A walk on Rathlin island part 2.

It’s been a couple of weeks since my walk on Rathlin, the weather was grey and heavy rain has I left home. It rained for most of the 80 mile trip to Ballycastle to catch the 8.30am ferry across to the island. But half a hour before the ferry was due to leave the sky cleared and a beautiful morning took it’s place. The 35 minute crossing was a little choppy with a strong breeze roughing the water. The sun was now reflecting bright from the white houses that line Church Bay has we came into the harbour.

Coming into the harbour area of Church Bay.

Looking back at at part of the Church Quarter on my out to Rue lighthouse.

It was time to remove my coat and enjoy the warmth of the morning sun, get a hat on to protect my naked head from the sun and wind.

Island life can be hard on all people and objects.

A short walk and I’m leaving the main Church Quarter on the flat single track road that ends and gives way to the hills ahead.

It seems I’m the only walker heading this way.

The remains of the build on the right in the above photo is the Kelp house. It dominates the view for the next quarter mile. Before I get there I stop to get a few more photos. The beauty that surrounds you here make for a slow hike and a lot of photo opportunities. The colours turning to warm autumn tones, the sounds of the water kissing the shore fills a soul with contented peace.

A look back at the rugged landscape to holds Church bay.

Enjoying breakfast on the wild natural grasslands.

The Klep house.

A little history on the Kelp house.

Heading into the old building you get a feel of it’s size, the work that went into building the stone walls. The closeness of the sea and the views back towards the village.

Using a longer focal length lens to close the distance across the bay.

This Rock Pipit has stood and watched me invade it’s space. Thank you little one..

I was going to show you the wildlife I photographed on this walk but it would make for a long blog post. so I’ll add a few and put the rest into another post.

So on with the walk, shortly after leaving the Kelp house the hills start. from the ferry to where I go off road to follow the Roonivoolin Trail is around 1.75 mile. This trail takes you across fram land and its livestock, so if you have a fear off cattle or sheep it’s probably not for you. The path starts along the side of a small lough where I spotted a coots and golden-eyes on the water.

A Coot, if you have ever heard of the saying ” as baldy has a Coot” well you would have if you lived in the UK or Ireland. It’s thought the saying relates to this bird.

And here is the beautiful little Golden- eye duck, you can see how it got it’s name. These little ducks feed by diving for there food so you never know where they will surface.

The path is muddy and slippery underfoot has I follow the trail markers on the gentle climb towards the sea cliffs watched over by hardy hill sheep.

I love those eyes and the texture in the horns. In fact heres a close up below, not sure that you would agree with me but that eye is great.

You’ll never pass a sheep again without looking at it eyes..

Theres always someone to keep you posted the right way on the trail. Terrible pun ,sorry. Another Pipit, not sure if its a meddow or rock Pipit. They all look alike to me.

Another five mintues and you climb over a rickety stile and onto the cliff top walk. the path is a worn trail between a wire fence and a long drop. Watch your step, wet grass is slippery and I don’t fly like the gulls or crows that hug the cliffs.

The clouds are closing in and it looks like rain but with the company of a few woolly sheep leading the way I set off.

I’ll tag behind you..
You can see the dog-leg shape of the island from here. The yellow sign tells you to keep away from the edge, where do they put it… yep you go over to read it…

Great view down the cliffs.

The walk is safe if you stick to the path beside the fence, and take time out to look at the views. I was sorry I didn’t bring a flask of coffee to enjoy my breaks as I sat on a rock with nothing but the sounds of nature, no man make sounds reached me here. Bar the sounds this one made, but that was only my body trying to get air into it…

The next set of photos are some of the splendid views across the island in all directions.

Just follow the cliffs . the background with heavy cloud cover is the mainland of Northern Ireland.

Looking across the island to the East Lighthouse.

The rough lands of the island with Northern Ireland around five miles across the water.

The grand cliff of Fairhead on the County Antrim coast of N.Ireland.

