Blog header

The new blog header comes from my good friend Gordon Hay, who took this photograph during one of the few recent sunny evenings whilst on the top of Colley Hill. The view is looking SSW towards Mordor Leith Hill. I really should get my act together and produce a few more headers, although I do like my usual one so much that it will appear again in the future.

Comments

Derek Faulkner said…
Mmmm, I think I preferred the previous one.
I've often fancied one of those but as a PC iliterate I've never worked out how to do it.
7 January 2016 at 19:01
Stewart said…
A change is as good as a rest Steve, I like to change mine with the seasons or to match something that is currently around....
7 January 2016 at 19:31
Steve Gale said…
Send me was images Derek and I'll knock some up for you.
7 January 2016 at 20:21
Steve Gale said…
I've always liked that about 'From the Notebook' Stewart, the surprise as to what the header will be. Little Auk in a basket coming up?
7 January 2016 at 20:23
Gibster said…
As soon as I clicked on ND&B I thought, "wow, what a wonderful header, look at the detail and the overallness" (not a word but so what?) Then I see it wasn't yours...lol, it's brilliant anyway. It'll have to suffice until you put your own image back I guess :)
7 January 2016 at 20:34
Steve Gale said…
Don't rub it in Seth, I'm encouraging a very young photographer here.... oh, hang on, Gordon's almost my age.... oh, well.
7 January 2016 at 20:42
Steve Gale said…
Cheers Bill, I'll pass that on to Mr Hay.
7 January 2016 at 20:42
Simon Douglas Thompson said…
Beautiful....but one does not simply walk up Leith Hill
7 January 2016 at 21:59
Steve Gale said…
You can actually see the sea from the top of the tower Simon!
7 January 2016 at 22:20
Steve Gale said…
I should have claimed it as my own Jono...
7 January 2016 at 22:21
GeoffB said…
so which particular character are you pray tell ? I could proffer some
8 January 2016 at 07:43
Steve Gale said…
Character? You've lost me Geoff!
8 January 2016 at 13:42
GeoffB said…
"twas in the darkest depths of Mordor" ?
8 January 2016 at 15:44
Steve Gale said…
Ah, most probably Gandalf the Green!
8 January 2016 at 15:59
Stewart said…
Never had one in a basket Steve, they all just fly by or swim past quite healthily. Maybe this weekend will change that.
8 January 2016 at 19:58
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Goldfinches and Lavender

Image
We have three medium-sized Lavender bushes in our back garden. Throughout the summer the flowers (which last for several months) are a magnet for insects and give off a most restful aroma. As tempting as it is to cut the dead stems in the autumn, we always leave them, as we know that during the late winter we will get visitors to feed on the seed heads... This video was taken from the kitchen window this morning. We will normally see one or two birds over a few days, but have had up to 14 at once. We never tire of watching them. Lavender is a wonderful plant to have in the garden, with year round natural history benefits. So what are you waiting for? They are readily available at a garden centre close to you right now! There is an historic association with Lavender in this part of northern Surrey and south London. Lavender fields have been harvested for many years, with one particular field close to Woodmansterne being very popular with day trippers. A significant proportion o...
Read more

Welcome back!

Image
In November 2005 I purchased a pair of Swarovski 10x42 EL binoculars from The London Camera Exchange shop in Guildford, for the then princely sum of £899. These bins have served me well, with almost daily use in all types of weather, testing their durability to the maximum - salt water spray, deluges of rain, 38C temperatures, dust, dirt, slight knocks... and apart from the armour coating that had started to bubble and come away from the body, nothing to be alarmed about. Then, in the summer of 2022, I noticed that I had a problem when close focusing - the outer focusing wheel would lose grip and it would take me an age to regain a middle-ground distance of focus - plus, over the next few weeks this outer focusing wheel became loose. I resorted to the use of tape to keep it all in place, but realised that I had to do something about it in the long run. For a while I did consider buying a new pair - after all, they were then 17-years old - but they were still optically superb. It seemed...
Read more

A special day

In birding, timing can mean the difference between an average day in the field and that of a spectacular one. Good timing can be helped by reading the weather conditions correctly, or understanding local conditions but it is more often down to pure luck. In this case, I just got lucky... I had not visited Dungeness since March 2022, quite a gap for me. It was high time that I once more trod the shingle and my timing of a visit was down to several factors, mostly a personal liking for mid-late autumn but also because I needed to be at home until September 20th and could not make the journey south until then. I also chose to stay at the bird observatory for a few days rather than make it a day trip. All this conveniently found me stepping outside the observatory's back door in the breaking dawn of Sunday 22nd September, quickly making my way to the fishing boats, an area I prefer to stand to best appreciate any visible bird migration, an aspect of birding that I find exhilarating.  A...
Read more