http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news en mike@mikemcfarlane.co.uk Copyright 2011 2011-12-11T19:37:22+00:00 http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-10-wild-nights-and-mud/ http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-10-wild-nights-and-mud/#When:19:37:22Z I was off on a stereotypes trip again, first a couple of days down in Kent on the south coast, then nearly a week in Essex. I was thinking wide boys, white stilettos and motorways. Of course I am a landscape photographer, not a paparazzi, so there was no chance of white stilettos, and I normally try to avoid the wide boys, especially wild camping on their land. I don't like sawn offs. Honestly, I have been warned about this on previous trips. I thought the Romney Marshes in Kent would be a bit like other parts of Kent I have visited, gently rolling countryside covered in orchards. A look at the map for Romney Marshes on the south coast is fascinating. Vast areas of totally flat land, with sudden little contoured bumps. Very odd. Off course, the marshes used to be marshes, with lots of little islands in them. But the marshes were drained resulting in this strange topography. I camped a couple of nights on the sea cliff, which was now about a mile inland! Such landscape scale man made change fascinated me. So it was a pleasure to make panoramas of everything from the wetlands at Rye Harbour and out into the arable land that is now so productive, and sought after for a variety of developments from housing to wind turbines. It's that denseness of experience that is common in the south east. Essex also has that densely used landscape feel. But it is not just dense with motorways as it often feels from the car, it's housing, fields, pastures, industrial areas, estuaries, wild spaces (including reserves). Everything packed in, overlapping. It's the embodiment of condensed Living Landscapes. All parts of the system must work together.  I camped on a campsite near Billericay for the first couple of nights. I could have wild camped, there were definitely places, but a campsite was the easiest path and I could just leave my tent up allowing me to move more in-encumbered and quickly between locations during these short winter days.  The Hanningfield Living Landscape scheme takes in Hanningfield reservoir and surrounding area. The resevoir was very low, so I was was given permission to photograph from the shoreline which would normally be under water. It's always good to get a different perspective, a ducks eye view in this case. The Essex Wildlife Trust is also working closely with the Royal Horticultural Society at Hyde Hall to create a more wildlife friendly formal garden. It's very formal, everything so neat, with a label on it. But gardens, both the grand and our own, are an important place for wildlife, as a place to live or to link up with other wildspaces. The Essex Wildlife Trust is also heavily involved with local schools and local communities, and it was great to hear Gayle from the Trust not only list the ideas they were trying in this area, but the successes as well. Thinking back to my visit to The Great Fen when there was a group of smiling happy city kids visiting and enjoying the green natural spaces, it was easy to imagine Essex kids enjoying themselves in a similar way. A quick train trip up to Colchester, yes I am now that lazy to take the train 30miles (the days are too short, honest), and I met up with Sarah to be shown round the Blackwater Estuary Living Landscape. Normally, I get a short tour then am left to my own devices to make panoramas. Some WT very generously give up a day to show me round. Sarah however had a two day location packed schedule planned with military precision. A Geordie girl, so we had lots to talk about, and she had lots to say. But it was apparent she was also a good listener which had led to a fantastic success with the Colne oyster men. (The Colne is one of only two areas in England to supply oysters.) By listening to them, what motivated them, what they wanted then working with them, she has managed to create a management plan that will give their oyster beds legal protection from nomadic foreign oyster boats. They off course have obligations to conservation as part of this plan, although it sounded like they were already very committed to an area that they have worked for generations and know they must look after for future generations. All the same, they have been trying to get this legal protection for 120years! We talked, Sarah wandered whilst I photographed and we travelled round the Blackwater from St. Peters Church round to Mersea Island. It's a lot of muddy estuary, dominated by inlets, the old decommissioned nuclear power station, salt marsh, boats and people. It's beautiful, wild, tamed and fascinating. Joe Cornish has talked about a photographers fascination with edges, and the Blackwater is full of edges, at every level.      Of course it is also the edge of the sea, a sea with a large tidal range. Sarah had thoughtfully arranged for me to camp on the sea wall at one of their reserves. A delightful location to wild camp (although a ten minute cycle to the toilet!) Stunning salt marsh full of the burbling Brent geese and whistling oyster catchers. Perfect. I was intrigued to make a starlit panorama in this area, and a call of nature one night woke me at about midnight. If I'm up.... The sound was wrong though, the bird noises which had been some distance away were now all round my tent. Apprehensively I left my tent. Yep, the tide was in, through the break in the sea wall that the trust have made to flood the salt marsh as it would naturally. And the tide was pretty far up the sea wall. That's ok, it's the sea wall for goodness sake. I was near surrounded by silvery flat seawater, it was beautiful. I headed down to the jetty to make my star light pano, but the jetty was underwater. I checked my tide tables to find out when it would be safe to go back onto the jetty and noted the tide would still go up by another meter. Wow. It was then I looked back towards the sea wall and my tent. A sea wall with only a meter sticking out the water! The sea scares me, I'm not above taking risks with tides, but I respect it's nature. And I was scared then. It would be pretty embarrassing to have to call the coastguard to be rescued. I tidied my gear, ready to break camp quickly and checked, then rechecked the way back out to solid land. Escape planned, it was time for tea and apple pie to keep my spirits up and to stay warm in the sub-zero temperatures. I've gone on long enough about this, the tide stopped about 30-40cm from the top of the sea wall, I made my starry pano (so many stars to see despite light pollution), and went back to sleep in my safe little tent. No worries!      Then got up again two hours later to head out to West Mersea harbour to photograph the oyster men going out to sea at sunrise. It was a subtle pink dawn, much like my face as they took the mickey out of all my layers of clothing as they wandered round in t-shirts and jumpers despite the hard frost. Such a wimp, I made my pano and Sarah and I then retreated to the Pearl cafe for a bacon roll for me and tea. Cracking. I spent the next couple of days exploring the Roman River, also Essex. After four glorious days, I had to make my photographs of this military training and conservation area in moody grey skies. It was a shame, as there is a lot to see around the Roman River area. Like a lot of MOD ground, it is often left to itself with generally less interference by man (apart from lots of soldiers or tanks moving over it, or stuff being blown up) and this often allows nature and wildlife just a little more freedom to get on with it's life. The tidal mouth of the Roman River is a large area of mud flats, which apparently offends some local residents with it's mucky mud, but it is a haven for all sorts of plants on the banks and many winter wading birds who were busy digging bits of protein out of the mud. Personally I think the mud is quite pretty, the textures, the light reflected off it, but us photographers are strange when it comes to aesthetics. With a long face after such a great time in Essex, I left to head up to Wellingborough in Northhamptonshire. Heather from BCN Wildlife Trust showed me around the reserve at Summer Leys with obvious pride in the area and all the winter waders that come to over winter. Judging by the number of walkers, bird watchers, dog walkers, cyclists and families who were using the paths through the reserve it was pretty popular with people too. It was quite quiet after the raucous bird noise of Essex, but I enjoyed the peace after I got into it, and it was fabulous to see a Living Landscape including this reserve being enjoyed by wildlife and so many people.  The wild camping was not so great, lots of wide open sheep fields, so with a slight sense of disgust at myself, but also slight relief I headed to a hotel for my last night. A bar meal, a pint, some wifi then some TV! Not so hardcore! It was a great trip of brilliant conservationists (both WT staff and those who work the land/sea like the oyster men) and fascinating places, some wild, some totally man made. The camping was great and the photography was amazing. I've just finished the virtual tours for this trip and they look great, even if I do say so myself. I'm a lucky guy to be living a gig like this working with a fab organisation like The Wildlife Trusts. It continues to give me hope for the future of man and wildlife. 2011-12-11T19:37:22+00:00 http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-9-summer-to-winter-in-a-day/ http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-9-summer-to-winter-in-a-day/#When:18:19:17Z Winter has arrived, missing out autumn, and it is making me work now. No more sitting around in the sun watching the world go by, it cold short days that need to be busy to stay warm, well planned to make meetings and ensure I get all the locations photographed in a day. Subtler colour palettes, and long shadowed orange light. Long nights in the tent where I can sleep for fourteen hours and still have a lie in. Yes, winter is here. The trip started in the summer though. It might have been November, but no one had told the weather gods to adjust the thermostat. I started this trip at The Tame Valley east of Birmingham with blue skies and t-shirt and short clad lunch stops. It makes the photography so easy. The deep cool water filled former gravel extraction pits that make up much of the attraction to wildlife and pleasure seekers looked really enticing. Not that there is much wildlife to see, or hear, without close inspection at this time of year. The countryside is now very quiet after the noise and showmanship of spring and summer. And less tweets is meaning less Tweets, hey ho. I added in the luxury of a campsite as well as the sunshine. After the last trips succession of shady urban wild camps, I couldn't face more of them round Birmingham. Which was a shame really, because there is no much green space around Birmingham. The city seems to transition instantly from grey urban, to green rural, so places like the Tame Valley may be busy with people, but they do feel like green spaces, although not quite wild! A lovely country lane ride through Warwickshire deposited me in the centre of Coventry, for a quick coffee stop before heading out to Brandon Marshes visitor centre just outside Coventry to meet up with Gina from Warwickshire Wildlife Trust who was going to show me round Princethorpe Woods Living Landscape. It's a bit of a warren of little lanes and small coppiced ancient woodland, but Gina had thoughtfully bought along detailed maps for me, so no getting lost. The gold and copper woods were pretty quiet during the day, no much to see or hear in the wide rides (tracks) that are kept clear for butterflies, or in the coppiced glades that are managed for a variety of species including cute little dormice. Come sundown though and the woods came to life with a cacophony of owl and other night sounds. I met up with Mike the volunteer warden the next morning who was showing people round and also a team of Community Payback lads who were helping with the coppice management. It looked like hard work clearing the dense wood and the hot weather just made the work harder. I was keen to photograph them at work as I like showing the range of people who volunteer for the Wildlife Trusts and the hard work they put in, but wasn't sure if they would be happy to be photographed. I approached their team leader who did an intake of breath and said they probably wouldn't want