The Roaches

Sometimes the patience of a saint is needed to forgive the Meteorological Office the apparent effortlessness with which they get the weather forecast so completely and utterly wrong. Many are the times when we have embarked on a long journey to a particular destination, comfortable in the assumption that the forecast the previous evening can be relied on; only to wonder, as we stand cursing under a heavy blanket of unpredicted cloud, whether we will ever learn.

Our journey to the glorious Peak District on the day this photograph was taken proceeded a forecast that the morning’s cloud and rain would clear in the afternoon. Throughout the morning and early afternoon the cloud and rain were disconcertingly noticeable by their absence. As the afternoon wore on, the clouds assembled in force to ensure that the sun would set without a display of either colour or light. The light in this image disappeared moments later, never to reappear.

In this composition the aim has been to persuade the eye to follow the fence into the scene and up to the rocky peak. The wind was extremely strong and so there is inevitable movement in the heather. All being well the light on the fence and the distant peak has helped to ensure that the blurred heather is not too great a distraction.

Canon EOS 5D and EF 16-35mm lens.

Exposure of 1/10th second at f/13.