I don't know about you, but nine weeks of being restricted to my home and immediate local area is driving me nuts, it has been over 12 weeks since I have been out in the countryside. My stance has always been to abide by the rules, and only travel when necessary but this has been driving me mad with frustration.
After careful research, reviewing the latest government guidelines and discussing this with my immediate family, I decided to get to take a local walk as exercise and to get out in the countryside.
I choose a area which I thought would not be as popular as the most well known locations, in the Lake District, and one that was reasonably local to me, and that I wanted to be there as early as possible to further reduce the chances of meeting others, on arriving at my destination, I was pleased to see that there was no one else about and my car was the only one in the car park.
I was soon changed and on my way along the path to get to the waterfall that I wanted to see as I have never been here before, only to find that the area was under a temporary closure order for tree felling, improvement the paths and bridges in this area, and there was also some conservation work being done to allow rhododendrons to re-establish themselves, the area is not planned to open to the public until May 2021.
As disappointing as this was, there was nothing that I could do except check the map and look for other routes that would have areas of interest along them. I soon found another path that would take me along the banks of the main river, so off I set.
The water was crystal clear, the rocks creating emerald coloured water within the many deep pools, no waterfalls as such but some minor rapids, I stopped to take a couple of photos of these as I went on my way.
I came across a couple of old oak trees that caught my interest, now woodland photography is far from being one of my regular genres, but the shapes and colours one these trees made me stop and seek out a decent photo opportunity. I was aware that there was no mist to create separation between the subject tree and the background, but I hoped that the flat light and dull conditions would assist me in this. I took a couple of photos, whist not the best woodland photos in the world, I am reasonably pleased with the finished photo as shown below.
What are your thoughts on this?
There were several fords crossing the tributaries to the main river, some of these had stepping stones to cross on foot, but on one a bridge constructed for walkers which ran parallel to the ford crossing point. I stopped and had a scour around this to see if it would make a interesting shot, finally deciding to take a photo from a low level to create depth within the photo which included both the wooden bridge and the ford, again not the best photo I will take, but it tells a story of how the beck is crossed by walkers and vehicles.
During this time I had not met a single sole, only on my return journey to the car did I pass a couple walking there dog, and another family pulled up in the car park as I was pulling away.
I had planned to visit a local tarn as my second walk of the morning, one which I have never been to before, but as the light was so flat and dull I decided that this would not be the best conditions to try and get any photos from here, so thinking on my feet, I decided to head to the Roman Fort at Hard Knott Pass. My thinking was that there would not be too many people about, and I was hoping to be able to have a good walk around the ruins and try to get any decent photos form the fort looking down the valley. As I drove up towards the pass, there were very few cars parked at various parking places along the road, and I did not see another vehicle on the road.
I arrived at the fort to find that I had the place to myself, not another soul anywhere to be seen. It has been many years since I had been here before, so I took my time walking around the ruins, trying to pick out any photo compositions, and reading the many information notices scattered around the fort.
Sadly the weather was not playing ball, it was becoming even more overcast and a hint of mist forming in the lower valley which put the mockers on any grand vista shots. I then began trying to pick out any smaller interesting detail from the large landscape views all around me, a small tree clinging to the side of a rock scree was one such instance, but despite moving as far round this tree as possible, moving up, moving down, I could not get a shot that I was happy with, so after about 45 minutes I gave up on this. I found myself at the highest point above the fort looking down the valley from where a took a panoramic shot of the fort ruins which captured the atmosphere and conditions of the day. In this photograph the nearest ruins are of the Granaries buildings (see information notice below), the ruins in the far distance are those of the forts headquarters, (again see information notice below) this was the best photograph of my time spent at the fort by some margin, a copy of which is attached below.
For anyone that is interested, here is a short piece on the history of the fort:
Built between about 120 and 138, the fort was abandoned during the Antonine advance into Scotland during the mid-2nd century. The fort was reoccupied around 200 and continued in use until the last years of the 4th century. During this time, an extensive vicus developed outside the fort. The initial Roman garrison here was a detachment of 500 infantry of the Cohors IV Delmatarum from the Dalmatian coast.
The fort is square with rounded corners, 114 metres long externally, or 105 metres internally, the rampart wall being about 1.7 metres thick with ditches adding to the total width of the rampart. The low walls of the fort were "restored" some years ago, a slate course showing the height of the walls before their rebuilding.
The outer wall has four gates, at the centre of each side, and lookout towers at each corner. Within the walls are the remaining outlines of several buildings: two side-by-side granaries, the garrison headquarters building and garrison commander's villa, or Praetorium. In addition to these stone buildings, timber structures would have housed barracks for the mounted auxilia.
Outside the square of the fort are the remains of the bath house, and the levelled parade ground, which is considered to be the finest surviving example in the Western Empire.
The parade ground is approximately two hundred yards higher up the slope to the east of the fort. A track led up to it from the East Gate of the fort. A plan of the fort by R. G. Collingwood in 1930 shows the parade ground to have been as big as the fort, with embanked edges to ensure a level surface.
