Yesterday and today I managed to get out for a walk around the hills near Tracey’s house, and explore the farms in the surrounding areas. This is all part of my 2023 Project which is all about the changing face of farming. The Past, the present and the future almost. What farming has done to sustain itself almost. There are some great examples of this in the hills above Walmersley, and these walks were all about sample shots of possible images that may or may not get shot for the eventual project.
You will see this sort of think more and more as you adventure into the hills. This is a classic diversification approach with the owners opening up small “cafes” or shops and sell things to the walkers, cyclists etc who venture along to these parts. This has grown over the last few years to such an extent that this morning every seat was taken. The punters enjoying pies, cakes, and drinks of all types. I can vouch for how fabulous the pies are here.
As we sat eating our purchases yesterday, I noticed this scene. The lovely flower on the table, but mostly I noticed that you can see the other sort of farm that exists, the wind farm. You can see these all in the distance without much effort but if you do like to see things a little clearer then use the binoculars that the owners have kindly put out so folk can see what’s ahead of them on their walk.
Soon to be unveiled to the public is this lovely table location, on a small jetty that juts out into the lodgeside water. A pleasant place to have a drink and take in the sun (when it makes an appearance that is). I like the frame in frame nature of this image, is is a fair major crop into the original image but that is ok given the 35 megapixel sensor in my Sony Alpha7 iv.
One of the complimentary themes of this project is the “wind farm”. I’m all for these and this frame in frame caught my eye as we walked back after sampling the cafe pies. You can also see the derelict old farm buildings in the middle distance, which I guess is farming in the “past”.
This is a sign of further diversification on this farm. It’s not unusual to see a tractor on a farm, but this one has the branding of the plant hire business that has sprung up from this farm.
A farm wouldn’t complete without some animals, and yesterday we ran into this gorgeous beast as we walked through the farm grounds. He trotted over to the fence as was more than happy for me to stroke him, im not normally a lover of animal images but I like this one.
All these images were taken hand held on my Sony Alpha 7iv with the 24 to 70 f2.8 GM II lens.