Has you can see from the heavy cloud cover it was looking like heavy rain coming in. Luckly it stayed on the mainland where there were heavy downpours, we remained dry on the island.

Fairhead in N.Ireland, a rock climders heaven. 30+ years ago I climbed a few routes over there.

A moody B&W of the picture above.
Two hooded crows sit awaiting me like Odin’s two Ravens ‘Huginn and Muninn’.

Where the crows sat is the point where you turn away from the cliffs and start a downhill walk back towards the road. Below to the right is my destination, the smugglers cottages and Ushet port.

Ushet Port.

Rue lighthouse.

Dropping downhill I had one more incounter with the wolly guardians of Rue. Just checking this human was leaving…

Watching you..

With another rickity stile to climb over and a final down hill walk I exit unto the road. Swinging right it was down hill to the cottage ruins. This is where i go into stealth mode. Around Ushet port seals come into here, so it’s keep the ruins beween them and me. There is a break in the rear wall of the cottage closest to them,once inside it’s off with the camera bag and set up with a 150 -600 lens. Using the building for cover i get some shots of the seals. Here a shot below, see how I’m greeted.

A friendly wave from them both.

Here is a chopped section of the above shot.

Right it’s time to make my way back to Church Bay, this time its a road walk. There are very few cars on Rathlin so its safe on the roads here.

The call of the Buzzard.

A Bee in a flower.

The last few photos were taken on the walk back to the ferry. The rest of the wild life photos will be in another blog post. If you have lasted this long well done on coming with me on this walk, your are always welcome.

Back to Church bay and a visit to a chippie van, across to the beach and enjoyed the best chips/fries ever. On into the village and got a coffee to go, up to a little park area beside the church and sat enjoying my coffee. I still had a hour to kill before the ferry, I spotted the 3pm ferry getting ready so checked if I could change booking and was onboard in minutes. I sat on the upper outboard deck tucked in out of the wind, packed the camera away( I avoid the saltwater spray) and sat relaxing looking up at the cliffs I’d walked earlier in the day.

I’m going to leave you with two B & W photos I took on my walk back to Church Bay. Again thank you for joining me today.

Church Bay
An end to a beautiful day.

Thank you,

George.

Black & White Wednesday

Had a few days break from work and was happy the sun decided to shine those few days. So I spent one of them at a few spots along the County Down coast. The tide was out and I was not counting on much wildlife on the mudflats. But the day left me with some grand photographs. So todays image is one of a Little Egret (Egretta garzetta) fishing in a fresh water stream that runs out through the mudflats.

Little Egret: Egretta garzetta

So it turned out a enjoyable day and may you all enjoy your day.

George.

Camera: Nikon D750 with a Sigma 150-600 mm lens

Data: f/6.3 @ 1/2000 sec: ISO 360, focal length 600 mm

Water babies.

While photographing birds around the coast I noticed birds washing in the incoming tide. So here are some images taken around the County Down coast.

All photograph’s taken with a Nikon D7200  plus a Sigma 150 – 600 lens with a Sigma 1.4 converter and edited in Lightroom.

 

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Time to dry out.

 

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Next up is a Hooded Crow or a Grey Backs has they are locally known.

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Deep dive.

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Next two photographs of a Common Crow.

 

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He looked like he was enjoying that..

Next the gull that thought he could stop the waves.

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First a warm up.

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Command the wave to stop.

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STOP.

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More practice required.

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Hope you all enjoyed bath time.

Thank you all for stopping, feel free to comment you likes or dislikes.

George

Ring Necked Pheasant.

Had the pleasure one evening watching a Ring necked Pheasant as it and a couple of hen Pheasants fed while crossing some scrub ground. While the hens kept under cover in the longer grasses the cock remained in the open, like me was keeping watch.

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Here he stands in the warm evening sun light showing off his well tailored suit and face markings.

They make a range of sounds has they communicate with each other, from crowing to beating there wings. Sometimes both at the same time.

