Last colors in the Lake District

We rented a cottage near Rosthwaite for four nights. Weather was miserable in the charming English way — low cloud, occasional sun, drizzle you could only sense on your face. Perfect for fall color on birches, if less perfect for a long lens.

The main subjects this trip were the colors themselves: birch gold, oak bronze, bracken going orange on the fellsides. I kept the telephoto on for compressing layers and only switched to the 23mm when I needed to get the whole valley in.

I also came across a few birds worth chasing — a Dipper working a beck just upstream of a stone bridge, a family group of Long-tailed Tits moving through a hazel hedge, and several Buzzards riding the afternoon thermals. The Dipper took an hour of sitting still. Worth it.

The cottage had a Border Terrier that was not ours but adopted us for the week, and a kitchen window that looked at a hawthorn full of fieldfares. I took a lot of photos through that window.

Best afternoon of the trip was walking back from the pub with the light failing over Derwent Water and mist coming down the fells. I didn’t take a single photo on that walk because my hands were full of a pint glass and I think it improved the memory.