to be photographed but he would ask anyway. And they all promptly said yes. Cool. A pleasant wild camp in some fields overlooking Coventry completed a good day. But that was it for the good weather days. As I got on the train for Hereford the next morning it was apparent that winter had arrived, the weather gods had tweaked the thermostat and added in a bit of rain and mist to make us suffer. I arrived at the Herefordshire WT office and did my usual scrounging of battery charging and shower before we headed of to the Woolhope Dome. It's a pretty impressive feature of bumpy limestone hills poking out of the flat floodplains. Herefordshire presents a bit of a contradiction. On the the one hand there are many very affluent people, and this is apparent looking at the neatly groomed countryside. But, there are also some very deprived areas which don't receive a lot of attention as Herefordshire is perceived as wealthy, and the wealth skews the stats. So, with pretty countryside, but grey gloomy skies I feel that the photographs I made reflect this contrasted area. The last stop was Shropshire where I had a couple of locations to visit. The first was Holly Bank west of Shrewsbury which sits on the River Severn floodplain. The Holly Banks reserve is a pilot field system to explore sustainable farming methods (which are also wildlife friendly) for an oil free future and also to explore the use of farmland as a sink for flood water rather than building an ever increasing number of flood defences around towns (which only pushes the flood problem elsewhere.) The project is still at very early stages so there wasn't a lot to actually photograph at this stage, but it is an exciting concept for the future. The weather wasn't at it's best for photographing such a location, I would really have liked some bright blue sky to enhance the currently rough look of the location, but the sun stayed hidden for much of the day. With slightly grim heart and an oncoming case of man flu I packed up my gear only to find that my bike had a puncture. No trouble, until I broke the pump! In the middle of nowhere! Shit! I stuffed the tyres with grass and rode a lumpy twelve miles to the nearest garage to repair the puncture and inflate the tyre. Grrr. And so I finished at the wildly contrasting Living Landscape of Meers & Mosses east of Ellesmere. A place of deep glacial lakes (the meers) and mosses (bogs where peat has been cut). I woke with a grim heart and my man flu/cold even worse but at least the night in a hotel had been kind so the grey morning didn't feel as bad as it could have. But as I slipped through the grey mist I studied the the light and how it was fluctuating enhancing the autumn colours at times. Fab, an opportunity. I waded out in the shallows of the mere, but still draped in the hanging weeping willow and went for a moody pan surrounded by water. The mosses in the afternoon were only slightly drier, but an abundance of autumn coloured grass and heather made the grey sky a blessing that let the subtle colours of this beautiful landscape shine through. It wasn't the easiest trip with the grey skies, damp camping and quiet landscape, I found it hard to enthuse, hard to Tweet, just mentally hard. I think I am probably slightly burned out. But I am now past halfway, my equipment choice is holding up for the most part, I've got nearly two weeks at home, and my next trip is a return to Essex. Bring it on! 2011-12-11T18:19:17+00:00 http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-8-sleeping-arrangements-for-cycle-tourists/ http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-8-sleeping-arrangements-for-cycle-tourists/#When:11:07:26Z Yorkshire, Leicestershire, Cheshire, Lancashire and Cumbria were all counties I passed through. It was quite a range of regional identities to move through, and a very wide range of sleeping arrangements for this cycling photographer, from hotels to totally dodgy wildcamps. I started not far from home in Doncaster. Off the train and pedal into the town centre to get some food. I'm locking up my bike when a lady comes up to me and asks me if I expect to find my bike there when I get back! Great, quick shop then. And my bike was still there. It made the tone of the area feel serious straight away, and as I cycled through industrial estates, large roads and intersections and a myriad of railway lines I wondered what I would find at the Potterric Carr reserve. Sat there like a green and blue jewel in amongst all the concrete and tarmac grey, bordered on all sides by motorways and railways, with my arrival heralded by torrential rain (grey skies too) is a myriad of pools, reeds, woodlands and hides. The sound recordings were pretty grim with all the road noise, but it was interesting to see a successful reserve in this setting. And my campsite? A muddy ploughed field miles away to escape the rough industrial landscape. Euch! There is not going to be much talk of cycling in this diary. If you have read my last few diaries you will know that I have become increasingly exhausted with all the travelling and photography for this year long commission, so I decided that I was going to take a step back and take things really easy. With short days and long nights I was able to rest pretty well and get some good long sleeps, when I could sleep (see below). Just to add interest, The Sun newspaper were giving away free Lego that week, so it was my little quest that week to find a newsagent, then a ToysRUs or WhSmith to claim my free Lego. It felt pretty relaxing to eat at a decent time, play with some Lego in my tent, read for a bit, then be able to sleep till 6 or 7am then next morning. And the cycling through much of these very industrial and motorway covered landscapes would not be much fun, so the trains were welcome. I headed down to The Charnwood Forest near Loughborough next. I used to live not far from here and it was a surprise to find such a large hill, covered in old woodland rather than the flat arable land that I remembered from trips to Leicester. This contrast between car travel perception of the landscape and 'reality' was highlighted on this trip. Travelling by bike I usually manage to find lots of green areas to travel through. But in the car and on the train landscapes can often look just grey and industrial. This became even more apparent later in this trip in Merseyside. Huge motorways, but lots of green hidden away. Charnwood Forest was a delight, with autumn golds in the grasses and leaves. Golden light galore. The wild forest contrasting with the massive granite quarry nearby that has shaped the landscape and the local economy. Katie from Leicestershire Wildlife Trust who showed me round works closely with the quarry company to ensure issues of conservation and quarrying are clearly understood on all sides and to ensure wildlife and the local communities can both continue to benefit from jobs and wild areas. And I got to camp a nice grassy field at the back of a farm whose family also works closely with Leicestershire Wildlife Trust to manage land in the Charnwood Forest. And the farmers mum took pity on me and kept me plied with cake and hot tea, and chat. Perfect. Cheshire next, eventually. The train got stuck in the Peak District, so I was really late to meet Rich from Cheshire Wildlife Trust. Being late isn't a problem as such, but with the early nights, finding a campsite after I have been shown round a location can be a problem at times. We had a good tour round The Mersey Washlands on the edge of Runcorn looking over the Mersey to Liverpool. The light was pretty good when we arrived, so I took the opportunity to make some photographs. A nice view from the top of the fort inspired visitor centre with me balanced on top of a railing to get a higher viewpoint for the 360 panorama. Then wait till it was pitch black to make a nigh time panorama of the Mersey at night with the lights of Runcorn and Liverpool twinkling in the distance. Another one of those green places surrounded on all sides by grey. And one of those locations that can look very grey when travelling there by car, but actually there is a lot of 'hidden' green.      So, in the middle of a marsh, on the edge of the Mersey, about 1/2mile from the path over the marsh in the pitch black, surrounded on all sides by really deprived areas! Sometimes I wonder what I am doing. With no campsite to go to. Should I woos out and go to a hotel? I had no idea. I had to get myself out the marsh first, wading through long grass in the dark, trying to avoid all the deep hidden ditches. Getting closer to the path, where I have hidden my bike and trailer in the long grass, and someone starts shining a torch at me. I ran scenarios in my head, extended my tripod legs to use it to protect myself in case of trouble, left my bike where it was and headed back to the path and the torch wielder. Turns out it's just a young Liverpool lad out walking his dog. So, sat and chatted to him for half an hour, talking about Shelley (the poet) and Siddhartha (Buddhism). Relieved, but bloody odd. Still nowhere to camp, but wasn't really up for a hotel, so I headed away from the path a bit and pitched my tent behind a tree. Too tired at that point to really care, I slept soundly till about 2am and woke in a panic realising where I was camped. I lay there for two hours terrified, every noise outside raising my heart rate and dropping even more adrenaline into my system. Honestly wondered about getting up and cycling around till dawn. However, I eventually decided I had already had some relaxed sleep, wondered how that had happened and figured out I had put my head in my winder sleeping bag which blocked out most sounds. So, put my head back in my sleeping bag and went back to sleep till dawn. Early up, and breakfast on a nearby picnic bench. I don't know what all the fuss was about. Well I do actually, it was a bloody stupid thing to do, so I promised myself a campsite the next night. First I had to photograph Gowy Meadows on the edge of the refinery between Runcorn and Chester. A shell suited scaly paying too much interest to my bike and camera gear meant that was a very quick photoshoot, before heading to a campsite outside Chester. A shower, a safe campsite, hot running water. How I looked forward to them. How disappointed I was to find it closed to tents for the season. As were all the rest in the vicinity! I sat slumped on a bench for half an hour. No use in that, so I got my map out and the Delamere Forest nearby looked like a likely spot to hide a tent. It wasn't perfect with lots of people about and lots of houses nearby, but it was better than the edge of the Mersey that's for sure. Wigan Flashes was next on my itinerary and I had no idea what to expect. I got off the train on Sunday morning in the centre of Wigan to a litter and vomit covered post Saturday night urban scene. Cripes. I'll say up front, that to counter this, the people of Wigan were so friendly with an amazing community spirit and on the Monday I even saw a group of schoolkids out on a litter pick. First impressions were soon proved wrong. And Wigan Flashes itself. An old brownfield site and gravel quarry, it has been managed to create a wild space that feels really wild with dense woodland, primordial looking pools full of waterfowl, heather covered heath, grassy meadows criss crossed with miles of paths that people used for walks, cycling, getting to work, fishing and even a boating lake. Right on the edge of town, it looked and felt like a success in every way, for both local people and wildlife. I look at places like that and feel nothing but respect for the initial vision to create a place like that, the hard work that went into implementing that vision and the ownership of local people who take ownership of it and prevent petty vandalism in their space. Bloody cool. And, I had a hotel room for the night. The flashes had been beautiful at sunset so I headed back first thing for another glorious sunrise with a sound track of waking birds then watched all the people on early morning dog walks then commuting to work over the reserve. Truly a Living Landscape.  Hotels are alright, but nothing beats a home cooked meal, so I headed up to Penrith to stay with my sister and her family. After living a quiet life in a tent, two young kids is quite a handful, but we had great fun playing before my sister did her very best to feed up a stick thin cyclist with plate after plate of tasty sausages and mash. And the odd beer from my brother in laws prime beer stash. And he gave me a lift down the road to Preston the next morning. Very relaxing and restful.              