This months club landscape trip was to Hardley Windmill, near Chedgrave/Loddon in Norfolk.
Hardley Windmill
Hardley Windmill was built in 1874 as a drainage pump and after storm damage in 1950, an electric pump replaced it.
Restored from 1991 to 2005, it is now owned by the Hardley Mill Trust and supported by the Friends of Hardley Mill. There is a visitor centre here too.
See here for more info all about the Mill.
A quick sob story for the night owls
Having been postponed from last week thanks for storm Eunice, meet time was a little earlier at 05:45 so my alarm was set to get up at around 4:45 (ouch!).
I’ve come to realise that I need a minimum of five hours shuteye to avoid feeling sick. And ideally, a couple of hours sleep when I get back. On this trip, both of those objectives were met.
You may ask why don’t I just go to bed earlier? Good question. But I find I can’t just modify the body clock and go to sleep that much earlier, it just doesn’t seem to work like that for me.
The Shoot
I’d never been to this location before and as we walked from the car park along the river, it seemed really nice.
We reached the mill and club members started to peel away to pick their locations for their first shots.
I started with one on the main path looking at the mill with the grass path a leading line.
Although the morning light was pleasant, it was behind us rather than behind the mill.
I then climbed down into the reeds to get a shot of the mill from lower down.
I moved back along the path a bit to do a similar shot but this time with a fence as an extra piece of foreground/mid ground interest. I quite like this shot even though the mill is in the distance.
The fence adds a little more interest for me along with the reeds at either side providing some framing to the scene.
As I walked further along the path, I grabbed a shot of the line of trees as the morning light shone on them.
I then walked down to the river and along a very slippery and occasionally rocking jetty / mooring float.
This is possibly one of my favourite shots of the morning…
As I left the jetty, many club members had started making their way back to the car park for the customary flask coffee and post shoot chat.
I don’t blame them, by this point the light was starting to get really bright. I joined a couple of members taking shots of the Cantley sugar beet factory but just did a shot of the chimney, nothing special.
After 3-4 weeks of no trips out, I really enjoyed getting out and about, fresh air, good geeky photography chat, and as always seeing what I can get with the shots.
We were all done by 08:15 so it meant heading home via the usual breakfast stop courtesy of Ronald.
I even grabbed a couple of hours extra sleep before an afternoon excursion with my wife.
Onwards and upwards…