A wrong Thurne
A lot of time in recent weeks was spent preparing for my wedding but now I'm married and back from honeymoon it's left me time to get back to some landscape photography. Autumn is a brilliant time for landscapes, misty mornings, colour in the trees and with sunrise at a much more civilised time, the amount of locations within easy reach increases a well. With that in mind I've started to turn my attentions over the border into Norfolk and the Broads.
First place on my long list was Thurne, a small village on the river Thurne (surprisingly) in the heart of the Norfolk Broads and with not one but two drainage mills on opposite sides of the river it seemed like as good a place as any to start. I did my usual research in advance... checking places to park, location of footpaths and potential viewpoints on google maps then had a look at what had already been done on by other photographers on Flickr (some of who were only too happy to give a few tips on where to go). Closer to the time I checked the weather on various (and all differing) online sites and where and when the sun would rise on the Photographers Ephemeris before finally getting a postcode for the sat nav and I was ready to go.
On the morning of the shoot (well it was still night technically) the sky was disappointingly clear but I thought there might be a chance of mist so I set off as planned. As the sunrise probably wouldn't be too spectacular I decided to go to the east bank of the river aiming to catch some nice warm side lighting on Thurne Mill before shooting the other mill across the river and as I got closer the hoped for mist materialised. However on arriving at the river I found boats moored along both sides of the inlet blocking my view of the mill and couldn't even see the mill just down the river on the opposite bank through the thick mist... disaster!
No problem, plan B was a simple one, cross over to the west bank... a frantic 15 minute drive and sweaty ten minute walk later I was there. I'd missed the little bit of pre dawn colour in the sky but there was always the chance of an interesting shot once the sun came up high enough to backlight the mill with the mist acting as a nice big diffuser. I met another photographer on the walk who showed me the way down to the river bank where there was a landscape workshop taking place which although it spoilt the solitude meant I picked up a couple of free overheard tips and had no shortage of other photographers to chat to while I waited for the light.
So as I was setting up my gear and thinking I'd rescued a potentially wasted 3 hour round trip, I discovered I'd left my filter holder in the car! For a split second I thought about going back to get it but settled for metaphorically kicking myself and holding the filters in front of the lens by hand instead.
After all the minor set backs I did finally get a couple of photos of the mill emerging from a misty river and left content that at least I had some first hand knowledge of this beautiful location for next time and had made a couple of new like minded acquaintances in the process... time well spent.