At Preston I was visiting the Brockholes reserve and Visitor Village. This is another place with strong vision, and the strength to make that vision a reality. Just off the M6, they aim to not only create a world class reserve in the former gravel quarry, but they have created a world class motorway services as their visitor centre. Sitting on a concrete and polystyrene pontoon in the middle of one of the lakes is their Visitor Village with beautiful buildings housing a cafe, shops and meeting/conference/wedding facilities and a carbon footprint that is one of the lowest in the UK for a visitor attraction. The reserve itself has been heavily reshaped from the gravel quarry to create wildlife friendly pools with heavily shaped (to look natural) edges to attract further species to the lake fringes. And these pools are just a short walk from the Visitor Village, so it's easy to have a quick walk after a tasty lunch in the cafe, before getting back in your car to continue up or down the M6. Not a traditional wildlife reserve at all. Not fancying a wild camp in such a rough area, I headed off into the hills to find a campsite. After a long cycle and climb through biblical thunder and hail I arrived at the Longridge campsite which was still open and even had a swimming pool. All for £6.95 a night. And promptly broke down in tears. It was all just too much. The rough wild camps, the time away from home, the enormity of the job, worrying about my wife who is left managing the house and trying to find a new job for herself. And whilst I had enjoyed my time with my sister and family, I often get by on these long trips by hardening my heart to my emotions and getting on with the job, but something as personal as seeing family broke down that wall before catapulting me straight back into my other life. It is really too much sometimes. But, calls from my wife, encouraging tweets from all my friends on Twitter, and a message from my brother in law to come and collect me again if I wanted. There is no way on this earth I could do what I am doing without the support of those around me, and I am so thankful to you all.                  The journey goes on and I moved from grim to cheerier as I moved from urban areas into the countryside of Morecambe Bay. David (from Cumbria WT) and I headed up onto the deeply folded limestone pavement of the Witherslack Hervey reserve. Wind shaped and deer nibbled stunted yew trees, a ground covering of wild juniper, views to Morecambe Bay and the Lakes. The urban reserves were deeply fascinating, but here was a place I could relax again. Despite the rain, I managed to make some delicious moody panoramas of the area. The only bad thing was having to portage my bike and trailer up (and down) a steep 500foot cliff to get onto the reserve as I didn't fancy leaving it at the bottom. I guess I was just paranoid after days in town.                  And so to the Lake District proper. Penrith first, to meet up with my lovely lady, then off to Blea Tarn south of Langdale to capture some classic Lakes photographs with a backdrop of the Langdales and golden moody autumn spotlights of light dancing over the landscape. The area around Blea Tarn is still in the early stages of management, and is more about managing and preserving what is already there, rather than the total reshaping that I saw in so many areas on this trip. I went the full gamut in every way on this trip. Reserves, conservation management, emotions, travel, places to stay, everything I saw and did was the full spectrum of possibilities. Both of my own and the work carried out by the Wildlife Trusts. Oh yea, and the last night I stayed with my parents near Penrith. 2011-11-01T11:07:26+00:00 http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-7-diary-on-moving-mountains/ http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-7-diary-on-moving-mountains/#When:09:02:16Z Wow, what a trip! Mentally I just wasn't ready for this trip, it required a huge amount of effort to resist cycling to the nearest train station and going home. I felt drained, threadbare, homesick and just overwhelmed by the enormity of the remaining number of locations still to shoot. (I won't finish till April 2012 with at least another 38 locations to shoot.) Sympathetically, The Wildlife Trusts Living Landscape schemes that I saw also had required a huge amount of effort by the trusts to complete. I had, like a lot of people, thought that conservation usually was lightweight chainsawing and habitat creation amongst other things, nothing too heavy duty. But the schemes I saw on this trip, whilst not literally moving mountains, often involved huge changes to the landscape to bring it back to a more natural state or to preserve areas against encroachment by natural succession (by woodland) or man. I began in Norfolk, near King's Lynn, at Roydon Common and Grimston Warren. The land was 70's psychedelic purple from the mass of heather over the heath. The Heath had been restored by clear felling a huge expanse of non-native trees to open up the landscape again. This work has just been completed on Grimston Warren so the land is still very bare, with just odd sprigs of heather starting to peek through the bare sandy earth. Like a lot of the places that I am visiting on this commission, the space is very much defined by it's soundscape, the places I am visiting have a distinct wilder sound, and despite proximity to a major town and numerous major roads, once you are on Roydon Common and Grimston Warren they are mostly really quiet, noticeably quiet. It was quite eery to be in sight of King's Lynn with the only sound that of pipets and curlews. After a couple of lovely days with stunning autumn temperate inversions giving lovely morning mists (and cold shivery camps for me) I headed off down to Norwich on my way to the Bure Valley. Flat countryside to cycle, but visually overwhelming travelling through the old villages, the day before the Tour of Britain passed through, it made a welcome distraction from my mounting gloom and homesickness. I stopped in the delightful Norwich to get an espresso and do some people watching, and was just about to tuck into some cake when my phone rang with a call from Ed at Norfolk WT (who had shown me round the last location) wondering if I was available for a photoshoot with the local paper. Always fun, although I can only smile for so long! With that out the way, Ed and I went for a wander round Upton Fen in the Bure Valley, in advance of my proper tour with the local warden the following day. Ed is a real keen bird lover and it was a delight to wander round the reserve with him explaining tiny details and sounds. As always, peoples keenness rubs off on me, inspires me, and I photographed till darkness, forgetting that I hadn't scoped out a wild camp spot for the night because we had been busy with the photoshoot. Slight panic! Strange countryside, consisting of either ploughed fields, houses or very boggy fen. Yes, slight panic indeed. In the end, I just waited till it was pitch dark then hopped a gate into an empty horse paddock and camped there. Less than optimal. Waking early, partly with fear of being shouted at by an early rising horsey landowner, partly with excitement to get back out onto the lovely fen to photograph, I quickly packed up and cycled over to Upton Fen. It was one of those quick cloud mornings, one minute solid grey sky, the next glorious light. My only interruption in three solid hours of photography was a dog out for a walk, who kindly put up a deer just as I was doing my sound recording, so I got a lovely recording of a deer barking in the swishy fen reeds. Thinking I had achieved quite a lot, I met up with Kevin from Norfolk Wildlife Trust who was to give me my official tour. I thought that perhaps the rest of my day might be a bit slacker. No way, we talked, I learned, we explored for another three solid hours, although my admiration was for Kevin who was not only an amazing communicator of the fen life but a keen mountaineer so we had lots to chat about. He also had a two week old baby back home that he had taken time away from to come and show me round on a Saturday. It's a joy to see people so passionate and committed to their job, and their life. Armed with another passionate point of view, I set off to make even more photographs of Upton Fen and photographed till dark again. It's such a fascinating place, with moody subtle coloured fen, through the grazing marshes out to the River Bure with it's constant train of boats and pleasure cruisers. When I had passed by early in the morning I had spotted a number of large diggers and assumed they were something to do with the Broads Authority. Which they were, but in partnership with the Wildlife Trust they were using the silt and mud from river clearance work to create new riverside wetlands that will not only form new habitat, but also help to link up wild places for wildlife to travel through. Definitely a change to see such heavy plant used for conservation work. The interesting thing to me about this, is that man is having to replace what nature would have done naturally. Especially around rivers, the land would have changed dramatically each year as rivers flooded and changed course. Those mythical oxbow lakes that we all learned about in geography, but never see in real life would have been an everyday occurrence. But with straightened rivers and other land management such as drainage, the land now exists mostly in a static state. I was a little shocked at first by the use of such heavy plant to change the land for conservation, but after thinking about things, it actually makes sense. Still a bit paradoxical though. Exhausted from such a long day, I crawled into my tent and promised myself a long lie the next day. With a lovely campsite by the river, I woke to sun on the tent, and spent the morning eating stewed 'scrumped' apples and waving to the boats going by.          Suffolk next, but having spent a few warm days cycling I was pretty sticky and grubby, so a quick detour to the beach at Gorelston (near Great Yarmouth) was in order. I was the only one in the sea that day, which was a shame because despite the cool wind, the sea was actually pretty warm having had the summer to heat up. Very pleasant indeed, always nice to be clean. It was funny being back near the Broads, prompting many memories of childhood boating holidays. And with suitably dramatic autumn rainbow showery skies to accompany my gloom. The only places I could find to camp were fen and ploughed field, so I plumped for ploughed field. Another less than optimal campsite.              It's fair to say I was pretty fed up at this point. The photography had been amazing, but apart from moments behind the camera all I really wanted to do was go home and see my wife. It felt like I had been on the road for ages and I had only photographed two locations, with another six to go. (This trip was about 16/17 days) I often just felt like crying. Don't get me wrong, I love the work and the adventure, but it is hard hard graft, one of the hardest things I have ever done in my life. As usual I was saved by the kindness of Wildlife Trust staff! After Steve from Suffolk Wildlife Trust had shown me round Carlton Marshes, and being a keen photographer himself with a lovely book just finished (A Living Landscape for Suffolk) we had chatted photography to the max, he arranged for me to spend the next few night in various visitor centres and made sure I had access to the wi-fi. This was a real bonus, warm, dry, running water, toasters and wi-fi. Little things, but so appreciated and being able to spend the evenings on Facetime with my wife made all the difference. The trip still felt long, but it was achievable now. I spent the first couple of days in Suffolk on Carlton Marshes near Lowestoft, before moving on to Sandlings Heath near Ipswich. These sites felt somewhat tame compared to some of the wilder spaces I have visited, but their proximity to major conurbations provides welcome space for lots of people to escape to as well as good quality habitat for wildlife to live and move through on their way to other places.                  