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The above sequence of shots show the wing beating without the crowing. Below a couple of photographs from him crowing Pheasant calling

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These Photographs where taken over a half hour period where I used a fence post has a make shift tripod. Shot with a Nikon D7200 and a Sigma 150 – 600 mm Telephoto lens. Processed and cropped in Lightroom. My last shot of the evening was where I caught him crossing a break in the ground cover and the warm light on his back.

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I put the camera down and spent the last ten minutes just enjoying the scene.

Hope you have enjoyed seeing this beautiful bird with me and thank you for visiting.

George.

Killough harbour.

This week has been a busy one plus the weather should be turning towards spring. With snow still falling in places and heavy rain and winds hitting others, its still winter. So with an hour to spare and a chance of fresh air I went to Killough on the county Down coast here in the northeast of Ireland. With grey sky’s and dull light on the land, landscape shots were out.

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With the tide on the rise this forgotten boat and the colour on the harbour wall caught my attention.

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With it’s moorings long gone and just the remains left I decided this would be in monochrome.

My next three where taken with a 600mm lens with a fence post used has a tripod.

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Shot from around 100 metres and chopped  with very little post processing. I could spend all day shooting gulls in flight. I you every watch a master working in their craft, then gulls are the masters for flight using the medium of air to paint their path.

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The colour’s nature has painted over time and the textures left by the stone masons tools has they shaped the blocks for the harbour wall. The worn steps reshaped with cement, the rusted and coloured metal handrail. It was all this texture and colour that pulled my eye to this shot.

Thank you for visiting, feel free to comment.

Take care,

George

From snow to coast.

This time last week I was digging the snow from the drive, taking photo’s in the snow. A week later and bar the mountains the snow is gone, well for now. Here in Ireland the weather can change in an hour. With a cool breeze and sunshine that gave no heat I headed for the coast. With heavy rain showers and a bitter wind I sat with a coffee and watched the bird life feeding in the mud flats left has the tide receded. With the return of the no heat sunshine I grabbed the camera’s and went for a walk. Below are a few of my shots from the day.

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Relax now this is the only bird shot this week, a couple of Redshank’s feeding around the mud flats.

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Fishing boats and one of the markers at the mouth of Strangford Lough. In the back ground is the Isle of Man, Looking closer because of the use of a telephoto lens.

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Kilclief beach looking the Irish sea towards the Isle of Man on the horizon.

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Then I spotted this, photo below.

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Parked in the wrong spot…. the colour of the toy car caught my eye on the walk back.

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It was the sun hitting the seaweed and lichen on the rocks that drew me to this photo.

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My final one of the day.

Thank you for visiting my blog, feel free to comment. What you like ,dislike etc.

Enjoy your weekend.

George.

 

 

 

 

The lough’s edge

With a few days of freezing weather and mist over the lough it has started to freeze over.

Here are a few photographs from the lough edge.

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With a heavy frost build up on the plants and the waters freezing over it gives a whole new look and feeling to the place.

Thank you for visiting.

A Cold & Misty morning

So a misty morning greeted me with a heavy frost coating the world in fine jewels. Just me and the dog out for a morning stroll, with a 17-70 zoom on the camera we headed out. With the mist acting like a giant softbox the landscape soft on the eye, my old pal and I headed off down the road.

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Yes this is a road, one of the many little L roads in Ireland.

A stop at one of the small loughs and it’s soft on the eye with the mist still down.

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 A couple of close ups for the foliage

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A beautiful morning in a grand part of Ireland where the pace is slow and the company great.

Thanks for dropping by.

361/365 Shutter release challenge

Street light

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Due to early mornings being dark and the light is fading when going home the only time I can shoot is when its dusk or dawn. So have been out early some mornings while on my way to work. This way taken in a car park with the street lights illuminating the tree. With a long exposure and a light wind you can see movement in the branch’s and not the jogger that ran in front of the camera.

Thank you for visiting