Contrast

Contrasting green and orange foliage in the forest. Chamonix, France.

~ Spotted Cow

à deux

An intimate lunch. Ignore the gooseberry photographer.

A reader asked to see a bigger visual of the restaurant featured in my Hole In the Heart photograph at the Grand Hotel du Montenvers.  And so, here it is with a couple of cheeky extras.

~ Spotted Cow

Forest for the trees

I could be accused of missing the forest for the trees … but I couldn’t resist taking pictures of the spotted textures of the bare tree trunks and branches.

Chamonix, France

~ Spotted Cows

Weekly Photo Challenge: Seasons

A granny flat? Albeit, the granny wouldn’t get too many amenities in there. It looks like it’s about 6 square metres (or 6 square yards).

Winter, naturally.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Seasons

~ Spotted Cow

Moss & bark

The star-like moss was so pretty, I wish I had brought my macro lens with me. I like the delicate features of the moss, sitting next to the rough texture of the bark.

Chamonix, France

~ Spotted Cow

Hole in the heart

My Valentine’s Day photo. The view through a heart-shaped peephole in a dining room chair in the Grand Hotel du Montenvers, Chamonix … while I was waiting for lunch.

~ Spotted Cow

Glaciorium

Before you think that all was lost, I did manage to get up a mountain on my Chamonix weekend. I took the train up to Montenvers where I intended to visit the Mer de Glace glacier cave. Alas, it was closed that day due to the weather.  It was snowing fairly heavily, unlike down in the valley where it was raining. Clearly, very few attractions were going to open for me on this weekend. Still, I had a look inside the Glaciorium, which told me about the glacier.  And then, in the best of French tradition, I went to lunch at the hotel next door … at the Grand Hotel du Montenvers.

~ Spotted Cow

 

Family Outing

More from my slushy walk around the forest. You can tell from this – and the others in the Chamonix series – that I spent a lot of my time waiting for people and animals to turn up so that I could make the forest a backdrop to something.

~ Spotted Cow

As the credits roll

I shot this image on my slushy walk around one of the forests in Chamonix. It looked like it could be the final scene in a movie, when the credits roll. Two people, having made a strong resolution among themselves, walk off into the rest of their lives.

~ Spotted Cow

 

Weekly Photo Challenge: Vibrant

In the white, snowy Chamonix landscape, the vibrant green of the forest stands out … if you’re in the valley, that is.

Weekly Photo Challenge : Vibrant

~ Spotted Cow

 

 

(Fool)Hardy

I went to Chamonix – the French ski resort – on a weekend in early January. It rained. The snow was slushy and horrible and most of the ski runs were closed because of heightened avalanche risk. So, what did I do? I took my trusty camera out for a walk in the drizzle and took photos of the forest.

It wasn’t easy walking conditions, but there were a few people about. I spotted this runner out on his daily jog. He looked quite hardy. Or foolhardy.

~ Spotted Cow

Lille skyline

Lille at Christmas. I thought that I should put up some architectural details of Lille the city skyline so that you wouldn’t think I only had my nose in the sweet treats and market stalls.

~ Spotted Cow

Lille day trip

A collage of picture details of my day trip to Lille and its Christmas market. In fact, the whole town is Christmas at the moment. Lille is only one & a half hours from London on the Eurostar train. How did I not know that before?

~ Spotted Cow

 

Snap Chat. Same shot, different perspective

One summer, while walking along the Brittany shore I spotted a dinghy with its anchor exposed by the washed out tide. The anchor was old, textured and corroded. And the dinghy had a bright sun-streaked orange-red rim. Both things were interesting but which should I take the photo of?

I decided that I wanted both objects in the picture to demonstrate the connection between them, but only focus on one in order not to divide your attention. So I set a low f-stop number to control the depth of field. I took two photos – one focussed on the dinghy and the other on the anchor. Both were taken on the same setting: ISO 200, 70mm, f5.6, 1/250s, on a summer’s afternoon at about 5.30pm when the sun had lost its intensity.

For choice, I prefer the anchor picture. What do you reckon?

~ Spotted Cow

 

Breton Blue

Lots of things in Brittany are coloured blue – window shutters, gates, letter boxes, signs, boats, cars. It’s a cornflower blue and similar shades around it. I’d like to think that they do most of their painting in summer and throw the leftover colour into the sky.

~ Spotted Cow