Category Archives: Photography

The road less travelled

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After days and days of muddy brown light, the sun shone this morning. So I packed camera and lenses and went for a walk in the woods. There was a freezing wind up on the ridge outside Wimpole, so much so that it was painful to hold the camera, even with leather gloves on. And yet it was lovely to be there, listening to the wind sighing through the trees, and picking my way over rotten branches and fallen trees. At one point I was standing contemplating the view and thinking about lenses when I heard voices raised in desultory conversation, and then two horsemen passed me and politely said “Good morning”. After they’d moved on, I fell to thinking of one of my favourite poems. And took the picture.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

LATER: Quentin reminded me of his own poetical venture in this territory!

Roll out the barrels

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Every year, on Boxing Day, the village of Grantchester holds a barrel-racing competition. A section of the road is cordoned off and lined with straw bales. Teams of four from pubs or nearby villages then proceed to race one another by rolling barrels from one end of the course to another. The origins of — or indeed the rationale for — these curious proceedings are unclear, and in any case may be beside the point: the organiser Francis Burkitt was once quoted as saying that “the whole point of the event is that it is pointless – it’s a slightly mad English holiday tradition which is great fun.”

Sounds simple, doesn’t it? Well, it ain’t.

I had great fun photographing the proceedings (see the photostream on Flickr if you’re interested). But of course for me the main interest was in watching the spectators. For example:

Or here:

Hmmm… Who was it who defined a psychologist as “someone who goes to the Folies Bergére and watches the audience”?

Still, at least I didn’t come on Jeffrey ‘Lord’ Archer, the village’s most notorious resident. One must be thankful for small mercies.