Port Eynon, Gower, South Wales, Autumn
Just outside of the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park, one can find other excellent stretches of South Wales coastline.
Just outside of the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park, one can find other excellent stretches of South Wales coastline.
East of Pembrokeshire, Swansea is home to the Gower Peninsula and the Gower AONB (Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty). We had already explored a small section of this area at the start of our holiday at Mumbles. But further along the coastline from Mumbles one can find a stretch of fantastical coastline between Port Eynon and Rhossili.
Whereas the cliffs at Lydstep Head were more vertiginous, at the Gower Peninsula the cliffs are formed from a faulted and folded sequence of Carboniferous rocks. More recent sculpting occurred in the last Ice Age as the Gower lay on the southern margin of the last ice sheet. As a result, the cliffs here feature fantastic shapes of curves and folds smashing into each other at peculiar angles.
All photos taken on my Fujifilm X-T2 using my Vivitar “Series 1” 28–105mm f2.8–3.8 zoom and Laowa 9mm f2.8 prime lenses. RAWs converted in Capture One for iPad, developed and finalised in Affinity Photo for iPad.
Port Eynon, Gower, South Wales, Autumn by Ian Cylkowski is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
Looking back along the limestone cliff edge from Port Eynon Point towards the summit trig point, the open Overton Mere, and the Gower cliffs beyond.
From Overton Mere, looking back at Port Eynon Point, it’s easier to see the folding of limestone that’s occurred around this stretch of the Gower Coast. Seemingly impossible shapes and lines that are entirely natural.
Below Overton cliff more fantastic shapes are revealed, millions of years of folding, faulting, erosion, and glacial scouring.
On top of Long Hole cliff we navigated a join in the folds of limestone to use as a leading line towards the Common Cliffs, as beautiful late afternoon light highlights their shapes.
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Berwick-upon-Tweed, Northumberland, Summer
Here’s the final collection of work from our week-long summer jaunt around Northumberland.
Here’s the final collection of work from our week-long summer jaunt around Northumberland.
Berwick-upon-Tweed is a town steeped in history and filled with curiosities. It’s England’s northernmost town, right in the northeastern corner of the country. In fact, it’s slightly further north than Copenhagen in Denmark as well as the southern tip of Sweden.
Berwick’s name comes from the Old English berewíc, meaning “corn/barley farm”, which I guess gives you an idea of the town’s origins. During a period of about 400 years, Berwick changed hands between England and Scotland a dozen times or so. Richard of Gloucester retook Berwick for England for the last time in 1482. More than 200 years later, the Kingdom of Scotland joined the Kingdom of England in 1707, forming the Kingdom of Great Britain, and ending the border quarrelling between the nations.
A persistent legend exists about the town “technically” being at war with Russia. The myth goes that because Berwick had changed hands several times, it was regarded as a special, separate entity, sometimes referred to in proclamations as "England, Scotland and the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed".
For the declaration of the Crimean War against Russia in 1853, Queen Victoria supposedly signed the proclamation as "Victoria, Queen of Great Britain, Ireland, Berwick-upon-Tweed and all British Dominions". When the Treaty of Paris was signed to conclude the war, "Berwick-upon-Tweed" was left out. This meant that, supposedly, one of Britain's smallest towns was officially at war with one of the world's largest powers – and the conflict extended by the lack of a peace treaty for over a century.
In reality, Berwick-upon-Tweed was not mentioned in either the declaration of war or the final peace treaty, and Berwick-upon-Tweed was legally part of the United Kingdom for both.
Regardless, the town is fascinating and you can feel the dual-nationality personality of the place. During our wandering, a sea fret obscured most of the coastline, lending a misty foggy atmosphere to our photography.
All photos shot on my Fujifilm X-T2 using my three prime lenses: a Samyang 35mm f/1.2, a Laowa 9mm f/2.8, and an adapted Pentax SMC 55mm f/2.0. Developed using RNI Film’s Astia 100f profile.
Bamburgh, Budle & Cheswick Sands, Northumberland, Summer
Despite being in peak summer, it wasn’t all glorious sunshine during our week in Northumberland.
Despite being in peak summer, it wasn’t all glorious sunshine during our week in Northumberland.
On this particular day I poured over the various weather apps and services I check to ascertain temperatures, chances of rain, atmospheric conditions and more. From what I could see, if we stayed near the coast of Northumberland around Bamburgh we could probably avoid a lot of storms that were moving southwards.
After a beautiful morning of sunshine wandering around the beaches of Bamburgh and Budle, another glance at the weather services indicated a storm moving in over the area. This was also self-evident as the clouds above the beach and castle of Bamburgh were getting dark and foreboding. Lisabet and I nipped into a pub for lunch and decided on another beach further north that we hadn’t explored before: Cheswick Sands.
Thankfully, this was the correct decision. Not only did the rain fall as soon as we arrived at the pub (thank you, Lord Crewe Hotel), but the conditions at Cheswick Sands were blessedly dry. More than that, Cheswick Sands is beautiful. The area features extensive dunes, soft beaches, and fantastical sandstone formations to play around with photographically.
I made perhaps some of the finest seascape compositions I’ve ever done.
All photos shot on my Fujifilm X-T2 using my three prime lenses: a Samyang 35mm f/1.2, a Laowa 9mm f/2.8, and an adapted Pentax SMC 55mm f/2.0. All images were made 80% in-camera using a customised Velvia film simulation, with minor edits and corrections after in Lightroom and Affinity Photo.