Tag Archive: Travel

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Travel

Copenhagen – Part 2

Finally finished editing down my shots from Copenhagen… Here’s a few of my favourites. The rest are here.

Facade

Walker

Nyhaven

Reflection

Deck

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Travel

Copenhagen – Part 1

Just back from a few days in Copenhagen this weekend. Couldn’t resist opening up Lightroom when I got in and processing a few shots. A few of my favourites below from the 4Gig I shot. Ooops.

A great place to spend time. Felt very Dutch in many ways. More text and images to follow.

Car Park

Weequizzie

Rooflight

Dreamlike

Grid

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Architecture Photography Travel

Abbaye du Thoronet

Still collecting together some of my photos from the last few months. On my recent trip to France with work we took a trip to see the incredible Abbaye du Thoronet. It is quite simply the most beautiful building I have ever experienced. Whilst it was a little crowded with tourists the strong shadows and detail of the stone are incredible. I managed to get through two rolls of film whilst there. I would love to spend a week there just watching the changing light and documenting it through photography.

Here’s a few of my favourite shots from the visit.

Roofs | Tiles | Steeple

Light pools

Arch | Steps | Handrail

Through the window

Texture

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Architecture Photography Travel

Unité school

A few more shots uploaded to Flickr. Will write a full blog post soon.

Unité school

Les Arcs 2010 – The Camping Trip

I’ve been going to Les Arcs for a summer mountainbiking trip since 2004 with my good friend Gavin. A number of others have joined us over the years but Gav and I seem to have been the constant amongst the groups. The summer trip to Les Arcs seems to have become a bit of a tradition and we’ve ended up going in 2005, 2006, 2007. For 2008 we went to Scotland for a week instead to ride the 7 Stanes trails, 2009 was a year off due to me studying for my Part 3. But 2010 was back on to the usual annual trip. This year it was me, Matt, Vaughan and Gavin all travelling in his superb Fiat Scudo van.

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Man & machine in perfect harmony – Photo © Gavin Hutton

Previous trips to Les Arcs have always been with TrailAddiction which we’ve always had a great time on. This year we decided to have a bit of a change and go solo as well as sorting out our own accommodation. We managed to find a pretty nice little campsite at the bottom of the main lift in Bourg-St-Maurice. Of course the family tent made another appearance as did the warm weather!

Jazz hands
Happy campers – © Andy Matthews

Whenever other riders ask me what riding in the Alps is like I always used to say “Well it’s a bit like riding in Wales only longer and a bit steeper“. The first days riding really rammed home the point that I’d been spouting utter bullshit for quite sometime. You really do forget just how steep, exposed, rooty and rocky the riding is. It’s great but the first day certainly makes you draw a few sharp breaths over some of the trails. It’s hard to capture just how steep some things are but we all spent a lot of our time just hanging off the back of the saddles. It’s pretty exhilarating and your riding goes up a few notches instantly. Smiles all round after our first days riding too.

Vaughan
Rooty rocky stuff – © Andy Matthews

On the Monday we actually did have a guide for the day from TrailAddiction, Ali, whom we’ve spent lots of time riding with previously. He showed some great new trails as well as a few favourites such as White 8, a variation on the popular, and pretty worn out Black 8. We also used the newly opened Vanoise Express lift at Villandry to get over to the La Plagne side of the valley. The lift is simply incredible! Being in a metal and glass box 380m above the valley floor is quite an experience. Ali showed us some real corkers of trails over the other side. Some really steep and rocky stuff as well as some really nice flowy singletrack. We came back over to the Les Arcs side of the valley and finished on Chicane down to Bourg.

Tuesday we just headed out in our usual lazy fashion after a good breakfast and coffee to get some more riding in. There rarely was a plan but we all liked number 10 and found ourselves up that way a few times. This year there were large patches of snow left in some of the higher sections of the trail. This allowed for some pure comedy stacks from Gavin & Vaughan as well as a few great team photos on it. A nice soft landing to stack it on though so nothing damaged. From this lift we also did Ridgeride but again this is so worn out it really wasn’t worth it. One trail that did seem to hit the spot was Lakeride. Getting out at one of the higher lifts and then heading down an enormous scree slope to find the top of the trail was great fun. On the 2nd time down Matt led the way on the snow and has quite a talent for it. Megavalanche next perhaps? The rest of us followed are seeing that he hadn’t died.

