Tuesday, 9 April 2013

Absolutely Steaming


Finding things to do over the Easter bank holiday was a bit of a challenge, given the freezing weather. On the Monday, we found our way to Westonzoyland pumping station, were there's a steam museum. The thinking was that its a steam museum, so it's bound to be warm, right?

Well, sort of. It was damned expensive to get in - £5 a head, although our five year old went free. And the place was basically a bunch of steam engines, which aren't really my thing, in an old shed. Who'd have thought?

But we set about the 'I Spy' quiz and whiled away a couple of hours. At three o'clock they fired up the main pumping engine and another half hour disappeared. Then tea and cake in the cafe, and off home to get warm.

The image above is of the main pump, taken using my Alpha 550 and Tamron super-zoom, which is really slooooow at the telephoto end. I'm inordinately proud of this photo, not because of the composition or the exposure, but because it was taken handheld at 1/10th. There's another image below, of the engine in operation, taken at the same shutter speed, just to prove that it wasn't a fluke.



No comments:

Post a Comment