Southend-on-Sea - Out of season

I took these images at Southend-on-Sea, a seaside town in Essex.  I don't particularly like English seaside towns; they are really quite tacky and noisy. In the summer months they are full of families, all trying to enjoy a low cost day out; which ususally consists of bad food (chips and burgers), drinking cheap beer, walking around and wasting money in amusement arcades.  I admit that I spent a lot of time in those amusement arcades as a kid.


If you visit these places ouside the summer season, they can seem quite desolate and empty. Here are a couple of arcades, still open and hopeful of luring in some unlucky lonely pursuers of coin operated fun. But they are virtually empty.

Ahh...  here's a skillful operator of a claw game, trying for that white teddy bear in the glass cabinet of soft toys.  How many coins will he spend?

In another claw game, this is what you could win...   Woody from Toy Story!   I remember a scene from one of the Toy Story movies, where a 'claw' game is full of green aliens.  

In the cold and the wind, a couple of friends enjoy the amazing spectacle of the pavement fountain. I apologise for my use of black and white; but I can assure you that the fountain changes colour, from pink to green and white. Southend should be proud of this wonder of the modern world.

I have to finish this series with a view of Southend Adventure Island.   It doesn't look scary at all...

More from the forest

While I am in the mood for 'quite out of character' wanders around my local forest; here are a whole bunch of photos I took one nice sunny Sunday morning two weeks ago. I had the strange urge to get my feet a little muddy and go walk about amongst the trees.  I think it is a natural reaction to my usual photography of hard concrete and tarmac, filled with monochrome people, all rushing around their hectic lives.  There is certainly some therapy gained from exploring your local nature, just as much from the local urban environment.

I left my faithful Ricoh GRD3 at home and took the old Nikon D80 with me. Also a Sigma 10-20mm lens for some of the shots.  The old Nikon may not be quite as clever as some of the new DSLRs around now, but I can't actually ever see a need to upgrade. I don't use it too often anyway. I know the camera well enough to get some nice images...   and that's all I want.

Anyway....

Bluebells

It's bluebell time again. Beautiful carpets of blue appearing in all our forests. Spring has finally managed to arrive. It makes a change to get off of the street, and back into nature. Early mornings are the best time for nature...  before the sun gets too high, and maybe a slight touch of mist here and there.

Here are some photos from my local woods. I have processed these a little through photoshop.