Nuclear Foxgloves

Nuclear Foxgloves, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

The answer my friend is blowing in the wind
The answer is blowing in the wind
- Bob Dylan

In the windblown wastelands of Dungeness the Nuclear Power Plants are framed by some wild Foxgloves blowing in the wind.

Dungeness A (foreground) was build in 1965 and closed down in 2006, it will be 2111 before it is fully decommissioned at a cost of £1.2 billion... another 100 years! Dungeness B (background) was built in 1983 and has just had its active life extended until 2018.

Dungeness Dreaming Series #2

*Samsung EX1 - 3 shot HDR

Dungeness Dreaming

Dungeness Dreaming, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

It's here where the land meets the sea,
flat, wilderness, desolate in it's beauty.
Pebble-dash shingle, stretches, runs free
for miles and miles.

It is here where the land merges into sky,
which covers like a blanket over your head.
Colours ever changing, as weathers break by
black to blue, grey to gold.

From Dungeness by Ann Rta

Dungeness is a desolate, surreal and beautiful place. A shingle headland jutting out into the English Channel, its designated as a National Nature Reserve (NNR), a Special Protection Area (SPA), a Special Area of Conservation (SAC) and part of the Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). It is also home to the 4 Nuclear Reactors that make up the Dungeness Nuclear Power Station and to a scattered mixture of ramshackle huts, old beached fishing boats, shipping containers, cottages and designer cottage conversions along with odd scrap sculptures and the iconic Old Lighthouse pictured here.

Dungeness Dreaming Series #1

*Samsung EX1 - 3 shot HDR

Sunset Seagull Fly By

Sunset Seagull Fly By, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"Don’t believe what your eyes are telling you. All they show is limitation. Look with your understanding. Find out what you already know and you will see the way to fly."

— Richard Bach (Jonathan Livingston Seagull)

* Pentax K20D and Pentax SMC DA 18-55mm Lens

You Will Never Walk Alone

You Will Never Walk Alone, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

Though your dreams be tossed and blown
Walk on, walk on, with hope in your heart
And you'll never walk alone
You'll never walk alone

- R. Rodgers and O. Hammerstein II

* Pentax K20D and Pentax SMC DA 18-55mm Lens - 3 shot HDR

Above Below Sunset Glow

Above Below Sunset Glow, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"Just this: What is above knows what is below, but what is below does not know what is above. One climbs, one sees. One descends, one sees no longer, but one has seen. There is an art of conducting oneself in the lower regions by the memory of what one saw higher up. When one can no longer see, one can at least still know."
— René Daumal

* Pentax K20D and Pentax SMC DA 18-55mm Lens

One Man and His Dog

One Man and His Dog, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and man."
— Mark Twain

* Pentax K20D and Pentax SMC DA 18-55mm Lens

Layers of Meaning

Layers of Meaning, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"By means of all created things, without exception, the divine assails us, penetrates us, and molds us. We imagined it as distant and inaccessible, when in fact we live steeped in its burning layers"
— Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

* Pentax K20D and Pentax SMC DA 18-55mm Lens - 3 shot HDR

Evening Glow

Evening Glow, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"I will arise and go now,
And go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there,
Of clay and wattles made;
Nine bean rows will I have there,
A hive for the honey bee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there,
For peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning
To where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer,
And noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings

I will arise and go now,
For always night and day
I hear lake water lapping
With low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway
Or on the pavements gray,
I hear it in the deep heart's core."
— W.B. Yeats

West Hill taken from East Hill, Hastings, England.

* Pentax K20D and Pentax SMC DA 18-55mm Lens - 3 shot HDR

A Nuclear Horizon

A Nuclear Horizon, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"The fact that we live at the bottom of a deep gravity well, on the surface of a gas covered planet going around a nuclear fireball 90 million miles away and think this to be normal is obviously some indication of how skewed our perspective tends to be."
— Douglas Adams (The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time )

The Dungeness Nuclear Power Plant can be seen on the horizon of this shot taken from East Hill, Hastings.

