Spring knocks on the door. Sunrises through young leaves, creating golden slumbers in the early sunlight. Vanishing as the sun climbs higher in the sky.
Spring is around the corner. The garden wakes up slowly, with the Forsythia claiming the first flowering spot.The Netherlands, Oegstgeest – February 2026
The Leiden Marathon as seen from the bicycle path, dedicated to one of the most successful Dutch professional cyclists, Joop Zoetemelk near Rijpwetering.
The Dutch landscape has low horizons and is flat (but not as a pancake). Canals cut through it. Bicycle paths offer easy access for exploring. These photos are just behind the dunes at Noordwijk. They are at the edge of the Maandagse Wetering. On the horizon is Voorhout.
Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #350 (congratulations!) is ‘zooming’. A zoomlens gets you nearer to the subject, and can be used for lots of creative effects. The brief for this LAPC is to be creative, but in this photo I used the zoom just to get closer to a section of the ‘full picture’ of the Surrey Scholar on High Street in Guildford. The zoom puts the statue in a different light, taking the context away.
In The Netherlands, all trees are bi-annualy inspected for risks, like falling over during a storm, to prevent calamities and discomfort. Its aim is to prevent and control future situations. In a way this makes sense, if you can prevent accidents, what is not to be liked about that? On the other hand you are never sure when they come down, but you do know that it will happen! At times with severe storms, trees tend to come down on roads and motorways or train tracks. C’est la vie, say the French. Luckily, in England one can enjoy the odd dead, broken, fallen over or not too healthy tree like this one. Let nature be nature, enjoy the ride.
The iPhone has a cute panorama feature. The result of a pan shot is the above. I wonder if you could ‘turn it around’ so that it looks more like a wide angle/fisheye shot. That would look more natural to me. Anyone has any ideas? Now it looks like a view from a corner.