Feeling calmer and refreshed after Steve's helping hand, I left Suffolk and headed down to Sussex. I met up with Mark from Sussex WT to have a tour round Ebernoe Common. I expected open heath type common, but was delighted to find it was ancient old growth grazing woodland. It's a fascinating wood with open managed (for shooting) beech woods, dark claustrophobic old growth oak woodland with magnificent stag head oaks, an old brickworks, ponds and a deep greenway from hundreds of years of people passing through, all just starting to turn to autumn greens and golds. There is also lots of hard shiny green in the form of holly which is threatening to take over vast areas of the woods, but because of the wide variety of bat species it is difficult to do much active woodland conservation work without disturbing the bats. Personally I think this is quite a difficult situation. Certainly the bats are important, but not at the expense of other species - flora or fauna. They are part of the larger jigsaw, but not the whole thing.                      Anyway, a magnificent wood, with much of the surround arable fields bought by Sussex WT and then left to see how succession happens naturally with minimal intervention by them. Interesting to compare to the approach in the Bure Valley with it's heavy plant.  I felt a bit happier then, the trip was a bit further on and a couple of scenic wild camps eased my mood. I merrily pedalled down to Lewes, fascinated by the change in countryside and society. Definitely things got a bit more liberal and arty as I approached Brighton. It all felt very relaxed, especially with the heatwave that was just starting, my mood improved by the hour. I was headed for Malling Down above Lewes. There is a lot I could probably say about Malling Down, but it was just so pretty, vast expanses of chalk down grassland surrounded by towns and a patchwork of arable fields, so I simply enjoyed the beauty of the location. Nights were cold and clear, with more autumn mists shrouding the valley and towns in the morn. Despite the lateness of the season there were still also a lot of small flowers amongst the chalk grass. Feeling pretty grubby from long hot days I retreated to the local swimming pool for a shower and a swim. We give our dog a bath sometimes and she normally emerges from this full of beans and spends ages tearing about, obviously delighted to be clean. I felt like that, after a week of dried on sweaty glaze, it was sheer delight to have clean fresh skin. I hope the swimming pool was OK. A bit of shopping in Lewes's lovely shops for a pressie for my lady completed an idyllic couple of days. Onto my last leg in Kent, I headed up to Maidstone which was a bit of a shock after the peaceful south coast. I met up with Allison and Steve from Kent Wildlife Trust and we went for a tour round Holborough Marshes with it's industrial borders then onto Queendown Warren. It's interesting to see such natural areas squeezed into very urban areas. I could have wondered before starting this commission how valuable areas like this are to nature, but having spent months working and living (camping) in areas like this I know from what I have seen and heard just how vibrant and alive they are. I spent the next day photographing a group of Kent WT volunteers as they cut and cleared scrub to keep the chalk grassland open. Hard, prickly work, especially in the 30degree heat! However, wild camping was not on the cards here. No way. Too many stories of Kent wide boys in Range Rovers with sawn offs! We toured round a couple of campsite, only to find they no longer accommodated tents, so Allison kindly agreed to let me stay at her house. I do feel privileged constantly on this job by the kindness of people. We arrived at her house to be met by her neighbour whose chicken had fly-strike. Sadly there was nothing to be done for it, and no of the others knew how to 'dispatch' a chicken so it was down to farmer boy here to wring it's neck. It just felt a little surreal. Anyway, nice to have a comfy night in luxury. I was heading down to Dover the following day and hoped to find a lovely wildcamp above Canterbury to watch the morning sunrise, but ended up in some woodland as night fell. At least it was quiet, and the dog walkers curious but friendly. I arrived in Dover the next day after following the cycle route from hell (for the record I hate cycle routes as they wander around all over the place) and headed to a hotel for my final night. Seems like I did OK for accommodation on this trip doesn't it? The final shoot was at Dover Castle. Kent WT is working with English Heritage on a prototype grazing scheme. The moat and much of the grounds of the castle has been maintained by man and machine power, but the cost of this is becoming prohibitive. Notionally some of the areas could be left to nature, but the risk to the castle foundations by new trees could not be ignored. So a small number of sheep are going to be used to graze the moat. Low carbon, low cost maintenance. Surely a Good Thing™?                              I have to admit at this point, on my last day, after all the deep gloom I was sad to be heading home. Ecstatic to be seeing my wife for sure, but it had been a real adventure with a deep sense of satisfaction that I had completed it. I had been transfixed by the stories and work of the various Wildlife Trusts and shown real kindness by their staff who were all so excited to be part of this project, and thoughtfully did all they could to help me. And I enjoyed seeing the breadth of work they were undertaking. Everything from heavy machinery earthworks, to traditionally grazed woodland, through manpower land clearance to innovative (in a way for our times but obviously traditional) low carbon land 'maintenance' schemes. Truly fascinating.  But it was great to get home for a hug:) 2011-11-01T09:02:16+00:00 http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-6-diary-time-to-relax/ http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-6-diary-time-to-relax/#When:13:02:10Z After the craziness of mucho, or is that macho, cycling in Wales and the South West of England, this trip was a relative holiday. Hardly any cycling as the locations were close together, or so far apart that I was on public transport. And as we go into autumn the days are shorter so I can lie in till 05:30 and still be up and about with a camera for sunrise! And autumn it definitely is. The days were cooler and the landscape has started to change. Leaves yellowing, wildlife quieter, light more golden, heather blooming. I began this trip at Ash Ranges, east of Aldershot. The ranges are only open to the public two weeks in the year and people were making full use of that access. Walking, cycling, exercising dogs, watching the view, it was a steady stream of people passing through and enjoying the vibrant purple heather that covers much of the heathland. The short period of open access also makes the work of the Surrey Wildlife Trust difficult as they have to fit all their conservation work, such as scrub and bracken clearance, into that two weeks, often requiring the use of heavy machinery and aircraft to get everything done. Busy busy. I managed to find myself a quiet out of the way spot to wild camp and spent a couple of days photographing, watching the light dance over the landscape, being sung to sleep by a nearby nightjar and marvelling at the fact that all this was within naked eye viewing distance of The London Eye, The Gherkin, Canary Wharf and various other landmarks in central London. The next location at Caesar's Camp was just a few miles away on the west side of Aldershot and in sight of Farnborough Airfield. This military range is open to the public year round making the conservation work and public use of the area very different from the Ash Ranges. The range is used by the military for non-live round training. It felt a lot more urban too, houses were visible all around, and there were lots of people out. Even at 3am there was a steady stream of people making their way home across the range from the pub. That was a bit un-nerving as I thought my wild camp was out of the way in a quiet spot. And I woke one morning to find another tent not so far away with others in who had come to enjoy the countryside, as well as maybe the odd beer.  Sadly there were no grazing cows to see as a recent case of lead poisoning has meant they have had to be removed from the land till the source is discovered. The grazing cows which serve as scrub control (and income for local graziers) were a topic of conversation that came up often with trust staff. Local communities are often resistant to their introduction into 'wild' locations, often because people are nervous around such large animals. However once communities have been convinced by conservationists of the benefits they come to realise that the cows are normally pretty placid, and often phone the trust to ask where the cows are when they are removed. Many parents like to take their children on a day out to see the cows.  After five days away I finally got a chance to ride my bike further than the local coffee shop for lunch! I headed down from Aldershot to Portsmouth, often getting lost and punctures at bad times, to catch the passenger ferry over to the Isle of Wight. And arrived arrived on the Isle on a bank holiday. Bloody horrible. Loads of people, scooters all over the place, heaving beer gardens, not my cup of tea at all, so I pedalled as fast as I could out onto the quieter downs chalk ridge that runs from Newport to Culver. Like most islands land is at a premium and it is often intensively farmed so areas of un-improved grassland like the downs that run down this ridge are important, and visually really stand out making for great photographic potential. Delightfully, maybe due to the mild climate, there were still a lot of flowers in bloom on the ridge and in the meadows alongs it's edges. It's a thriving island. I enjoyed watching all the different people going by when I went down to Newport for a coffee, and one night I decided to make a nighttime panorama hoping to shape the stars into a star trail, but there was as much light trails from cars and passing ships as stars. Busy busy!  Feeling a bit cooped up from lack of cycling and wanting to see some of the Isle before I left I set off on a mini tour to find some hills and so stretch my legs out a bit. That was all going well, with various odd little villages full of collectibles shops, till I got carried away on a fast twisty road descent and rolled my trailer at 20-25mph. It was pretty scary for a few seconds with the trailer weaving around like a giant pendulum behind till friction slowed us down. There's not much I could do, just keep pedalling and let instinct keep the bike upright whilst I contemplated how rough the road was and how much the gravel rash was going to be a problem in a tent! Luckily, bizarrely, the bike stayed upright, the only damage was to my adrenal gland and slight abrasion of my TNF duffel. Those duffels are built to take a pounding. The next jump was up to Belfast, so it was ferry back to Portsmouth, train to Liverpool Lime Street, cycle to Birkenhead via one of the Mersey Tunnels (after convincing the police who monitor the tunnel to let me ride it a few minutes early) then onto the ferry to Belfast. It was good riding the 'hyper tunnel', something I've always wanted to do, and I emerged into an apocalyptic sunset over Liverpool. Very cool. The ferry to Belfast was slightly less salubrious than the ones I am used to taking to Shetland, but more of a problem was a lack of 3 pin power sockets which I was desperate for, and had been relying on, to charge my phone and spare batteries. Having not been cycling much it had been difficult to use the bike dynamo to charge them. Eventually I found some adaptors in the ships shop, so managed to get some things charged. It was exciting to land in Belfast first thing as the city came to life. After having to get off the ship at 06:30, I found an early opening coffee shop and had some breakfast. Apparently the coffee wasn't strong enough as I wandered off round central Belfast for 40minutes after locking my bike up, but leaving my camera bag just sat on top of my trailer. I only realised when I was shambling back to my bike and wondered what had been left on my trailer! Lucky. Andrew from Ulster Wildlife Trust picked me up soon after and we had a brief tour round some of Belfast's more 'historic' areas before heading up into the Belfast Hills to the Slievenacloy Reserve. Like a lot of Irishmen, Andrew had a lot to say, about conservation and life in general, and it was great to wander round the reserve having everything described in wonderful detail and just to gab away, good craic. It's not a large reserve, but with the grasses and reeds starting to change colour, the mystical faeriethorns and all the devils bit scabious in bloom it is definitely a pretty one. I was allowed to camp in one corner of the reserve and Andrew said that he would probably get numerous calls during the next day to report someone camping. Which he did. I thought it was great that people cared enough about the areas around them to look after them.      