Isla discovers the seaside 1: Wells

In early April Isla and I went to Norfolk for a couple of days, the primary excuse being that I was giving a talk at North Norfolk Photographic Society.  Since the talk was in Holt, I stayed at Mary Walsh's excellent White House Farm in Hindolveston, which happens to have a dog-friendly annex.  It was the first time I'd taken Isla away on an "adventure", and I was slightly nervous as to how she would behave.  I needn't have worried, though, as she was absolutely fine and didn't disgrace herself once.

I was determined to introduce Isla to the joys of the seaside, so on Thursday morning we headed to Wells-absolutely-nowhere-near-the-Sea.  As luck would have it the tide was out, so there was mile after mile of empty sand to play on.  Isla acquired a particularly good stick while walking through the woods behind the beach huts, and held onto it all the time we were there.  When I say "held onto it", what I mean is that Muggins had to keep throwing it for her, and she would then proceed to retrieve it.  So, an endless throw/fetch cycle, interspersed with bouts of frantic digging and a bit of swimming, so it's no surprise that she was completely knackered afterwards.  Indeed, she slept for the whole afternoon!

Can we go to the seaside again soon, please?

Trip to the Norfolk Coast

The past couple of weeks has been spent preparing for, executing, and then recovering from Christmas, so it was great to get out yesterday with my daughter Frances, her husband Christopher and Amber (of course) to the Norfolk Coast.  It was a bit nippy in the wind, but really nice when the sun came out.  It was also an opportunity for me to try out a couple of new Fuji lenses: the 50-140/2.8 and 16-55/2.8.  I deliberately put them through their paces by shooting wide open most of the day, and so far I've been very impressed with the results - especially from the 50-140 (75-210 full-frame equivalent, which is one of my favourite focal lengths).

Amber's natural home seems to be at the seaside, and she was terribly excited to be able to run round on the shingle at Cley (which patently isn't next-the-Sea, despite its name).

Christopher was skimming stones on the water, and Amber decided it would be a good idea to go and "fetch" one.  Unfortunately she didn't see the wave which then completely drenched her...

As always, there were lots of good smells on the beach.

The Fuji X-T1 is not known for its focusing abilities, but it made a pretty good job of capturing Christopher who was attempting to out-run Amber.

Frances had borrowed my backup Fuji camera - an X-E2 - and was getting to grips with it by photographing interesting things on the sea shore.

Ahhhh...

Time to check the pictures on the back of the camera.

Curses - spotted!

Christopher doing a little jig after winning the (highly intellectual) game of Pooh Sticks.

After lunch we went on to Wells (which really is next-the-sea), but by this time it had become very overcast and gloomy.

An excellent day out, and a wonderful antidote to the over-indulgence of the previous few days.