Dedicated to all those who have suffered due to the Fukushima I nuclear accidents and all those who will suffer over the decades to come. While the accidents have largely disappeared from our News channels the radiation they leave behind will take many hundreds of years to disappear.

For all those who think it could not happen here... It is worth remembering that Dungeness is built on a low shingle beach created by one of the massive violent storms that hit this area every now and again.

* Pentax K20D and Samsung D-Xenon 50-200mm Lens - 3 shot HDR

Life is a Lighthouse

Life is a Lighthouse, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"Inside my empty bottle I was constructing a lighthouse while all others were making ships."
— Charles Simic

Another unposted shot from the archives, this time Split Point Lighthouse on Victoria's Surf Coast in July 2010

* Pentax K20D and Pentax SMC DA 18-55mm Lens - 3 shot HDR

Little Balls of Wonder

Little Balls of Wonder, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or by imbeciles who really mean it."
— Mark Twain

* Pentax K20D and Samsung D-Xenon 50-200mm Lens

Spinnaker & Spice Island

Spinnaker & Spice Island, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"He who controls the spice controls the universe."
— Frank Herbert (Dune (Dune Chronicles, #1))

Possibly the most haunted city on the South Coast, Portsmouth has a dark history of murder, mayhem, plotting and politics. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the old quarter of the city - a place known as Spice Island. The place were the spices were landed from ships returning from the spice islands.

Once home to drink-sodden sailors staggering through crooked alleyways searching the pleasure of 'respectable' ladies of the night it's now an upmarket residential area. From the first terrorists to the murder of nobility, the dark streets of Old Portsmouth have been witness to it all. The Spice Island Pub dates from 1700.

*Samsung EX1 - single shot f2.8 iso100

In The Heart of Pinstripe City

In The Heart of Pinstripe City, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"Muggle women wear them, Archie, not the men, they wear these," said the Ministry wizard, and he brandished the pinstriped trousers. "I'm not putting them on," said old Archie in indignation. "I like a healthy breeze 'round my privates, thanks."
— J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Harry Potter, #4))

The Gerkhin in the City of London otherwise known as the Square Mile and full of Suits in Pinstripes :-)

From right to left: the Gerkhin (30 St Mary Axe), the Aviva Tower (St Helens Building), Tower 42 and the Willis Building (51 Lime Street) - The Lloyd's Building is hiding behind the Willis Building and partially reflected in the Aviva Tower and the Gerkhin.

*Samsung EX1 - 3 shot HDR (-1, 0, +1 EV)

Gunwharf Quays

Gunwharf Quays, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

A light hand leaps on the heel of the boom,
And with swift knife slashes the reef knots free;
Drops in the bunt as it yields him room,
While it brushes the crest of the sending sea.

From "Rounding The Stake Boat" by Walter Mitchell (1889)

The Spinnaker Tower at Gunwharf Quays rises above Portsmouth Harbour; a new landmark on the south coast.

*Samsung EX1 - 3 shot HDR (-1, 0, +1 EV)

Heralds of Spring Rain

Heralds of Spring Rain, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
- Sara Teasdale

We have had exactly 3.5mm of rain in the last 6 weeks, an unusually long hot and sunny Spring... and then last weekend at sunset the rainclouds gathered and the spring rains fell :-)

* Pentax K20D and Pentax SMC DA 18-55mm Lens - 3 shot HDR

Through The Lens of History

Through The Lens of History, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"Before I was bent-backed, I was bold; I was welcomed in the drinking-hall of Powys, the paradise of Wales. "
— Llywarch Hen-9th Century Welsh Bard

A more traditional view of Wales tonight, this being the Norman Keep at Cardiff Castle. I don't normally use treatments on my photos but couldn't resist adding a vignette and using Texturiser in Photoshop to give it more of a 'caught in the mists of the past' feel.

