Point of view

When I was young, my Gran lived in Morecambe and we used to stay with her for traditional seaside holidays with ice cream and donkeys and hook-a-duck on the pier. It was wonderful.

But when I was 10, I went on a young Quaker youth hostelling weekend to Northumberland. We had walks along what I thought of then as nondescript country lanes, but one day they took us to Bamburgh. We walked onto the beach and it was a coup de foudre. I had never seen such a vast stretch of sand before, with no urban clutter, and with that huge castle looming over it: it was the start of a passion for the Northumberland coast that has never left me. I've just looked through all my many photos of Northumberland and only found this one of Bamburgh beach and castle. 

Poor fare, with no sunshine, and actually no decent view of the castle. That's because I lost interest in Bamburgh when I came across Dunstanburgh ....so I have scores of pictures of Dunstanburgh castle...and Embleton bay, from every angle...

It's actually quite embarrassing how many pics of Dunstanburgh I have. Maybe I was taking the clouds in that last one. I do like clouds.

I don't take quite so many pictures of beaches or castles as I did...but here's one of Holy Island castle one early morning last week.

These days I'm in love with those 'nondescript' country lanes. There's a fraction of the traffic we have in the Peak District and they are so much better for cycling. They are quiet, many are sheltered from the prevailing wind, and the verges are generous. The skies are stupendous - huge and full of stacked up spectacular cloud formations. I don't have photos of them because I never want to step off the bike to get out my camera.

"Oh, those lanes - so silent, so fragrant, so deeply rural. And overhead the big sky, so much bigger than in Derbyshire, and so rarely like the solid grey helmet that so often weighed her down in Bakewell. In Northumberland the clouds were constantly moving and changing, and were luminous at sunset, a sunset that could be as late as half past nine in summer."  

excerpt from But I told you last year that I loved you.

And because I already have a full portfolio of bays, beaches and castles, my photograph interests are moving into colour and abstract, with pictures like this -