After a couple of days I headed back into Belfast to meet up with Andrew again. I took my own tour round, going down the Shankhill Road to see all the murals, and went to look at the Peace Wall. How different it must have been 10, 20, 30 years ago. Although looking through one of the local papers there are still some tensions, some troubles, but thankfully so much less than they were. We drove up to the Umbra reserve, near Downhill on the north coast, with me feeling only slightly guilty about not cycling. I was still pretty tired from the previous trip through Wales, so not that guilty. The Umbra reserve is part of the Magellan Dune system and is formed of embryonic dunes through to stabilised dunes covered in a wide variety of grasses, grass of parnassus, roses, devils bit scabious, waxed cap mushrooms and a very out of place conifer plantation. After so much time inland I was excited as a landscape photographer to be out on the coast. The every changing landscape, the waves, clearer light all make it pretty exciting and so I practically burst out of my tent the next morning to catch the inky then brilliant sunrise. As the day progressed the beach backdrop filled up with people enjoying the beach, and my camera memory card filled up with panoramas and detail shots of these unique dunes.              After finishing all my Wildlife Trust work I wanted to visit the Giant's Causeway before heading south to Belfast the next day, so I hot footed it the fifteen miles east and arrived to the expected scene of tourists and landscape photographers all over the causeway. I was pretty happy just to look, and with so many people/photographers and a grey dusk there was no chance of any landscape photography for me. So I scoped out some locations for the morning before finding a stunning campsite down by the sea and went to sleep with the sound of the sea in my ears. A call of nature at 2am brought the revelation that the sky was now clear and millions of stars were blazing down, so grabbing my camera gear and all my warm clothes I set off to make a star lit panorama of the Giant's Causeway. It took over an hour and a half to make all the exposures and the cloud drifted in and out in this time creating a sense of movement through the skies echoed by the sea. Grinning inanely I went back to my tent for two hours sleep before sunrise. Hmmm, clear skies, no photographers! From last nights plethora of tripods, now there was no one. Possibly they knew the cloud was going to drift in at just the wrong time, so I headed up onto the cliff trail that contours round the middle of the cliffs onto a spur of rock I had spotted the night before. Nearly an hour after sunrise the sun appeared lighting up the cliffs and the causeway, onto which one or two photographers had now appeared. Lazy bones! I made a really good panorama of the cliffs and causeway from above, before heading down to my tent to pack up and ride down to Belfast.              The ride did not go well. I had intended to ride down the coast to soak it all up, but the roads became rough and made of treacle, and a vicious coastal headwind sprang up that just sapped all my strength. After about 50miles as the rain really got going I had a bit of a tantrum and got on the phone to my lovely wife to find out where the nearest station was, the time of the next train, and just in case I really cracked, phone numbers for local taxi companies! I managed to make it to Ballymena station where I sat on the platform shivering for a couple of hours and making my dinner of noodles. I'm sure I looked like a proper hobo, filthy, tanned, ripped gear and hunched over my little stove. And people still came to talk to me! The Irish certainly are a friendly bunch. So to the overnight ferry and back to Liverpool, to catch the ferry across the Mersey and home. All possible cliches complete and accounted for! 2011-09-21T13:02:10+00:00 http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/exploring-the-construction-of-virtual-tours/ http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/exploring-the-construction-of-virtual-tours/#When:11:58:19Z My year long comission for The Royal Society of Wildlife Trusts producing virtual tours for their Living Landscape scheme is really allowing me to explore the medium of virtual tours. Find out how I produce my virtual tours in this new article. 2011-08-27T11:58:19+00:00 http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-5-diary-on-synergy-and-pain/ http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-5-diary-on-synergy-and-pain/#When:14:35:18Z With only a little hindsight, this has been my hardest trip to date for The Wildlife Trusts. I set off with starry eyes - Wales, Dorset, Devon, Cornwall. Lovely places with lots of photographic potential, lots of wild places for the herbs and beasties, and a plan to make as much personal photography as possible in all my spare time once I had finished my commissioned work. Best laid plans! The weather was less than useful. A lot of the reserves and Living Landscape project areas were in that summer in-between stages which made photographing them really challenging. And the cycling route was, essentially, long and torturous which left me little time and energy and very homesick once I had finished the commissioned work. That's all OK, despite the pain in my legs and the weather, I saw some really forward facing landscape scale Living Landscape areas, met some really motivated and inspirational Wildlife Trust staff and made some gorgeous photographs amidst the moody gloom. All against the backdrop of some of England and Wales most classically stunning scenery. The trip started on Anglesey. Having been a climber for many years I was looking forward to revisiting North Wales and Anglesey with their luminous white limestone cliffs in one area contrasting with the storm cloud grey slate valleys. It's dramatic countryside, although somewhat gentler in profile on Anglesey. I was excited by the cycling, and really keen to meet the Wildlife Trust staff to find out about the conservation aspect of Wales. Wales is also a great example of working Living Landscapes. In areas like Yorkshire that are more affluent it is easier to see how farmers can make the necessary changes in their farming to accommodate conservation measures. But Wales is very different with an ageing farming community working in a very marginal existence. I was intrigued to see how the farmers coped and how The Wildlife Trust staff effect the necessary changes by working with the farming community. Cors Goch on the east side of Anglesey is a plethora of habitats in a tiny concentrated area. It's almost bewildering. Fen, heath, an island, farmland, communities all crammed into a tiny shallow valley. Tiny as in about 1.5x1miles. Jon, the reserve warden, took me round this area explaining all the different habitat management methods that are required for such a varied area, before providing me with fresh eggs for my dinner. Despite the grey looming sky, a good start. Not so good photographically though. I try my best for all clients, try to make great photography that reflects their needs and makes them look great, but when the client is like Jon, super kind and passionate then I feel real disappointment when I can't make photography that is the best it can be. Landscape photography is like that, we have to work with the weather, and often it defeats us. I can dream of moody mists over the fens with low golden light sweeping through the reeds, firing the heather into a psychedelic blaze, but if it's grey, it's grey. And it was. I would like to have done better. I got some nice grazing horses in though! And so the cycling began. I could perhaps have been a little more careful in measuring miles between locations rather than just roughly gauging them on the 1:250 000 scale map. Turns out my first ride was 90miles through North Wales. That's 90miles of twisty, rough and exceptionally long steep hilly roads. My legs span, my mouth was constantly chewing calories or muttering curses about routes, my mind was a tableaux of mountainous imagery. Up Llanberris to a lovely wild camp overlooking the cloud shrouded mountains, then an early start to carry on through bleak mountains then round some flat golden coastline to mid Wales which I thought would be flatter having lower hills. The hills are lower, and also steeper! The final climb was 2000feet over 4miles which after 86miles had me on my knees, literally. Guardian angel Liz from Wales WT came down the hill for the last steep mile in her 4x4 to shovel what was left of me into the back and drive me up to Glaslyn in the Pumlumon Living Landscape project area. Maybe it was because she was Canadian, maybe it was the subject, but Liz could really talk. She told a fascinating story about the area and the work that the Wildlife Trust were doing with local landowners and communities. I was so sorry to have been late as it meant I missed time listening to her. The thing about Glaslyn is that it isn't that exciting on the surface. I'm a photographer and definite member of the 'it must looking exciting to have value' generation and a plain looking reserve like Glaslyn on first glance would do nothing for me. But as Liz explained it became apparent it was a perfect example of a Living Landscape. There isn't much headline nature here. The lake is relatively barren due to it's acidic nature and low nutrient levels. It's mostly sheep and cattle grazing with lots of heather moorland. But it's wild. A place that through improvement working with local landowners is improving the water quality of water flowing into lower water tables and locking in carbon. The quiet wildness hold immense economic and tourism value. Despite the continuing gloom there was a steady stream of walkers, cyclists and people just out relaxing in the quiet. We really need places like this. As a society and as part of the ecosystem they are critical to our survival and happiness.    I wild camped up there for two nights through a variety of weather moods. Misty, sunny, red skies, grey skies, blue skies, never ending rain skies. The quiet beauty really sank in and despite whooping with glee at the long downhill back down I was sad to go. Only about 60miles to my next location, but 60 long steep miles. Rough roads and cycling always into the prevailing wind was equally exhausting as the hills. I was really starting to suffer! Wales has a habit of surprising me, and as I cycled into Powys with it's pastoral hillsides I thought I knew what to expect from the next location, Cwm Marteg. But as I turned off the A470 it changed into a lost valley like place. Gone were the smooth billiard green hills, replaced by rough scrub, woodland and heath with the odd burial chamber and a deep river valley coursing through the bottom. It's even got a lovely tea shop! I'm not the only one surprised. Despite it's proximity to a major road and large towns, they only get about 30 visitors a day, on a busy day. So if you want to go somewhere quiet and unexplored in mid Wales then try Cwm Marteg. Zipping up A roads, single track roads and rough farm roads all at warp speed in a little old Peugeot I was given a tour by Daryll from Radnorshire WT. Her official title involves the words 'un-charismatic species' so she is responsible for things like lichens and mosses as well as cute ones like water voles. The water voles there seem a little crazy too. Quite un-characteristically they are to be found as often on the higher moors as in the lower watercourses and ponds, despite the Trusts best efforts to create new ponds for them near the river. Maybe they are staying out the way of the numerous circling keening red kites that fill the lower valley! As ever I was made so welcome by Wildlife Trust staff and given a place to stay in the visitor centre rather than camp out with the evening midges. Brilliant. Hot water, mains power and a wi-fi connection. I'm not proud, lifts up hills and wi-fi are great with me on a long trip. The weather was still not desperately useful. I was super keen to be down in the deep river valley at first light to make some atmospheric shots of the river, but the only atmosphere was heavy rain! Anyway, thanks to Pip and Viv for a warm dry bug-free place to stay.      