Tag Archives: sheffield

The Story Behind the Photo: August 24, 2008

Dark and brooding sands of Lancaster.

Toward the end of August 2008 my wife, son and I took a trip from Sheffield to visit Lancashire. We stayed in a sea-view hotel in Morecambe, and the vast tracts of empty sand fascinated me. It’s said that the tide comes in here faster than a galloping horse, and indeed a few foolhardy folk have ventured out too close to the changing of the tide, and have been lost.

On the way back, we drove over the Snake Pass, which is astonishingly not only a narrow winding road over some of the highest parts of the Peak District, but also forms one of the few major thoroughfares from Sheffield to Manchester – two of the largest towns in the north of England.

The Story Behind the Photo: August 17, 2008

Summer heather with child.

I wasn’t yet into a DSLR by summer of 2008, but I was definitely getting more creative with my photography. I would take a camera with me every time my son and I would go for a walk in the Peak District, and I loved capturing his childish joy and excitement in bounding from boulder to boulder across the moors.

This was one of our many treks into the wilderness, and the colors and clouds were just spectacular.

The Story Behind the Photo: August 10, 2006

The glorious August heather in England’s Peak District.

In 2006, I was just starting to get excited by photography. I only had an old point-and-shoot, but it had a few manual controls and allowed me to explore the options available while still making most photos come out reasonably decent.

Sometimes, on days off, I would take a drive through the Peak District surrounding the northern English city of Sheffield, where I lived. One of my favorite locations was Strines Moor, which comprises several rolling hills and valleys, covered in heather. The thing about heather is that for 10-11 months of the year, it’s an ugly brown, but in late summer the flowers begin to bloom, and all of a sudden the moors are aglow with purple and lavender, and in the crisp high wind it’s absolutely stunning.

This lonely tower is my favorite part of Strines Moor, mainly because I don’t know anything about it. It’s a solitary mystery, a lonesome relic of the past, and whilst some people might know what it is and why it’s there, I’d rather be in the dark.