I have only just rediscovered this blog post I created way back in 2018.  It has remained unpublished until now, so being Autumn I thought it might be a good idea to share it now, otherwise it will sit unpublished for yet another year.  Hopefully, more photography blogs will follow in less that seven years time!  Leave a comment, if you've enjoyed reading.

I never feel I have very much to say when it comes to writing a blog, but then again, as they say 'every picture tells a story',  so perhaps the photographs I share have much more to say than any description I could give them.

I feel very privileged that the music ministry my wife Julie and I are engaged in often takes us to beautiful places, Ashburnham Place in East Sussex being one of our most regular and most favourite places to stay for a few days, in any season of the year.

 It is particularly glorious in the Autumn sunshine. 

It may be an Americanism but 'the fall' really describes the season - there is nothing more beautiful than a carpet of fallen leaves lit up by the morning sun.  

One of the things we love about the grounds in Ashburnham is what we like to call the 'bench to path ratio'.  The benches are plentiful and thoughtfully positioned throughout the grounds so that anyone taking a walk, if they wish, can frequently stop for a rest and take in the views.  

On this particular morning , the benches were still wet with due but they caught my eye along with the dramatic colours and sunlight, their positioning really adding a sense of scale and subject to my composition. 

This one bench scene caught my eye with the sunlight glistening through the trees and I just couldn't stop capturing it from different angles, undecided which was the best...

When I'm faced with a scene like this, you'd think I might be satisfied to move on after capturing it, but no. I always have to go closer to stand under the tree and look up into the canopy.  The patterns and shapes made by the branches and sunlight shining through the leaves I find really compelling and hard to come away from.

I do love a sunset, but it's not recommended to stare directly into the sun.  However, I've photographed so many sunrises and sunsets in my life that I've probably damaged my eyesight doing so.  Sometimes the sun is too bright to photograph when it is still setting.  That's when a tree in the foreground becomes very useful and the silhouette effect can be very dramatic.  This particular tree in Ashburnham always catches my eye, particularly at sunset: