One Chance At Autumn Colours

It’s been pretty quiet these last few weeks due to further Covid 19 restrictions limiting us to travel within the county of Denbighshire only.

The Welsh government announced at the end of last week that the measures imposed above are not working and so from tonight we are going back into a full lockdown again. No travel, stay indoors, only go out for exercise, which must start and finish at your residence, and only essential shopping.

So on Tuesday I thought I better get out somewhere and get some photographs. Doing some research I found a forest in west Denbighshire and east Conwy that covers about 40 square miles (100 km²).

E-M1MarkII OLYMPUS M.12-40mm F2.8 1/50 sec at ƒ / 5.6 ISO 200

Clocaenog forest, under the control of Natural Resources Wales, is mostly coniferous softwoods and was planted in 1905 on moorland above 350 metres.

I’ve lived in Denbighshire just over 10 years and didn’t know this forest existed. Sadly I’ve always thought photography wise, Denbighshire is not as interesting as the neighbouring counties of Conwy and Gwynedd, which is where many of my North Wales photographs come from.

E-M1MarkII OLYMPUS M.12-40mm F2.8 1/13 sec at ƒ / 8.0 ISO 200

It was this avenue of Beech trees, that I found when researching where to go. It would have been nice if the leaves had changed colour a bit more, that will probably happen next when we can’t visit, but I’m happy with this photograph.

E-M1MarkII OLYMPUS M.12-40mm F2.8 1/50 sec at ƒ / 5.6 ISO 200

Wandering around the forest on one of the way marked trails, often laid out with showing things of interest in mind, I found this lovely pair of trees all twisted and gnarled. They do make for interesting photographs.

E-M1MarkII OLYMPUS M.12-40mm F2.8 1/200 sec at ƒ / 5.6 ISO 200

Not long after I took this photograph, the wind started to build and the sky started to get steadily darker. Rain was on the way but before it came I managed to photograph this old lodge hidden just behind the trees to the right hand side of the lake.

E-M1MarkII OLYMPUS M.12-40mm F2.8 1/160 sec at ƒ / 5.6 ISO 200

It was time to head back to the car but I couldn’t resist getting under the canopy of that beautiful tree to the left of the photograph above.

E-M1MarkII OLYMPUS M.12-40mm F2.8 1/30 sec at ƒ / 5.6 ISO 200

Almost back at the car I found one more tree to photograph. To be honest I could probably have shot loads more on my walk along the trail, there were so many interesting, but there are only so many trees you can post into a blog before it gets boring.

You’re not bored, are you? Too many trees?

Well here’s some more just to finish. I’d had an early start that morning so when I finished in the forest it was still only 12:30 pm. True the sky had gone flat grey, there was some rain, but I wanted to make the most of the day out. Taking a chance I set of for the Horseshoe Pass and Valle Crucis Abbey.

E-M1MarkII OLYMPUS M.12-40mm F2.8 1/20 sec at ƒ / 5.6 ISO 200

Along the road I had to stop for this photograph. The sun was shining through the trees casting some great warm colours into the shadows.

Stopping at the top of the Horseshoe Pass I watched the sunlight move over the forest across the valley from me.

E-M1MarkII OLYMPUS M.12-40mm F2.8 1/500 sec at ƒ / 5.6 ISO 200

So I waited until I saw something I liked and this is the result.

Photographs from the abbey I’ll save for another day.

Stay safe – Mike