*Samsung EX1 - 3 shot HDR (-1, 0, +1 EV)

Shadow of The Raven

Shadow of The Raven, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
`Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,' I said, `art sure no craven.
Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the nightly shore -
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

From The Raven by Edgar Allen Poe

* Pentax K20D and Samsung D-Xenon 50-200mm Lens

Sea Sky Earth People

Sea Sky Earth People, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"Down on the lake rosy reflections of celestial vapor appeared, and I said, "God, I love you" and looked to the sky and really meant it. "I have fallen in love with you, God. Take care of us all, one way or the other." To the children and the innocent it's all the same."
— Jack Kerouac (The Dharma Bums)

Another unposted shot from the archives... there are just so many :-) This one is from Airey's Inlet on Victoria's Surf Coast in July 2010.

Painkalac Creek is a salt lake separated from the sea by a thin strip of beach and the magnificent rocks of Split Point and Eagle Rock, an amazing place!

* Pentax K20D and Pentax SMC DA-18-55mm Lens - 2 shot HDR

A Rose By Any Other Name

A Rose By Any Other Name, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

'Tis but thy name that is my enemy;
Thou art thyself, though not a Montague.
What's Montague? it is nor hand, nor foot,
Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part
Belonging to a man. O, be some other name!
What's in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;
So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call'd,
Retain that dear perfection which he owes
Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name,
And for that name which is no part of thee
Take all myself.

From Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, 1600

* Pentax K20D and Samsung D-Xenon 50-200mm Lens

Mirror Mirror

Mirror Mirror, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"When I was a child, adults would tell me not to make things up, warning me of what would happen if I did. As far as I can tell so far, it seems to involve lots of foreign travel and not having to get up too early in the morning."
— Neil Gaiman (Smoke and Mirrors)

Dipping at random into the archive tonight, I came up with this gem from Victoria's Surf Coast last July :-)

* Pentax K20D and Pentax SMC DA-18-55mm Lens - 3 shot HDR

Cathedral Church of Paul the Apostle

Cathedral Church of Paul the Apostle, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"For we are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. - Ephesians 6:12"
— St. Paul (The Epistles of Paul and Acts of the Apostles (Thrift Edition))

One from the big freeze of the Winter just past, that I never got around to posting. St Paul's Cathedral taken with a Fujifilm point and shoot from the Tate Modern gallery on the South Bank.

Postcards From London Series #4

Amazing what you can do with a cheap point and shoot - I picked this one up at a Walgreens in Philadelphia for US$40... 12 megapixels of Cheapside goodness :-)

A Time of Renewal

A Time of Renewal, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"For me, trees have always been the most penetrating preachers. I revere them when they live in tribes and families, in forests and groves. And even more I revere them when they stand alone. They are like lonely persons. Not like hermits who have stolen away out of some weakness, but like great, solitary men, like Beethoven and Nietzsche. In their highest boughs the world rustles, their roots rest in infinity; but they do not lose themselves there, they struggle with all the force of their lives for one thing only: to fulfil themselves according to their own laws, to build up their own form, to represent themselves. Nothing is holier, nothing is more exemplary than a beautiful, strong tree. "
- Hermann Hesse

*Samsung EX1 - 3 shot HDR (-1, 0, +1 EV)

505 State Highway One

505 State Highway One, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"Joy, sorrow, tears, lamentation, laughter -- to all these music gives voice, but in such a way that we are transported from the world of unrest to a world of peace, and see reality in a new way, as if we were sitting by a mountain lake and contemplating hills and woods and clouds in the tranquil and fathomless water."
— Albert Schweitzer

More from the archives... this time Lake Taupo, just off Highway One as it winds around the shoreline, in February 2008

* Pentax K100D and Pentax SMC DA-18-55mm Lens

Greeting the Golden Glow

Greeting the Golden Glow, originally uploaded by TomRaven.

"The years, the months, the days, and the hours have flown by my open window. Here and there an incident, a towering moment, a naked memory, an etched countenance, a whisper in the dark, a golden glow these and much more are the woven fabric of the time I have lived."
— Howard Thurman

Another from the timeless, ageless shores of the Tasman Sea...

* Pentax K100D and Pentax SMC DA-18-55mm Lens