Instow Beach...

... was a glorious place to be yesterday evening, a slight nip in the air still, but a wonderful golden light from the setting sun, gave everything a magical glow... the sands here are clean and soft, with just the right amount of "give" to make walking on them a pleasure. I was (naturally!) taking photographs of various marine subjects, when a little way off I saw a woman dressed in red, with what looked like three white rough haired labradors...

They dogs were in fact Maremma sheep dogs, and their charming owner, Penny, told me all about them. They are not used for herding or controlling sheep as in the UK, but for guarding them against wolves in the hills of Tuscany. These dogs form a bond with the sheep that they guard and work without a human interfering! They live withe sheep in the hills and are intelligent enough to know when things are getting dangerous for their flock, apparently. Despite their docile appearance and sweet nature, clearly these dogs are bred for bravery... My pic today shows them posing for me on the beach!

There I was...

... enjoying a quiet bit of pro active photography in the countryside, when I got a call from my colleague, John Robertson, aka JR. "Can you get me to Sywell aerodrome and wait for an hour?", he asked....well of course I could but why would I want to wait when there was a chance of a flight in a Cessna 4 seater!!!?

So less than an hour later, I found myself strapped into the rear seat, snugly sandwiched between my camera bag and the window, en route for Bedfordshire.... a 20 minute flight! Much better than the 3 hours I endured sitting in a jam on the A14 only last week. I can't talk about the reason we were flying around for a while, but it provided me with some great opportunities for unusual views of familiar places. These will all end on my Alamy stock library I hope!

Today's picture shows us about to land back at Sywell, on their new all weather concrete runway - brilliant!

Later I managed to capture the fun pic of the stick man and the balloon - pure luck that I saw the situation developing as the ballon was being blown along the ground towards the painted figure on the ground... a little patience and the shot was made!

Oops...

... nearly forgot to say happy St Patrick's Day!

What a strange business

... being a photographer is! On Tuesday my colleague John Robertson and I were in London's Portobello Road, a most fashionable and trendy area, full of coffee shops, antique stores and street vendors, taking photographs of "Pop Princess" Gabriella Cilmi - a lovely,talented girl who hit the charts with Nothing Sweet About Me, a few months back. Gabriella has a new CD out this month and is also off to Australia for the Melbourn GP so photos were required for the papers down there. By contrast on Friday JR and I were in the slightly less fashionable surrounds of Burscough,near Ormskirk in rural Lancashire to take "dramatic" pictures of new lorries for a PR campaign. I have chosen to put the pic of Gabriella here rather than one of the lorries!!!! On second thoughts... some people like lorries so there is a lorry shot, although NOT the ones that we were being paid to photograph! I just like the colours!

St David's Day...

... and I thought that some nice daffodils would be a good pic for today! But fate had another idea and I found myself photographing a fairly major fire right next door

As I was packing up my car to head off to the woods for some spring flower pictures, the distinctive smell of burning rubber filled my nostrils. Then I noticed the smoke drifting from the top of my neighbour's garage doors...

My first action was to check that no one was at home, then I placed the plam of my hand against the garage door - it was red hot, so I dialled 999 immediately

The fire brigade turned out and sprang into action - levering a gap in the garage doors to see inside, they sprayed a wall of water before shutting the door again. My neighbour's car, a TVR Griffith was inside and burning, and the flames were already licking the roof inside the garage

More fire engines turned out, so eventually we had 4 in attendance and the cul-de-sac was closed off while they did their best to control the fire, which was threatening the upstairs bedroom over the garage

After an hour or so, the fire was extinguished and the full extent of the damage could be evaluated. It doesn't look like the TVR will be going anywhere soon...

REAL Tough Guys!

I felt privileged to get a personal invitation from Billy Wilson, the well known charity fundraiser from Wolverhampton, to attend and photograph an Atmy exercise on his farm at Perton the other day. The news had been embargoed until early on the morning of the event as the troops concerned are off to Afghanistan very shortly

These brave young men and women took on a slightly sanitised version of the Tough Guy course, as the MoD apparently felt that the civilian version was too risky, with its fire runs and electric prods!!!

Never the less the weather proved to be the challenging factor as the water temperature was low enough to risk hypothermia, and I saw several casualties being stretchered to waiting Army ambulances. Fortunately I heard from the MO later that they were all recovered and were eating heartily!

Although I captured many dramatic and gritty images I think that this one show the British soldier at his best - having a laugh despite the conditions!

Tough Guys...

... of all shapes and sizes (and sexes) came to do battle at Billy Wilson's farm in Perton, just outside Wolverhampton today. Although it was snowing slightly when I arrived ad the temperature was a balmy -2c, there was no shortage of runners ready to challenge themselves against this most dangerous and death defying course. Over 8 miles of muddy running, ice cold water, that had to be broken beforethe competitors plunged in, and then the ordeal of fire, cattle prods, and nettles all provided the ultimate challenge. The money raised goes to Billy's charity, a donkey sanctuary, and also to help for the heroes in our community.

It was achallenge getting pix off to the agency as there were absolutely no facilities for Press photographers to work from - thank goodness for a Land Rover and a dongle! I was told that I was the first to file, so I was very pleased with that given the army of phootgraphers around. Funnily enough, most of them were "amateurs" but the expensive equipment that they all carried was enough to bring cheer to Mr Darling - someone is keeping the economy going with new photographic kit!

My picture shows one of the less extreme challenges - this fiery carpet is to be run over after emerging from ice cold water! I don't think this chap will need to wax his legs for a while!