Album A Sense of Place from Old Owl

Mirror

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Fri, 25 Apr 2025 01:53:09 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

May I wish a Happy Fence Friday to all. This is a picture taken by She (Who Must Be Obeyed). Rather Arcadian, isn't it.

Refreshment

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Mon, 19 Aug 2024 04:34:33 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

HAPPY WORLD PHOTOGRAPHY DAY 2024.

Each day I walk around the part of Mandurah where I live, usually with my phone camera but also occasionally with my Fuji. I often take photos of the same things each time: Town Beach, the marina, the estuary which runs through the town, the small Mandjar Bay which is part of the old town, shops and cafes and such things. Nothing that I photograph is special, but everything is special to me because it is the place in which my wife and I chose to live when we arrived in Australia in the year 2000. By photographing it I keep it in my heart and mind at all times. Soppy, I know, but who cares?

Ipernity has welcomed me, too. I like the idea that World Photography Day is an opportunity for all of us (or as many as wish to participate) to join together on the same day.

This picture is of the Sugar Lips mobile cafe which sits in the car park at the Silver Sands beach each morning. Many people pass here on walks or their journeys to work and get a coffee. Just over the hill there, where the couple are looking, is the Indian Ocean.

As I’ve said before, it might not be a perfect place, but it’s as close to paradise as an old reprobate like me is ever going to get.

Have a delightful day, won’t you.

Monument

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Wed, 03 Jan 2024 07:45:42 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

HWW everyone.

This is a wall of Prospect Cottage in Dungeness, Kent, which was the home of the artist, gardener, designer and film maker, Derek Jarman between 1986 and his death in 1994. The cottage is also the home of Derek Jarman’s garden in the shingle close to the beach at Dungeness and in the shadow of the nuclear power station. This garden is wonderfully sparse and is well worth your time if you visit. Be warned, however; it is not the lush, regimented growth of a formal plantation; rather it was made by a man who used its creation for his own therapy when he was desperately ill and thus it reflects both his vision and the landscape in which it appears.

On the wall, the first stanza and the last six lines of the poem “The Sunne Rising” by the 17th century poet, John Donne appear, created by hand carved wooden letters affixed to the timber of the cottage wall.

My picture does Prospect Cottage and the carving scant justice, my skills being insufficient for the task. It does, however, show what is a fine and much admired project by a fine and much admired artist. The book “Derek Jarman’s Garden”, published by Thames & Hudson, is worth reading and has some wonderful photographs by Howard Sooley.

The extract from "The Sunne Rising" is below. The spelling is the original 17th century style; modern versions are readily available on the internet.

Perhaps more clear if the picture is enlarged by pressing Z.

Busie olde foole, unruly Sunne;
Why dost thou thus,
Through windowes, and through curtaines call on us?
Must to thy motions lovers seasons run?
Sawcy pedantique wretch, goe chide
Late schoole boyes, and sowre prentices,
Goe tell Court-huntsmen, that the King will ride,
Call countrey ants to harvest offices;
Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clyme,
Nor houres, dayes, months, which are the rags of time.

Thou sunne art halfe as happy as wee,
In that the world's contracted thus;
Thine age askes ease, and since thy duties bee
To warme the world, that's done in warming us.
Shine here to us, and thou art every where;
This bed thy center is, these walls, thy spheare.

John Donne published “The Sunne Rising” in 1633.

Katitjin

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Wed, 29 Mar 2023 04:40:12 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Part of the wall which lines some of Perth Stadium at ground level close by the river. There are many different writings there in both the Whadjuk dialect and English. The stadium, like most of the rest of Perth, stands on what were the lands of the Whadjuk people of the Noongar nation. "Katitjin" means "knowledge" or "wisdom" in the Whadjuk dialect.

Have a Wonderful Wednesday Wall day. Stay safe and calm in the face of the various adversities which are currently facing us. And smile.

Patience

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Sun, 05 Feb 2023 11:40:26 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Stingray Wharf, Mandurah.