I normally have a days travel, then a days photography. But my friendly client had slipped in another location with no travel day! I swear she is trying to kill me! Only another 60 hilly miles to the next stop. Those of you following my tweets will know that I was getting a bit thin by this point. Mentally and physically. I can't complain, it's a dream commission and each location is so different from the last I am inexorably pulled on. I was a bit late again, I hate being late to appointments, due to another steep finishing hill to be met by a smiling Ben from Brecknockshire Wildlife Trust and team of bracken clearing volunteers on the Alt Rhongur reserve. "Oh, we passed you in the cars on the way here, thought you would be about an hour!" Spot on, but a lift would have been ok too! Alt Rhongur is a quite a recently acquired area and the Trust are currently seeking funds to help improve it if you have any spare doobs to donate. It's not a large reserve, but with stunning views out towards Swansea and a bettony strewn twisted hawthorn hillsides it is very pretty, which was helped muchly by the sun coming out at just the right time when I was making photographs. It was great to see the volunteers at work. Bracken clearing was obviously hard work, but when the results of clearing the bracken are so obvious in the nearby flowery hillsides it was easy to see why they were so motivated.           After a cheery farewell from them all I set off towards Swansea to catch a train out towards Cardigan. It was great to get a bit of a rest on the train, although the train doesn't go all the way to Cardigan, so I would have a bit of a pedal to finish, about 30miles or so. I got off the train quite late and set off towards a likely campsite on the moors over Cardigan bay. Up, up then some more up, I hoped the campsite would be worth the effort. Right at the top of the hills a bridleway appeared, looking good so far, so I followed it, into a bog, at the top of a steep hill! No idea how that works, but as it was now dark and the midges were vicious I just had to make the best of it. I woke the next morning to grey clouds. Grey clouds of midges that is, the sun was shining beyond them. I packed up quick without brekkie and set off for Cardigan for a midge free breakfast in a cafe. After some confusion over campsites I found a lovely little site on the coast, family oriented so quiet, and with showers and a washing machine. Simple things make all the difference on long trips. A washing machine and clean clothes are a luxury. The Teifi Gateway Living Landscape is very much based on the community in lovely Cardigan, rather than farming based like other schemes. With a showcase family friendly visitor centre and reserve and easy access to the Pembroke coastline there is a lot of potential here to preserve, educate and link natural areas for wildlife movement.              With clean clothes and a clean body I set off back over the hills to catch the train. I was exhausted by now, there was literally nothing left of me, although my legs kept going round. They do that. They always do. Oddly tweeting kept me sane. One thing about long distance touring is the loneliness. Sometimes it is great to have someone to commiserate with or let off steam. Just me, so I let some angst out on Twitter. Thanks for all your support, it really meant a lot, keeping me sane. The next morning there was an email from my client at the Wildlife Trusts too, telling me to get on a train and rest or else!  Maybe she isn't trying to kill me. Also appreciated, it's so much fun to have a client who I really get on with. The train down to Exeter was pretty good, although I did feel a little guilty, just a little. Next up was Dorset's Pastures New near Axminster. Gently rolling countryside, traditional small green fields and farming practices in many places. Lovely pink morning skies and golden light to highlight all the small field patterns with a super relaxed tour with Nick from Dorset Wildlife Trust. We basically sat on the hillside for a couple of hours talking and enjoying the views. Despite his really relaxed demeanour his knowledge and love for the area was in abundance and he really understood the needs of local communities and farmers as part of the conservation effort. The machinery pool was one idea that stuck in my head. Local farmers who are interested in conservation work can borrow machinery from the pool to help them improve their land to the benefit of both them and nature. It is just a really practical service to offer. With an ageing farming population living a very marginal existence it is measures like this that keep them afloat rather than having to sell their land to larger landowners who will in many cases want to maximise their yields which is done by pulling out all the hedges and ditches to form larger mono-cultural fields which significantly reduces bio-diversity and reduces the natural links for wildlife between wild areas. Still feeling tired I got the train the 30miles to Exeter to a top of the world photoshoot. Well, the top of Exeter Cathedral anyway. I arrived in the evening just as the sun came out and I was super excited about a nice sunset over Exeter then some night shots as the light dimmed. Up the long long spiral staircase we went and through the Norman slit windows I could see the clouds returning. I wanted to rush up the rest of the stairs to catch it, but tired legs and the virger who was so proud of the cathedral and wanted to explain everything we saw slowed things down. Emerging finally onto the top, the rain started, the wind picked up, the light faded. I love those kind of conditions for photography. The sun can burst through suddenly like a searchlight, the stormy clouds are glorious shades of grey, yellow, purple, green. The air so clear from the rain with a million twinkly lights in the town below. Making 360x180 panoramic photographs in the rain and wind with low light levels creating long exposures and rapidly changing light as you pan the camera round is not so easy. In fact it is nearly impossible. But, you know, I'm ok with a camera so I managed. I made a selection of stormy moody shots including one as the rain poured down softening the view and making the wet rooftops all glisten. Rather pleasingly it was that one picked as the keeper shot by the Trust. The next day day was a trip up the old Debenhams building which is presently being renovated. I could have gone up the internal stairs but there is a low risk of asbestos, so I opted for the external route up 15 flights of scaffolding! Fun stuff in the sun, the Health and Safety officer accompanying me was aghast at some of the places I wanted to photograph from at the top, but we managed to agree some good locations so all was well. A quick trip back to the cathedral in the still sunny afternoon gave me a spectrum of life in Exeter Wild City! A massive thanks to Emily from Devon Wildlife Trust for taking the time to organise such fab locations. After a couple of sedentary days including a hotel I was ready to be on the move and back in my tent, although I missed the coffee and cakes. Up on the NW corner of Devon is a small area of old culm grassland. It's a bit like Pumlumon, it's not obvious why it matters, it takes a bit of getting your head around and a bit of background knowledge to understand. Understanding this, Mark from Devon Wildlife Trust brought along Les, one of the commoners who farms the land. Commons can be very difficult areas to manage with so many vested interests from the landowner, the commoners, legislation, subsidies and conservation. It seems like a real juggling act. But through sensible and passionate organisation by the commoners they manage to graze the land profitably and preserve it's wild and rare nature. And so into Cornwall with it's stunning coast which made for some lovely wild camps once the surfing and sun worshipping hordes had departed for the night. I was still pretty tired at this point, but from Bude in Devon it is pretty hard to get trains or buses down to Truro that don't take all day. If it is going to take all day I may as well ride it, but it was 60miles on a busy A road which was mentally tiring but I appreciated the wide and slow overtaking from all the considerate motorists out there. As for some large van and wagon drivers, you know which ones you are, cyclists are fragile and break easily, please pass wide and slow to avoid us being smeared down the side of your vehicle!                  Now maybe I was thinking in stereotypes, but I thought Cornwall was meant to be sunny and warm. So what was with the heavy mist and rain that I encountered on Penwith? Normal apparently for Penwith! I met Liz from Cornwall Wildlife Trust at their HQ (a cluster of houses in a reserve kindly donated by someone in their will) and with my usual tact along the lines off "Hi, lovely to meet you, have you got a shower in here I can use?. Liz took it in good grace, probably because we had a long drive to do together and being stuck in a car with a stinky cyclist probably didn't appeal! We toured around the Penwith area, with Liz alternately pointing out conservation areas and likely looking teashops. Due to the rain I didn't get to visit any of the teashops, but I did enjoy the wild spaces. Waist high heather and gorse was in full bloom on the heaths and looked stunning in the soft misty light, although with many adders around I was reluctant to explore too far. With a mix of people (locals, holiday makers, incomers and farmers) the subject of land management can get very contentious, very quickly. Change happens slowly, sometimes not at all, sometimes very successfully. Wild Penwith really highlighted the balance that is required to juggle the needs of local communities, our need to grow food and our need to protect nature and links between wild areas.                       We all want so much from the land, with many seemingly conflicting needs, that it is hard to see how we can satisfy all. Often we can't. But when people are flexible, when passionate organisations like The Wildlife Trust work with with passionate communities and forward thinking landowners then the results are a real synergy. I saw so much of that on this trip, so many different areas, often not that exciting visually, but all so important and when managed well the results are obvious and of benefit to all. 2011-08-25T14:35:18+00:00 http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-4-diary-on-heat-bugs-and-colour/ http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-4-diary-on-heat-bugs-and-colour/#When:13:17:53Z Normally the summer fills landscape photographers like myself with dread. Biting bugs or midges make waiting around for the light hell. Early sunrise and late sunset mean there is a lot of waiting around, being eaten. Really hot days which are no fun laden down with tonnes of camera gear as you sweat up a hill. And to top it all off, summer in the UK is a period of constant green. Not highlights and shades of green, just UK summertime green. Personally, from May to August, I never normally leave the house except to buy food or visit camera shops! I was going to be wrong on one of these points as it turned out, but sadly only one! Trip 4 for The Wildlife Trusts was also a very unusual mix, starting in Hertfordshire, going down into London, before heading up to the Fens, back down to Bedfordshire, then up the road again to Coventry and then finish close to home with a couple of locations in County Durham. I was intrigued as to how I would fare photographically and personally on this trip. I like Hertfordshire. I used to live on the Herts/Essex border and I look back on my time there with fondness. There is always something going on, and the people are lively and friendly, so I was looking forward to returning for a few days with three locations to shoot. I arrived late so had to quickly find a wild camp in the dark near Stevenage. I ended up on a farm track off a B road. As is so often the way with rushed night pitches I woke to find I was only a few metres from a soft pretty meadow which would have been so much more lovely for a campsite. Hey ho.  