2020 Review - December

Click on any image to se a larger version.  All images copyright Leslie Ashe.

It's now 31 January so it's about time I got round to reviewing images from December. Three visits to the Mournes were the main feature of the month.  

3 December saw us over  Slieve Binnian and rather than simply following the wall back down to the Carrick Little track we detoured to visit the quarry works on the south and south-east side of Binnian.  A misty day with hoar frost over the tops and fleeting glimpses of the valleys below when the mist cleared from time to time.

Moon over Binnian North Tor and Douglas Crag on the left.

Path up to the North Tor overlooking Ben Crom Reservoir and about to enter the mist.

Two views of the North Tor as the mist cleared.

Along the ridge towards the Summit Tor

Looking back to the North Tor as the mist cleared

Brian and Ian at the Back Castles

Frost rimed granite

Slieve Donard from Binnian summit

Old quarry works 

The Annalong valley in its glorious winter colours

Swinley bay on a Sunday morning long walk. Since discovered that the line of rocks is part of an ancient fish trap.  iPhone image.

Meanwhile back home a sunset from the front door.

Planned day in the mountains turned out wet, windy and misty over the tops so we decided a long walk in Tollymore (10 miles) was a reasonable substitute.  No point in getting a soaking for a soakings sake!

We visited the remains of an old church and discovered that the Forest Service had felled a couple of trees to stop the mountain bikers riding through what was left of the church.

Also a visit to the White Fort - the site of an ancient circular settlement from c.500-1000 AD.  Brian  standing on the remains of the outer wall.

 Pre-Christmas family commitments and respecting lockdown restrictions meant that 17 December saw our final outing to the mountains for 2020.  Trassey Track, Slievenaglogh, Commedagh and a long hard descent after Commedagh ridge to Tollymore and back gave us a reasonable day out.  I had hoped for an image of the Millstone on Slievenaglogh (a previous one was taken with my phone) but the mist had other ideas!

The remains of an old jetty in Strangford Lough provided the foreground for an image of the back edge of a heavy shower at sunset.  Unfortunately the tide was higher the I had anticipated but at least the tops of some of the posts were visible.

Finally, on 30 December the setting moon taken from my back door.

Snow

 A few from Castle Park this morning.  Not as much snow there as there was at home half a mile away and what there was was melting quickly off the trees.  With little snow cover on the ground I concentrated on the way it was thawing on the branches (and dripping down my neck!)

This one would not be to everyone's taste (or even to anyone's taste) but I liked the confusion of the scene and how the snow and ice on the twigs helped to delineate them. 

Mourne Wanders and Wonders

 Two page centre spread in the Mourne Observer this week about granite works in the Mourne Mountains. Penned by my colleague Brian White on mountain walks and illustrated with my photographs.

  

Fish traps

 I’ve been reading “Mourne Country” by the late E Estyn Evans, Professor of Geography at Queen’s University Belfast and in it he refers to evidence of fish traps on the beach at Newcastle.  He also records that there were also fish traps in Swinely Bay near Crawfordsburn.  The first image below is of the curved line of rocks that formed the trap in Swinely Bay. The second image is of the remains of fish traps at Greyabbey.  There is also the remains of one at the Nendrum on Mahee Island on Strangford Lough (not pictured).

I have photographed the Swinely Bay stones several times as they provide a very pleasing arc at the right state of the tide.  It’s good to know the reason why they are there.

2020 Review - November

 

Click on an image to see a larger version.  All images copyright Leslie Ashe.

Started the month with some black and white printing.  All A3 size - 5 images of various trips to Iceland and one of Tenaya Lake in Yosemite National Park (after Ansel Adams!).  To misquote the great man: The [digital file} is comparable to the composer's score and the print to its performance.  

Back in the mountains on a dismal foggy day, this time with the Fuji XT20.

Social distancing at lunch, hunkering down on the lee side of the wall.

It eventually cleared.  I thought the black and white treatment of this brought out the  triangles of the mountains - Doan, Binnian and Wee Binnian retreating into the distance.

Another one of the Tollymore bridges destroyed in the October storm

Tollymore in its autumn colours

And I rediscovered the remains of the church which I first came across a number of years ago but had forgotten it's location.

A stop on the way back at St Donard's Church of Ireland in Dundrum

Back to the mountains.  At the beginning of the month I started carrying the Fuji XT20 with me in the mountains but on this occasion I took it out of my rucksack at the back of the car to get at my hat and gloves and forgot to either hang it round my neck or put in back in my rucksack.  It was a shame because here was some good light and I had to resort to my phone.

The millstone on Slievenaglogh

The end of November we had another outing to the Mountains and I made sure the XT20 was packed!

This huge piece of rock was perched on smaller boulders (like a dolmen).  Was it a glacial erratic or had it fallen from the crags above? Probably the latter as it was too angular and sharp edged to have been carried there by ice.

Social distancing on the move.

Great light on Ben Crom with Doan on the right and Slieve Muck in the distance.

The crags of Cove Mountain

And finally the view back up the Annalong Valley.  The foreground looks more like the African savannah than the Mourne Mountains.

2020 Review - October

 

Click on an image to see a larger version.  All images copyright Leslie Ashe.

I mentioned in my September blog that a health issue  had restricted my activities.  Early October saw me in hospital for a day procedure.  Recovering from this continued to restrict what I was able to do but as the month progressed I was encouraged to slowly increase my physical activity which meant that I could start to get out again with the camera and also start to extend my exercise to include gentle, then easy, walks in the mountains.

The evening before the procedure I made the effort to get out for the harvest moon rising at Donaghadee.  It gave me something to think about other than what was to take place the next day!

It was 3 weeks before I felt fit enough and confident enough to heave the big camera bag and tripod out for some autumn colour in Clandeboye.

The next day I ventured out with two colleagues for a low level walk in the western Mournes.  To keep weight down I didn't carry a camera and my phone yielded this image of a relic of the not too distant past when turf was cut in the area for use as a fuel.  

Towards the end of the month the call of autumn colour in Tollymore got me out again with the camera and tripod.  It turned out to be a very tiring day but good nonetheless.

Very heavy rain in the previous week had wreaked havoc along the Shimna River with three wooden bridges swept away, damage to the stepping stones at the meeting of the waters and large areas of the riverside path washed away. The damage to the bridge in the image below, where half of it has been washed away and with significant damage to the rest of it, shows the level that the river reached.

I couldn't resist making my annual pilgrimage to Foley's Bridge

Amongst the evergreens the ferns provided autumn colour.

Finally, at the end of the month I had another easy day in the mountains, again with my phone for pictures.

We spent some time in and around the remains of some of the granite workings in the Annalong Valley.  

The remains of a shelter.

We came across two "fizz troughs" where the workmen tempered their tools.

The crags of Lower Cove

And a waterfall I hadn't seen before and which warrants another visit with a camera and tripod.