Elsecar

The Elsecar Heritage Centre near Sheffield is somewhere we visit occasionally if we have a couple of hours to kill in the city.  It's a bit of a sod to get to (more so now they've redesigned a couple of roundabouts, apparently to vastly increase the likelihood of road traffic accidents), but when you get to the actual place it's rather nice. 

I was there with Younger Child, killing time whilst waiting for Amy and the two Other Childs to finish a narrowboating trip with the Scouts at Wakefield, so with no particular plan we wandered around the museum and the paths near the railway.

The railway itself is a bit of an oddity; a former colliery line which has been preserved, so heavy on the industrial locomotives (two generations of Sentinel above, vertical boilered steam loco and later diesel), but a short line... except it should be a longer line, a big chunk is out of use waiting for the level crossing to be signed-off as safe for use.

After a stroll along the side of the old canal and the railway, we returned to the preserved colliery buildings for a mix of photography subjects, some nature shots of the surprising varieties of flowers around the site, and some of the industrial archaeology.

After we'd exhausted the amusements of the heritage centre, we went over to the adjacent park, where Younger Child entertained herself trying to give some of her blackcurrant juice to the very tame ducks.

Not a bad way to spend a day, and somewhat unexpectedly, another shot from the day published (as with York the day before, they were very much sent off on the off-chance someone might like the pics).

Not directly related, but this is from a little earlier in the year, a pic published from the New Years trip to the Black Country Living Museum.  As with Elsecar, it shows the sort of thing I tend to get published these days, the less 'mainstream' subjects.  Whilst everyone else is rushing around photographing "Flying Scotsman" I do rather prefer going after these smaller locomotives and ex-industrial subject matter...  And yes, this is me unashamedly blowing my own trumpet.

York NRM July 2018

Bit of an oldy for this post, a trip out to the National Railway Museum in York with the Younger Child (it was still the NRM at the time, it's since rebranded) back before the summer hols.

It wasn't exactly a photography trip; it was chucking it down so much I didn't want to use the SLR that day, so used the phone cam instead.  And likewise I wasn't trying for photographs so much, as I had The Child with me who has a limited patience for standing around getting photographs when she isn't the one with the camera.

I was glad to get some a few pics of the Stirling Single however, as I needed it for reference for a massive upcoming miniatures build.  Happily, with the loco on the turntable, I managed to get a ton of shots from varying angles without having to overly exert myself walking around...

We went for a ride on the miniature line in the rain, and to my annoyance I spotted what would have been good visual reference for the earlier Jabberwock project...

Back indoors out of the rain...

Using the phone I managed a couple of odd angles, but then with The Child in tow, it wasn't really a day for photography.

That said, impulsively sending off the pictures paid off, as the NRM was in the news (specifically 'Railways Illustrated') for undertaking a ground-breaking rebranding exercise, which -no doubt after much expensive consultation- saw them... shorten the name to "Railway Museum".  Possibly in karmic punishment for my cynicism about that decision, my pic was accidentally mis-credited as belonging to them, but hey-ho, that's life.

Holy Island

Whilst we were in Northumberland back in August, we ticked another one off the bucket list, and visited the former priory on Holy Island.  Luckily we had a nice day for it, and whilst the museum was very interesting (especially for Amy, who'd studied this period of history), the ruins themselves were what we felt was worth seeing.

One problem reared it's head though; it was lens-flare city with the camera.  This is a side-effect of having foster children... though they swear blind they never touched the camera, after a day out the week before the lens became mysteriously smeared with a jam-like substance... which necessitated swapping the filter ring for the back-up which flared like nobodies business.  Definitely something to replace before any of the upcoming night shoots in the summer, but proof why a tenners-worth of filter ring is a wise investment on several hundreds quid worth of lens.

There's only so many ways you can photograph a set of ruins, so we took to doing some abstract shots too.

All in all, a nice place to visit, helped of course by the presence of a shop selling a great selection of locally-produced spiced mead.  Very nice.

Threlkeld

Threlkeld Quarry Museum, near Keswick, in Cumbria, has been on our list of places to visit for a while, but it's tended to be closed when we've been in the area.  Happily, it was a venue for the day visits during the Red Rose 2018 Scout Camp we were at back in the summer, so we descended en-masse with about 50 kids on a somewhat grey day.

The place was great if you're as much of a nerd for industrial archaeology as I (Ben) am, though having said that, the young people with us seemed pretty into the place, and the fact they could wander freely and explore all these old machines.

With only a phone camera to play with in between Leader duties, there wasn't much scope for photography but I managed a few shots.

Bagnall saddle tank "Sir Tom" was doing the honours on the railway line.

Not much to say; the Scouts enjoyed the place, it was an interesting visit for a couple of hours before we raced off to the next place on the itinerary, the people working there were welcoming and friendly, and we intend to re-visit by ourselves when we have a better camera and a bit more time to explore the place.

Landy

Short post this week... whilst we were camping up in Northumberland, we (Ben, and Elder Child) went green laning with Father-in-Law in his wonderful Landy.  Well, Land Rover Owner International had by coincidence published a list of green lane routes near where we were camping, so it would have been rude not to.

We were up in the hills west of Alnwick, the roads getting progressively more basic until we hit the green lane itself.

Not sure how amused Father-in-Law was with me keeping getting him to stop so I could dive out to take a pic, but I fancied getting some shots of the Landy...

Up in the bracken.  The article in the mag hadn't lied, the scenery was wonderful up here.

The sky was nice and dramatic.

Playing with a few zoom effects...

A nice evening out, and our first green lane experience.  Also fun to get some decent shots of the Landy for Father-in-Law to have too.  Might have to do some more of this, though having to jump out and drive sheep away so we could get past lost its appeal after a bit, but there might be a whole photography project (admittedly a very nerdy one) documenting the dozen different gate-locking mechanisms we encountered on a single 2-mile route.