Not the best photo, I'm afraid. The scene was some distance from me and I was shaky having run/walked some distance on an increasingly hot morning, plus my iPhone skills are rather rudimentary.

The bird on the right is, of course, an Australian pelican; the one on the left is, I think, a Nankeen heron (sometimes called a night heron in these parts). I took this and walked on ... They were all still there, in more or less the same positions when I passed by 45 minutes later on my return journey. Now THAT is patience. I hope they were all rewarded by a feed from the estuary waters.

Gosh, I love this land.

Blink

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Fri, 30 Dec 2022 07:19:24 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

A Happy Final Fence Friday of 2022 to everyone. I hope your day, your New Year celebrations and the entirety of 2023 are pleasant, joyful and far, far better than 2022 seemed to be. Love to all.

This is one of the many canals in Mandurah, along which Madame Much Younger Owl and myself march briskly each morning early for our daily exercise and for the delight of seeing dolphins, swans, herons, egrets, ducks, terns, seagulls, other walkers (old and young) and their dogs. Life is good, innit.

Press Z to biggen it up.

Expanse

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Wed, 12 May 2021 13:31:38 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Lake Muir, WA

At the moment (autumn) this is a salt lake. When the winter rains begin it will gradually fill and then the water birds will arrive. In spring it will begin to dry and then in summer it will revert to a salt lake. It covers about 45 square kilometres and sits in the middle of nowhere!

As always, big is best. Please press Z.

Yellow

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Sun, 05 Sep 2021 02:57:16 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Yes, it's a cliché "out-of-the-car-window-at-110 kph" shot.

Yes, it's fuzzy from the movement and the grubby window.

Yes, you've seen pictures of canola fields and trees so many times that you've instinctively yawned.

And guess what? I don't care. I like it.

Somewhere north of Woodanilling in the Great Southern region, Western Australia on our way home from Esperance.

Far

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Fri, 05 Mar 2021 03:04:54 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

HFF, everyone. I hope you are all well and that the weekend will bring you joy.

This is Busselton Jetty again.

(Biggen it up by pressing Z. It's a very long jetty - almost 2 kilometres - so would appreciate being seen larger.)

Protected

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Sat, 13 Jun 2020 13:16:37 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Alnmouth, Northumberland. Houses protected from the sea and wind by dunes.

An attempt to emulate both Edward Hopper and Andrew Wyeth. Minimal success, but the attempt was worth the effort, the time and the thought processes.

EDIT. Rather than "emulate", which is impossible to do given the collective visionary genius of Wyeth and Hopper, I was attempting to "echo" their vision. Still a feeble attempt, but still worth the effort.

139

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Thu, 29 Aug 2019 23:31:56 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Happy Fence Friday one and all.

Stop 139, Acland Street, St Kilda.

Again?

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Mon, 04 Jun 2018 12:39:06 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Oh no, not another Northam sunset? (SOOC)

Fun

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Tue, 07 Nov 2017 12:37:31 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

It was a cold, windy and drizzling Monday morning in October on the east coast of Yorkshire. No-one was wanting to have fun ...

Bigger is brighter (Press Z, please.)

Care

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Wed, 28 Jun 2017 12:46:08 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

On a misty Northam winter morning ...

Height

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Mon, 13 Jun 2016 12:55:36 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Forgive the softness; picture taken through a window on the 40-somethingth floor.

Nice viewed large.

Mammon

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Sun, 12 Jun 2016 10:58:56 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Canary Wharf, from Wapping.

Home

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Sat, 13 Feb 2016 13:28:47 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Mandurah. From the Western foreshore. Summer Sunday morning. As close to paradise as an old reprobate like me will ever get.

Big it up and put it on black. (Press Z.)

Spin

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Mon, 28 Dec 2015 08:51:34 +0000

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View large. Press Z, please.

Johnston

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Wed, 16 Dec 2015 09:14:45 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Fitzroy, Melbourne

Break

nobody@ipernity.com (Old Owl) — Thu, 05 Nov 2015 11:49:24 +0000

Old Owl has posted:

Surfers Point, Margaret River, WA

Best on black (Press Z, please.)