Saturday, January 24, 2004

Not So Duff Duffryn

As Elis is starting to feel a bit better we took him out today to get some fresh air. Mrs Dio has recently been taking him out to Dyffryn Gardens, a few miles outside Cardiff in the Vale of Glamorgan. I'd been there once before with Mrs Dio, probably about 10 years ago. I don't remember having been impressed before - it had been expensive to get in and I didn't think it worth the money.

I'd spotted the other week that it was free entry during the winter months, so I though it was worth another go, to take a few photos and all. Mrs Dio has taken Elis there a couple of times recently (as a nice change from St Fagans) and said I would enjoy a revisit. So after a quick 10 minute trip in the car we arrived and I was ready to get snapping. We didn't have long to visit as it shuts at 4 during the winter and we got there just after 3.

There's a big old house (which I'm assuming is Dyffryn House) and loads of varied gardens. Everything was bare and skeletal - almost perfect golden hour light and nice skies with an occasional rainbow. In time honoured fashion a did my best to annoy Mrs Dio by running around snapping at stuff and leaving her holding Elis and turning around to talk at dead air as I'd stopped 10 paces back to take some shots. Here are some of the nicer ones.

We barely covered any ground in the short time we had. There were lots of paths and hidden little gardens we didn't have the time to follow. I think the last time we went there my head was in a completely different place and didn't enjoy it. This time, camera in hand I really enjoyed it and can see us going back fairly often in the near future.

On the way back we stopped in the Marks and Spencer multi-storey (I remember when that was all fields) and Mrs Dio had a quick trip to Tesco whilst I stayed in the car with Elis who was napping. To amuse myself I got the camera out and shot loads of shaky shots to get some nice abstract photos which will make good bits for making swanky graphics or indeed work nice on their own. I can hear Nursey banging on the door with a copyright infringement order right now.