WINTERS IN MID-WALES - TEMPEST, FLOODS AND SNOW (OCCASIONALLY)!

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When I first took up landscape photography I learned via trial and error but after a couple of years doing this (and identifying the errors!) I found that where I got the most satisfaction from my results was by creating a sense of being there, a sense of place.

I learned a lot wandering around NW Scotland, where the landscapes are incredibly and starkly dramatic, but on returning to Wales, where a softer beauty often prevails, I learned to adapt. It was at this point that the weather started to creep in...

My storm-photography back in the early 1990s was more focussed on catching big coastal events, floods and snow than convective weather. I didn't really understand meteorology at all, especially thunderstorms which so often seemed to take me by surprise!

Since then, as I hope the newer pages show, I've been learning a great deal of "met" and am eager for more! Here is a selection of non-thundery pix, featuring some of the more spectacular aspects of winter in Mid-Wales, stretching back from early 2003 all the way to the time that I worked out which way round you point the camera!



This was the Burns' Day Storm of January, 1990, hammering Borth at high tide. I drove down past fallen trees, round a boat on its roof in the middle of the road and wedged myself between a lamp-post and the sea-front railings to get this....





Sometime back then too: I was fascinated with the effects seen in breaking waves during really big seas. This was taken at the harbour at Aberystwyth...





A winter's flood in the Dyfi Valley. Such floods happen maybe 3 times a year on average, mainly in the winter. The roads out of town get blocked at Dyfi Bridge (A487 northward) and near Morben Hall at Derwenlas on the Aberystwyth road.

The most hazardous bit isn't Dyfi Bridge itself but under the railway bridge where there is a dip in the road. Every year diesel engines end up "bent" after people have tried to drive through 2ft of water, unaware that their air-intake is low down!

Occasionally the Newtown road is also badly flooded and then we're an island!!







Standing floodwater can make an interesting subject for photography, although the tricky bit is getting to a useable vantage-point!





A bit of sunlight helps though! This is part of Borth Bog after the Leri burst its banks in the Burns Day Storm, 1990.





This one's a bit "flary" but a clearance has arrived late on a winter's afternoon, meaning the shot of Machynlleth Station and the flooded valley beyond was taken straight into the sun. Road closed, railway open!





Onto more wintry things. This is Plynlimon from Hyddgen, mid 1990s. Two ways of describing this: a) The moorgrass gives texture to the foreground or b) I can almost hear it whispering in the wind. I prefer the latter!






March 1995 and a heavy overnight snowfall is followed by an "Alpine" day! This is taken from where I lived in the late 1990s, up above Machynlleth.






On Moel Fadian, between Machynlleth and Dylife, in the depths of winter, early 1990s - and it was bitterly cold up there, especially after sunset....





Across the Dyfi Valley from the top of the Common. The ridge in the background is Tarrenhendre. March 1995.





February 2003: The top of Penygadair (Cadair Idris) from the upper slopes of Mynydd Pencoed, with the late afternoon sun illuminating the crags.

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