I met up with Tim from Herts & Middlesex Wildlife Trusts who was going to show me round a number of their Living Landscapes with the choice being mine which I would shoot over the next three days. Too bloody enthusiastic by far was Tim. I was meant to shoot three locations, he showed me seven and made them all sound amazing, so I shot four. Too bloody enthusiastic by far was Mike. I remembered Essex and Herts as being very built up with some trees, but very few genuinely green spaces. I used to look at the map and despair before getting in the car and pointing it towards the Peak District for the weekend. Exploring by bike and getting a guided tour opened up many new green places. If you want to get a jump on these yourself, have a look at your local Wildlife Trust website and they will list many local reserves. Or go explore by foot or pedal like I did. I managed to wild camp too, not on reserves, without too much problem so there is plenty of green to find. I met up with some old friends for lunch, and met plenty creepy crawlies. One of the reserves, Balls Wood is managed to provide wide rides (tracks) which amongst other things are good for slow worms and grass snakes, of which I saw plenty. They were OK,  but one woodland camp infested my tent with earwigs which I was plagued with for the rest of the trip including some horrendous bites that started to go septic with poor camp hygiene. I also thought I had a tick on my neck, so had to accost a man walking his dog in the woods to have a look at my neck to see if it was a tick. All very shady. Just to complete the random horror show the weather managed to produce hail stones one day, in June. The sunny rides are also great for butterflies which I enjoyed a lot. The heat was a real problem for me. I was drinking 6-8 litres of water a day and eating lots of sodium and potassium rich foods, but it was just too bloody hot. Fortunately Tim provided me with two cooling locations. The first was the Mimram chalk stream near Tewinbury, which typically for chalk stream with clear water and white gravel beds is very striking and very good for a cooling paddle. In the name of my art after all. Just to repent, I got up at 1:30 in the morning and went back to the stream to make a night time panorama which involved me standing in the now chilly stream for an hour due to the long exposures. My feet were still cold the next morning! I visited Broadwater Lake, an old gravel pit, on the edge of London where we tried to make a panorama from a boat which was a hilarious failure. We made do with photographing from an island, then took a lovely swim in the lake to cool down. I still can't believe I am getting paid to do this job! I am working hard, honest. It's just very enjoyable with so many interesting places, and I am adoring making virtual tours. Starting with the constructed image of the 360x180°, then recording sounds and making supplementary photography that is embedded into the tour, it's a real pleasure to build up the image and story in layers.      The heat was a problem for my bike with puncture repair patches regularly popping off as the rubber glue softened. Really scary as when this happens the tyre will go straight down. A bit like me in the heat, I get pretty deflated, so a week in as I headed down to London proper, I thought a campsite with showers would be just the thing. The showers were brilliant, I would have paid any amount for them, and the hot soapy water did wonders for my now yellow and red infected bites. It was all brilliant until I put my clean t shirt on which resulted in my back immediately getting bitten all over as the t-shirt was full of earwigs from the tent infestation! Not happy, at all. I spent the next few nights on campsites as I was photographing Crane Park Island (London's favourite park in a recent competition initiated by Boris Johnson) and really couldn't figure out the concept of wild camping in London. Plenty green, I was just scared. It is always interesting exploring London's parks, they are such a reflection of the society and people there. With all the parakeets adding colour and sound it's quite an exotic experience for a Northern lad like me! Packing up on my last night with no photography made of any real use due to the deep haze I was pretty annoyed. I hate it when a job goes wrong. I decided to make up for my disappointment by riding into central London the next day to catch a train north, I thought a ride in the London rush hour would be simply zingy. The tent was very brightly lit when I woke the next morning. The sun was out and my route into London was very close to Crane Park Island, so I made a quick detour for some photography which turned out just right. Then girded my loins and piloted Birdy and trailer through the honking cars, buses and taxis to get to Kings Cross. Very, good, fun.          I caught the train up to Huntingdon (only sixty miles but I was feeling like I needed a rest) and then proceeded to ride out into a sea of colour as I headed for the Great Fen. Gently rolling countryside covered in yellow, ochre, orange, a million shades of green, lovely blue tones, greys, reds. The Fens was a delight to my eyes and a real antidote to the flat green of summer in so many places. And mysterious. Morning fogs full of howls, grunts and barks. Deeply cut paths through the fen reed beds obscure wider views. And the Great Fen is also one of the homes of conservation in the UK, as it was here, under the guiding hand of one of the Rothschild family that the first Wildlife Trust was formed. I could quite happily have explored the area by myself for days, but Lorna from BCNP Wildlife Trust took me on a tour which added depth and character to the area. The scope of their vision for the area is outstanding. It can never be returned to how it was with meandering rivers and what was the biggest inland lake in Europe due to the pressures of farming, heavily controlled rivers and shrunken peat beds. However the Trust is buying up large areas of farmland that will be restored to wetlands, reed beds and other natural landscape features bringing a safe haven for wildlife to live and to travel through to other areas as well as bringing in tourism and the businesses that support that. It's a beautiful landscape and a beautiful well thought out vision that I hope goes well. As it was I greatly enjoyed photographing there and would have loved a few more days in the mists and soft pastel tones.           Having travelled north on the train, it was time to get back on my bike and ride south again to Totternhoe near Luton to visit an old chalk quarry. It was a lovely ride through classic English villages with thatched cottages galore and with me fuelled by apple pies to satisfy a craving I had for apples. They are great cycling fuel. I do love sugar. Right on the edge of Dunstable the chalk quarry is a mix of nature reserve and arable farmland with views over the Chilterns past the Whipsnade White Lion (a chalk figure on the hill like a white horse) and out over Bedfordshire. Very pretty English pastoral countryside. The quarry was delightful with it's bright butterflies, colourful flowers including lots of poppies and the striking white chalk cliffs which glowed in the evening light. The area is crisscrossed by greenlanes and paths so many people venture out of Dunstable by foot, bike, horse and motorbike to enjoy the peace and quiet of the quarry bowl. Not so quiet when the bikes are there or the glider tug planes from the nearby airfield, but the rest of the time it is very sheltered and peaceful. I also managed to find a delightful campsite with panoramic views of the Chilterns. It was right on the edge of a greenlane, so quite a few dog walkers, and a troop of Scouts, went past my quiet little spot which led to some interesting conversations to go with the view. It's always great to chat to people when they are passionate about an area, and they were definitely passionate and thankful to have a stunning green area like Totternhoe Quarry next to town.              The delights of such a stunning campsite made my next nights camping all the harder. I travelled up to Coventry and scooped out the locations for the next days shot, then tried to find a good wild camp spot on the edge of Coventry. Distinctly hampered by a torn rear tyre which meant I couldn't cycle far or fast, it took me just over three hours to find a decent spot to pitch my tent. It's all posh houses and horse paddocks for miles and I couldn't imagine any of the landowners being that happy if they had found me on their land. The first spot I tried was on the edge of an oilseed rape field but it was just too muggy and buggy to stop. Eventually, on the margin of an estate I found a little field where I was out of the way and could pitch up.  At 10:30 at night it was a real effort to make and eat a meal, but missing a meal is just not a good idea for me. The locations around Coventry were a real challenge photographically. Warwickshire Wildlife Trust had picked locations that were right on the urban fringe, and they are not too pretty if I am being honest. But they were fascinating to explore when I looked under the surface. Lovely butterflies, some amazing tunnel web spiders and a wide variety of people using the spaces. Sophie, from Warwickshire WT, and I herded some grazing cows into one of the scenes so we could show how the grazing cattle keep the meadows clear of scrub and thatched grasses. And I found another spot five metres up a partly fallen over tree which gave a great aerial view of the alder woodland (planted when the area needed alder wood for clog making.) Making a 360x180° panorama up a narrow tree was challenging and dirty work, but the result when I stitched it was worth the effort. Good fun.              With a torn tyre, itchy septic insect bites and no desire to spend another night trying to camp around Coventry I decided it was time to head for home. I had two more locations to shoot in County Durham, but they are close to home. The first location is about ten miles from my home, ironic that I had to take my wife's car to get there with my Birdy bike out of action! Nestled on the edge of the Pennines, near Tow Law, Hedleyhope Living Landscape is typical of this area with broad flat hill tops and deep valleys. It is easy to see why cattle rustlers and illegal alcohol still owners found the area so appealing, lots of hiding spaces in the deep heavily scrubbed valleys. It's typical moorland, covered in heather, but I was a few weeks too early for any real colour. The second location was Blackhall Rocks on the coast near Peterlee. If I had been lacking colour in previous locations, then Blackhall Rocks provided colour in abundance to make up for any all all shortages. Moody coastal weather shot shafts of hard and soft light all over the multi-toned grasslands, the dene (little river valleys) sides were covered in bright purple mallow flowers and then there are the beaches. The beaches on much of the Co Durham coast were used to dump waste from the undersea coal mining and they have artefacts and colour palette all of their own. There is every colour and hue under the sun to be found in some bays. And a smell! But with time, many of the bays have been cleared up by the sea, and some hard work on the part of locals and various keen volunteers, to restore some of the most beautiful beaches in the UK. With steep white limestone cliffs bordering the bays, deep sand, very few people and a crashing sea soundtrack the area is an assault on the senses. I think there is something for everyone here. Photographers, artists, dog walkers, sun worshippers, families, all can find a bit of beach for themselves. This trip was certainly a mixed bag, challenging and interesting in equal measure. My next trip takes me down through Wales, Devon and Cornwall which are all very rural. The contrast between this last trip which was strongly centred around urban fringe areas and the upcoming trip certainly present an interesting contrast to the photographer in me. And they will also contrast and highlight the broad scope of The Wildlife Trusts Living Landscape scheme. Interesting times. 2011-07-13T13:17:53+00:00 http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-3-diary-a-journey-of-hope/ http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/trip-3-diary-a-journey-of-hope/#When:15:09:26Z It seems to have been a really busy week at home after trip 3 and I've not had a chance to write a blog diary. So I'm sat on the train on my next trip trying to pull something coherent together. It seemed like a long trip, not in a bad way, but in terms of volume of experience and variety of locations visited. I travelled so much of the UK, lots by bike, yet, for some reason I have few words for it. But what I do know is it was a journey of hope discovery. I remember feeling a bit down on my first trip, so much of our wild places has been shaped by man, basically all of it, that it seemed we had no real nature left. This mixed, badly, with my pessimism about the future. Through this last trip, I found a bit of hope for the future. Not just in the Wildlife Trust reserves and staff, but in other places and from other people.  