Blackpool Air Display

Finally getting caught up on blog stuff since I came back from the EduGeek meetings down south...

Before the meetings, I popped along to Blackpool for their annual air display. It was glorious sunshine and it was really nice to relax on the prom at North Shore for a couple of hours.

The air show also gave me the opportunity to play with my 500mm camera lens :-) By adding my 1.4x extender I got a full 700mm too :-D

Here's a sample of the pics I took (the noise was awesome when the Vulcan flew over - full afterburners, the lot!)

Dragonfly by the canal

This is the only pic I managed to get of the dragonfly I saw the other day... there was some random clicking going on as it shot past!

Anyway, this thing was huge.... I'm talking almost 6" from head to tail and the wingspan was easily more than that. Tom got a book out when I got home - as only he could - so that I could identify it and apparantly it's one of Britain's largest species.

A wildlife walk (trialing Google Docs)

I took another walk today to photograph some of the local wildlife.

My camera had decided to go off on one when on Aperture Priority mode which was a pain... everything was under exposed! :-(

Anyway, the wonders of shooting in RAW allowed me to rescue some images and I got some good ones later by switching to manual and keeping a better eye on the shutter speed.

I have decided to add a selection of images using a Google Docs presentation. Here goes ;-)

Another Walk

Following my little walk on Friday, I decided to go on another walk today. I was a little unsure about the weather but it was warm and sunny and the 24 hour weather forecast showed nothing but overcast skies.

I set out walking, spotted some ducks and got some nice pics with lovely reflections. The weather could have been nicer but I was even able to get some relatively nice landscape shots.

Anyway, about three-quarter's of the way to the Hand and Dagger (my usual point for a half-way pint!), the weather turned and it started to spot on... then we had sleet... then full on snow! How much did that annoy me!?! (I just had a fleece on!). I got a couple of pictures with snow... this one of the lambs was taken while I hid under a canal bridge at Salwick.

Canal Walk

Today I went on another of my little walks down the Lancaster Canal. As always, I took my trusty camera with me (Canon EOS 10D). I came across the usual pair of swans, although they weren't together today.

Just as I noticed the swimming swan, the sun poked its head out. Thinking that the swan would do one, I thought that I would take a picture from the rear to begin with... the swan clearly liked having his picture taken because he turned around and came closer! I thought that it was going to jump out of the water and attack me at one point!

Here's a couple of the pics anyway.

Jodrell Bank and the Dog Inn

Well yesterday I had a lovely day out with Caroline, taking advantage of my holiday.

It was decided that we should go to Jodrell Bank because we often see the large Lovell Radio Telescope from the motorway.

For the princely sum of £1.50 each we were admitted entry to the small visitors' centre and, after declining tickets for the shows in the '3D Theatre', we had a quick look 'round and watched some videos about the Lovell Telescope - although the screaming kids making a lot of noise made it somewhat difficult to concentrate.

We then had a walk around the base of the Lovell Telescope, which was unfortunately parked and so wasn't much to look at, before have a look at the 'Granada Arboritum' - a rather pleasant landscaped area full of trees.

After having a good look around we ventured off in search of a pub with a humorous name... we had a couple that we had found by trawling the web earlier in the day but the directions (courtesy of the RAC) sucked. We did happen upon 'The Dog Inn' and it was decided that the name was suitably humorous (plus it was in Lower Peover - which is a funny name in itself).

The pub was quite quiet, only a few customers other than us and the service could have been a little quicker but the food was excellent and the atmosphere was lovely too.