The quicker way down
Matt’s off ski-biking – © Andy Matthews

After the mucking around there’s actually a really decent trail to be had which starts with a fairly rocky section and ends in a beautiful open series of switch backs to the lake. So the earlier part looks something like this…

Lakeride
Rocky trails – © Andy Matthews

…and ends looking something like this. You can just about see the rest of the trail in the background with a few riders on.

Vaughan
Singletrack switchbacks – © Andy Matthews

Weds was a rest day. Hey, three of us were on hardtails and getting pretty beaten up. Time to have a trip out somewhere. We went up out of Bourg up to Pic St-Bernard and then over into Italy into the Mont Blanc tunnel and over to Annecy for lunch. After lunch and a wander around we hired a speedboat dingy with an outboard. Matt & I jumped in for a dip whilst Vaughan & Gav stayed on pretending to be in Miami Vice. The water was incredibly warm and so nice to swim in. Didn’t really want to come back in to the boat.

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Swimmers – © Gavin Hutton

The idea was to spend the rest of the week in Chamonix trying out trails there. Seeing as we’d been having so much fun in Les Arcs and we couldn’t really be arsed moving the tent, well, we stayed put. The riding seemed to get better in the week as we pieced together the trails a bit more and also tried out some others such as Grange Hill, Moist Nun etc. We still covered a few of the favourites too as well as the Cachette DH course which I really can’t stand!

A cracking week was had, the weather was superb as was the banter and of course the riding was the best yet! No massive mechanicals apart from the usual forks spewing oil and brakes overheating. Also no real injuries either. Vaughan damaged his thumb fairly early on but nothing too major. It was great riding in a smaller group than normal. We’re all fairly competent riders and evenly matched, with Matt probably being the fastest (usually as his brakes don’t work). Here’s a few of my favourite photos from the trip.

Hayfever ParadiseHayfever – © Matt Noble

For days they trudged....Snow trek – © Matt Noble

Gav in the greeneryGav in the greenery – © Matt Noble

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Rolling in – © Gavin Hutton

P1000469Team shot – © Gavin Hutton

More photos available on Flickr of course. Mine are here along with Gavin’s, Matt’s, and Vaughan’s are all online. The come down of being at work is horrendous. Roll on 2011!

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Family & friends Travel

Daisy retires

It was a sad day yesterday. I cancelled the car insurance, cleared out my Mum’s garage, reversed Daisy in, grabbed the tax disc on the way out and shut the door. I used to use her lots, away most weekends, back to Bath and generally nipping around. But recently I’ve started to use her less and less. She costs a fair bit too, £50 a month, £200 a year Car Tax and then the MOT and Diesel. It’s a shame but I’m taking her off the road for a while to see how I get on without a car. I’ve signed up to Street Car so I can use a car when I need it but I don’t see when I will yet. I know plenty of people who have cars and can always borrow the one from work.

She’s served me well. 30,000 miles, a trip to Les Arcs one year and countless muddy bikes in the bike. Daisy, we salute you!

Daisy daisy, I'm so in love with you..

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Cycling Photography Travel

Seb Rogers Alps Course

Not content with having two courses in the lovely Quantocks Seb Rogers has added an Alps Course to the mix in sunny Les Arcs.

Would love to go on this one in 2010. Couldn’t think of a better place to ride and take pictures. Lots of other destinations and activities vying for attention but this sounds pretty good.

SebAlpsCourse

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Family & friends Travel

Falmouth

Sitting in my sisters front room reading the paper and watching the world go by. I love this view!

Excuse the poor quality iPhone pic.

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Family & friends Travel

Off to Ireland

After surving the worst landing I have ever had, Emma and I have arrived in sunny Belfast. Off to Derry and then on to Donegal for a few days then back to Belfast for Jane’s 30th.. Think I should be sorted for photo of the day until Tuesday at least!

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Cycling found links London Travel Web

London | ghost bikes

I’ve seen a few of these bikes around recently but was pretty disturbed to see one appear on my route to work this morning. Don’t know what happened but it certainly makes you think!

London | ghost bikes.