Barnard Castle, County Durham, Spring
Apologies for the delay since my last post.
Apologies for the delay since my last post.
Things have been on the change again, personally. Also, this last week I’ve endured a rather nasty stomach bug. The less said about that the better.
A couple of weekends ago, Lisabet and I decided to move away from countryside-based adventures and check a wee little town you may have heard of (if you’re British and follow the news): Barnard Castle.
The charming historical town gained unfortunate notoriety in 2020 when Dominic Cummings, the chief advisor to the British Prime Minister, was found to have traveled there with his family during the first UK lockdown of the COVID-19 pandemic. Given his close contact with the infected Prime Minister, Cummings was at a substantial risk of carrying the virus himself (he exhibited symptoms the following day). Media accusations of violating lockdown rules emerged, to which Cummings explained that he had driven to the town to test his eyesight in order to reassure his wife of his ability to drive them back to London the next day.
Regardless of all of that, Barnard Castle sits in a beautiful area, which we explored to also take in the sights of the ruins of Eggleston Abbey.
A moody day for photography.
All photos taken on my Fujifilm X-T2 using my Vivitar “Series 1” 28–105mm f2.8–3.8 zoom and Laowa 9mm f2.8 prime lenses. RAWs developed in Capture One for iPad, edited and finalised in Affinity Photo for iPad.
Barnard Castle, Country Durham, Spring by Ian Cylkowski is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
The circular round tower of the Barnard Castle itself, one of the main features of the ruins that still stands. Daffodils lined the path around the ruins on a moody day.
Barnard Castle, the town, is chock-full of yards (alleys) like this, which always draw my eye for a photo.
We found the streets of Barnard Castle to be well kept, with plenty of independent shops and eateries, occasionally peppered with some more mainstream brands.
Below the castle ruins this handsome bridge caught a sliver of golden afternoon light.
We followed the country road from Barnard Castle to Egglestone Abbey. The moody and changeable day followed us. Here a table-tomb pointed towards some of the last standing walls of the abbey ruins.
The abbey was constructed in the late 12th century by Premonstratensian monks. Like all other abbeys in England, it was dissolve din 1540 by King Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries.
These days the ruins are in the custody of English Heritage, and access is free. I highly recommend a visit if you’re ever in the area.
Did you like these photos?
The Peace Of Time
Lisabet and I have visited quite a few abbey ruins in our time, and there’s a common feeling we experience when visiting them: a sense of peace.
I wonder what inspires it? Is it because the ancient monks who built these monuments found places that were inherently peaceful? Is it the sense of time and age, seeing the crumbling ruins and the sheer awareness of history? I don’t know. But we can feel our blood pressure lower when being in these incredible monuments of time and history.
This photo is from Furness Abbey, in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, once the second-most powerful Cistercian abbey in the country behind Fountains Abbey in Yorkshire. The small child running into the ruins just as I took the shot really helps to give the place a human scale and size.
Camera: Sigma dp0 Quattro
Lens: built-in 14mm ƒ/4.0
ISO: 100
Aperture: ƒ/8.0
Shutter speed: 1⁄160
Software: Sigma Photo Pro, Nik Collection, Affinity Photo