".

A bit more 70's, with the orange and grey.

Love this building; it looks almost like a film-set fake backdrop.

There's lots of nice details hidden about the place in amongst all the brutalism and concrete.

It's been a while since we'd been to Coventry, and it was nice to just go and have a stroll, followed by a sit and a drink in a cafe. Would be nice to pop back and do it again, maybe after the show next year.