11th of November 2010 at the Menin Gate in Ieper (Ypres)

I had edited this clip and uploaded it hoping to post it yesterday but YouTube took too long to process it (they have been a bit rubbish lately). The clip contains a few of the highlights of the 11 O' Clock ceremony at the Menin Gate, in Ieper (Ypres), Belgium, on the 11th of November 2010. I am sorry about the shakiness of the clip but the wind was gusting to 100Kph (more than 60 Mph), which destroyed my cheap umbrella (I bought A Better Umbrella at the museum shop after the ceremony).

There are still a few days until Remembrance Sunday, so if you haven't already there is still time to buy a poppy or Buy Something Nice or just Make A Donation, to the annual poppy appeal.

The 11th hour of the 11th of November 2010
The Menin Gate Ieper (Ypres)

BBE

R.E. Grave Railway Wood, CWGC Cemetery. A Photo Post

R.E. Grave Railway Wood is, as far as I know, the smallest official CWGC cemetery in Belgium. It is quietly situated in farmland and commemorates some Troops killed in the underground war of the tunnels and mines that happened in this part of Belgium. I found it difficult cemetery to photograph but I thought that I would post the pictures anyway. A video post should follow shortly.

for further information try the following links
R.E. Grave CWGC
R.E. Grave Wikipedia

BBE

Panasonic FZ38/35, playing with my new toy, trying out the video

Some local wildlife provided me with the opportunity to test out the video function on this camera and it is a lot of fun working out how it works. I am particularly impressed with with the Power OIS image stabilization, check out how steady the close up shot of the water bird at the end of the video is. This was taken hand held and you can see how long the focal length of the lens was when the image is zoomed out. I never thought that I could get a shot like that without a tripod.

Birds on the lake

BBE

Panasonic FZ38/35, playing with my new toy

Finally I have a new camera. It is a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ38 (FZ35 in the USA). It is a bridge camera with an 18 X zoom that starts at the equivalent of 27mm, for a 35mm film camera. It has a 12.1 mega pixel capability and can produce video at 720dpi. The leica optics are very impressive. I would have liked a Digital SLR but to put a decent kit together, based on one of these, was just too far out of my budget. I am more than happy with this camera though, it is so nice to have control over aperture and shutter speed again. I am still getting used to it at the moment but I have got some stills to show off.

Apart from a tiny bit of cropping, this picture comes unaltered directly from the camera

A sort of still life scene at about mid range of the zoom

The contrast and colours where deliberately mucked about with, on the computer, for this image, to find out how far I could push an image from this camera

A full wide angle landscape

This was taken at full zoom (about the equivalent of 360mm on a 35mm film camera) and then heavily cropped on the computer. I would estimate that you are only seeing about 6.5-7 mega pixels here

Full zoom with a tiny bit of cropping on the computer

I am hoping to master the video function on this camera, to post an example of what it can do with the moving image soon.

BBE

Breda and all that jazz, May and June 2010

Breda and it's jazz festival

This month I visited Breda, in The Netherlands and got one or two shots of it's older more peaceful areas but back in May I was lucky enough to catch a bit of the Annual Jazz Festival that is held there. Breda is a nice city and although I could not spend a week there, I think that it is worth a day of anyone's time. The clip starts with some general views of Breda, taken in June and then goes on to show a little of the Jazz Festival from May.

BBE

De Panne Beach 70 years after Operation Dynamo, May 2010

Operation Dynamo AKA The Dunkirk evacuation took place 70 years ago this May. I'm not one for going to too many ceremonies and so I decided to mark the occasion in my own little way, with a walk along one of the beaches that the evacuation took place on. The operation took place on beaches stretching from Dunkirk in France to the Belgian beach at De Panne. I decided to make my little remembrance on the De Panne beach, where I walked from De Panne town beach to just over the French border and back. The weather was not clement and the walk made me wonder what it must have been like there back in the desperate days of 1940 but the numbers of people enjoying the beach, even on a day like that, did make me think that the peace, that the sacrifices of the Second World War gave to Western Europe, is something that we should thank the men and women of that time for.

De Panne Beach 70 years on

BBE

The Zoete Markt (Suger Market) Kemmel May 2010 - A photo post

As promised in This Post, here are some pictures of the Zoete Markt in Kemmel.

The eco friendly park and ride taxi

Plenty of treats around

Including these strawberries freshly dipped in white chocolate

Treats from all over

there where lots of stands selling the specialties from towns around Belgium

Only in Belgium

Beer tarts!

And a souvenir

I bought home a bottle of the local Mede (Mead in English, honey wine), delicious. Everything else that I purchased, I ate at the Market.

BBE

The Zoete Markt (Suger Market) Kemmel May 2010

Apologies for absence

I do apologize for my extended absence from this blog and hope to re boot it and bring it back to life from now on but how frequently, I cannot say.

The Kemmel Zoete Markt (Sweet Market)

Every Pinkstermaandag (Whit Monday) every year, the small village of Kemmel holds it's Zoete Markt. Where traders and makers of Sweets (Candy), cakes, tarts and just about anything else that would make your dentist cringe, gather from all over Belgium to show off and sell their local speciality. This year I managed to get to this market. The weather was gorgeous and it was a pleasant surprise to find that the event was being held in the parkland around the local Chateau this year as there are extensive road works going on in the village squire, where it is normally held. The following clip is of some of the displays at the event and starts off by showing the rather nice (not to mention free) park and ride system that was in operation. Hopefully I will be able to post a few photos of the event in a couple of days.

The clip of the Zoete Markt

BBE

A tale of going home through the snow for Christmas - And thank you the staff and crew of The Pride Of Burgundy

The port of Calais in the snow

Well The trip back to the UK was taken on the 19th of December which was a day with many snow related travel problems, as you can see HERE and HERE. What should have been a less than two hour trip to Calais turned into an about eight hour nightmare, although we were not so bad off as the people on the other side of the Channel, trying to get to France, some of whom had to spend more than 24 hours stuck on the UK motorway, the M20. It was too dark to get video on the motorway, during our five hour sit in a tailback but I got some footage of the port of Calais and the ferry trip across the Channel, shown in the following clip.

Ferry's in the snow, December 2009

All the hassle was worth it in the end, as Christmas was spent seeing family that I had not seen for 12 months, including.........

This little Guy

My bright and shiny, new Great Nephew (as in the son of my nephew)

Thank you to the staff and crew of the P&O ferry
The Pride Of Burgundy
in the early afternoon of the 19th 0f December 2009

On a day when so many organizations and companies were letting people down a lot of tired, cold and disgruntled passengers got on board this boat at this time and where treated with calm, friendly professionalism, from a staff of whom many had stayed on for an extra shift after completing their night shift (according to an announcement on the ships PA system) to help clear the backlog of travelers. The journey on the ferry was a calming experience on a very bad day thanks to the guys and gals working on board. It was very much appreciated.

And no I do not make money from P&O on this blog, I just appreciate people who do a good job of work in difficult circumstances.

BBE

Happy New Year

Best wishes for 2010

And that photograph is of the whiter than normal cliffs of Dover, that I took from the ferry, on the rather eventful trip back to the UK for the Christmas festivities but more about that in the next post. Until then I hope that you all enjoyed or are enjoying your New Year festivities and have the best of luck for 2010.

BBE