I took a walk recently into the mountains just past Braemar on the East coast of Scotland. It was one of my landscape discovery walks and i do these to search out new locations, searching for points of interest, leading lines, and perhaps lone trees in the landscape. On this walk, as you can see, there is only this little river meandering through the valley. It wasnt cold and i was wrapped for the occasion, but as i walked with various thoughts and emotions from things id done in the past, i realised that as i walk to a location, i do this often. Once i see what appeals to me in the landscape though, i switch into a type of meditation and all thoughts and emotions stop and i can spend hours jumping around trying to find the stillness in the image, because thats how i feel inside myself. Yet to show this, is not so easy, yet i hope when you look at this photo, you can picture yourself walking along this route. If your stressed out and look at perhaps a video of my photography, you will be calm by the end because that it what i seek to show. There are rarely any people in my images, because where i go to find the images, not many other people go to.
I took this photo on the train to Edinburgh with my Leica monochrome, where i was going to meet my sons Lewis and Bradley for a night out. As you can see , i am in first class as i like peace and quiet on the train. In most carriages people are talking to each other, on their phones or have headphones in and dont really chat, so i decided it best i join them in being a solitary traveller. Anyway as i sat on my seat, i was joined by a young lad, who sat down, with his headphones on and never lifted his eyes from the screen of his phone. I presume rightfully so, that he didnt look like he should be in first class, but i was trying not to judge him, so left that thought alone. It wasnt long before a conductor came along and asked for tickets, to which he was caught sitting in the wrong class of carriage. When he asked how much to upgrade, it was too much for him and he got up and left. It was after this that i thought i could pay for him to remain, but he never talked nor made eye contact with me. If he'd made an effort, i would have paid for him to remain in his seat. I find it sad that no one likes to speak to strangers anymore when they are travelling. In the "olden days", meeting new people on your travels was what it was all about and i had some great times on planes and trains as i went on my way to some new country.
