Winter Wonderland

I'm feeling rather quite chuffed tonight. Yesterday's Trees In Conversation won the Calumet Photo of the Week Competition. Not counting the two fell races which I've won (both in the same golden week), this is the first competition I've won since I scooped a third share of the winning £5 prize in a mathematical puzzle contest some 35 years ago. On that occasion I was pretty sure I had found the optimum solution and couldn't be beaten - and it was actually pretty cool that two other people had found exactly the same answer. This win, though, was a very delightful surprise. To be fair, I did really like the picture (and thanks to all of you who agreed), but it was up against so many wonderful photographs. It's not announced with any great fanfare so I only found out when someone left a comment. That was a pretty cool moment!

The forecast snow duly arrived last night and this morning we woke up to a veritable winter wonderland. I took some street photographs which I really like, from Brook Street first thing, here, and then from Market Square on the way to the office, and with a similar sledging theme, here. This was real winter weather today, and full credit to everyone involved in keeping the buses and trains running. They did a pretty good job.

I chose this one over the street photos because it simply best captures the feel of the day for me. Snow was sticking to the trees like icing, a pristine white winter plumage. I headed to this track at lunchtime, having a hunch that it would be this beautiful. It's a bit of a shortcut into Shipley from the village of Baildon. Indeed, it's actually hard to believe this is just a 5 to 10 minute walk from Market Square. I was hoping someone would turn up to provide a bit of foreground interest and right on cue this woman appeared. I couldn't have asked her to dress more appropriately, with the umbrella the perfect accessory. Thank you Blip Gods!