Starting in Gwent in Wales, a country I love, was looking like a good start, but as I travelled on the train through Hereford and on into Wales the weather was very rainy. Then on the first day the Alfine Hub gear on my bike failed leaving me with only 2-3 working gears most of the time. And on the second day I managed to trigger my lactose intolerance resulting in, well, a bad time to be camping, enough said. And I missed my girl, desperately. But, these are problems that can be overcome and with solutions in place I tried to get into the photography. Solutia Meadows on the edge of Newport was my first stop and it felt a little hard at first. My mind was elsewhere, the rain continued, so I tried to relax, I knew the inspiration would come, it usually does. It came from the sounds of the meadows first, warblers, buzzards, wind turbines, dragonflies, wind in the reeds, the Solutia Meadows soundtrack was amazing and it led me into some lovely evening panoramas full of pastel meadow colour of greens, pinks, yellows, purples. Travelling up to Monmouth via the Wye Valley was one of the best rides I have ever done. The valley is really pretty, in a very pastoral way, and the sun was beating down, but I cruised along (as much as you can cruise with only 2 gears) gently caressed by woodland dappled shade and the smell of wild garlic and pine. I could have ridden up that valley forever. After a very steep hairpin infested (and due to bad route planning un-necessary) climb to Pennalt to find the pub was closed I met up with Gemma from Gwent Wildlife Trust. The countryside around Monmouth is really pretty, but because it is heavily wooded it is quite difficult to find places with good panoramic views. After a few hours driving around, feeling that we weren't going to find anywhere, Gemma said she had just one last place to show me, probably didn't fit the brief, but did I want to see it? You bet I did. And it was fab, a lovely view over the Usk and Wye areas, hills, fields, livestock, a place that really captured the areas essence. Sometimes I just don't know what it is I am looking for till I have travelled round a bit to get a feel for the place.  The second stroke of luck that day came as I was trying to fight my tent pegs into some very stoney ground, and losing. Rebecca and Richard from Gwent WT had a cottage nearby and wondered if I would rather have a room to stay in than the tent. This seemed to set a pattern for the trip, I spent as much time in Wildlife Trusts peoples houses as I did in the tent. Very kind of them, I think you have to be a kind and genuine person to offer a complete stranger a room in your house, and after the bad start to this trip their offer was really appreciated. They were right on the edge of Pentwyn Farm meadow so it was an easy trip in the morning, double bonus. The meadows here, perched high up on the hill overlooking the Wye Valley, are glorious, full of orchids and a palette of other colours. The skies were less than useful, usually solid grey or solid blue with just the odd plane contrail to add interest, very frustrating. Had some interesting bird encounters in my tent the next night! First a crow tried to perch on top of my tent but ended up sliding down it wakening me from a deep slumber, pretty scary for a few seconds till I figured out what was going on. Then whilst I was having my breakfast a fledgling blue tit crash landed in the meadow in from of my tent and I guess it could only see my tent through the long meadow herbs and flowers as it headed right for the entrance. It moved through my tent, shouting loudly for its parents, before hopping up onto the flat load bed of my bike trailer which was a perfect take off point. I love the things I see and experience on extended stays out. Happy days.      I left Wales via the Severn Bridge and headed down to beautiful Bristol. The sun was shining brightly and everyone seemed to be out in their finery looking very cool and beau. This transition, from rural to urban, from country to country, on a bike is such a seamless and fascinating experience. When I compare it to what The Wildlife Trust are trying to achieve with their Living Landscape projects landscape scale change which is about linking up wild areas to create travel corridors for wildlife and linking up communities and business with nature, the transitions and the links seem very parallel. No time to stop in Bristol though, it was slow progress in the heat with few gears, so I pushed on to Chew Valley. I was on my own for this one as the local contact couldn't meet up with me, but armed with his thoughtfully supplied maps I went to explore around Chew Lake and up Burledge Hill and it's meadows. The reserve at Chew Lake is formed where a main road crosses to the reservoir to form a separate pool. It's a unique location that is very accessible, so I was photographing along with young families, an ice cream van and a bike race for company. A pretty lively place and the ducks, geese, coots and other waterfowl seemed pretty happy to have a steady supply of bread and ice cream cones!      It was just as alive in the evening with massive swarms of insects swirling and buzzing above the trees and my tent.  Rain the next morning put paid to any really good photography in the meadows of Burledge Hill, but the rain kept me cool as I cycled up onto the top of the Mendips to  the remote village of Priddy to meet up with Michelle from Somerset Wildlife Trust who would show me round the Mendips, then Alys who would show me round the Somerset Levels. For some reason I didn't have the location information from Somerset so I had no idea where I was going to be photographing till I arrived, and I was going to be starting with Cheddar Gorge! A bit of a result for a landscape photographer. I immediately started looking for locations part way down the gorge, much to Michelle's horror, so she made me promise I would text her the following day to let her know I was safe after I had finished photographing down the gorge. Very thoughtful, and a very interesting lady who had lived much of her life in very remote Papua New Guinea. I enjoyed hearing about her life as much as hearing about the Mendips Living Landscape. The Somerset Levels were a total contrast, in nearly every way. Alys was full of passion for the Levels, and as we travelled along the bumpy drove roads in her 4x4 it was easy to see why. After the rolling Mendips, the extreme flatness of the Levels, broken by rows of trees, roads, peat extraction sites and reens (ditches) had a sparse beauty that was captivating.  This was one of the first places were I started to feel the hope I alluded to earlier. The landscape is so man made, so scarred and so sparse it is easy to see everything. All the changes. All the damage. And all the improvements that people and organisations like Somerset Wildlife Trust are making to rebuild wild areas for nature and for local communities. The first site we visited, near Westhay Nature Reserve, had an active peat extraction site on one side of the track and on the other an area that was being re-landscaped into a wetland. Just up the road is the nature reserve showing how wild spaces can be rebuilt, and if it wasn't obvious enough from travelling around the area, then the history of the site was beautifully explained with wooden carvings designed by local school children.  I was delighted to be photographing both the Mendips and the Levels, but with a fair amount of pressure to perform as both Michelle and Alys had been so passionate about their areas I didn't want to let them down. Again I landed on my feet with a couple of nights stay in a farmhouse on one of the WT reserves, thanks Kate and Moose. A couple of visits to the local pub, the Queen Victoria in Priddy, to sample the local cider were most enjoyable, but it is blooming strong, I can't imagine I should have ridden my bike after leaving the pub!              Scrambles down steep gorges for airy panoramas, getting badly lost on the Levels, cider, lovely kind and generous people, all very exciting, I liked Somerset. A lot. Wiltshire was my next stop, and I had a terrible journey to get there. Back over the Mendips via Glastonbury was really pretty and interesting, but the car drivers around Swindon really did my head in, with a 70 mile ride to do, I could have done without the aggro. But as we climbed up Morgans Hill near Devizes with Karl and Tony from Wiltshire Wildlife Trust with Tony excitedly explaining all about the chalk grassland and the sea of orchids (we saw about 7 species from common spotted to the rare fly orchid) I was soon lost in the landscape. The view from the top of Morgans Hill out over the soft patchwork of rural Wiltshire, with soft evening light and a gentle wind blowing through the long grasses was just sublime. Road rage was soon forgotten.              I had a much better ride over to Oxford the next day. Passing through posh Marlborough with it's smart college I stopped at the Oxfam Books to pick up a new book as I had finished my fantasy fiction. Their book selection was a bit more erudite, so I went for some Hemingway before continuing through the thatched cottages, oak beamed and Morris Minor countryside. I really enjoyed the ride, the high standard of bike friendly driving and to finish a nice 'community woodland' to camp on. I passed through a village called East Hanney which not only had a great farm shop with amazing port pies, but it also was home to the first home (well apartments) to be powered by a water driven archimedes screw, which along with various other energy saving measures meant they had cut their carbon footprint by 92% over a standard home. Pretty impressive. I met Giles from BBOWT (Berks, Bucks and Oxon Wildlife Trust) the following day and we started the day with strong coffee and not one, but three slices of cake in their HQ. A good start in my book which only continued when we went outside and Giles got his bike out as we were going on a bike tour of the Oxford meadows and flood plains. From the wild, but split in two by the A34, Pixie Mead meadow, through Port Meadow which has been grazed for over 1000 years, and then on to Christchurch Meadows in central Oxford overlooked by the college buildings and longhorn cattle, it was a varied meadow tour. And all the better to be experienced by bike. Not content with providing me with cake, coffee and an amazing tour, Giles wondered if I needed a place to stay that night, but was concerned that being Friday night he and his wife would be sat up drinking wine resulting in less sleep for the weary cycling photographer! Oh well, I managed just fine, with the help of a delicious home cooked meal and some wine. Their kindness, talk of Wildlife Trust and other organisations improvement work, and talk of the future really filled me with a bit more of that gradually building hope. A very fine day, very fine indeed.  Setting of early the following morning, I mixed the days photography with regular visits to a local coffee shop to keep me perked up. Maybe a bit too perky, I ended up making a couple of panoramas on Port Meadow surrounded by cows, then geese and ducks. Another amazing soundtrack. And so filled with melancholy to to leaving lovely Oxford I headed down to Greenham Common. The heavy rain matched my mood and I ended up soaked through. It was that heavy British drizzle that gets through even the best waterproof clothing, bloody horrible. Never having been to Greenham Common I was keen to explore and find out about the area and it's amazing nuclear and anti-nuclear history, so despite being cold and soaked I wandered round for a few hours soaking, literally, up the location. I met Jacky from BBOWT the next day for a proper tour, also conducted by bike. Well, sort of by bike. I got five punctures in an hour on the commons flint track, so I ended up pushing my bike around. It was a great end to a great trip, so much has happened there, it was despite the rain, a real pleasure to be making panoramas in such an iconic location surrounded by lots of other people who were out enjoying the common, or passing through on their bike on their way to the new industrial area created in the old military compund.                      Trip 3 was a real journey, geographically, personally and emotionally. The only problem was I was so moved by all the locations that I made a huge amount of panoramas which all had to be sorted and stitched. Worth it though, worth it for the little ember of hope that I start to feel. 2011-06-29T15:09:26+00:00 http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/virtual-tours/ http://www.mikemcfarlane.co.uk/news/view/virtual-tours/#When:15:06:03Z You can find my most up to date Virtual Tours at www.tours.mikemcfarlane.co.uk 2011-06-29T15:06:03+00:00