It was Sunday and the most recent spell of drab weather came to a welcome close, replaced by clear cold skies and gentle nodding cumulus clouds. As the light began to intensify towards the end of the afternoon, the colours on the branches of the Copper Beeches around me were set ablaze, the gorgeous orange and gold leaves dancing in the late November sunshine. It was a perfect moment in which to capture the final moments of autumn before the long dark winter finally arrived to take centre stage. Or at least it would have been if I hadn’t been sitting in the back seat of a Ford Mondeo on the A38, watching the countryside pass by at seventy miles per hour. Doesn’t it seem to always happen when you’re otherwise occupied?
We were on our way home from the latest weekend Rugby related escapade at Twickenham, where England had squeaked past the world champions from South Africa by a single point. Although it’s five years since I was introduced to the world of Rugby Union I’m still thoroughly confused. I understand the basics, such as how the scoring works and that the ball can’t be thrown forwards, but every time a penalty is awarded, I’m at a total loss as to why. With not even the faintest grasp of why “going in from the side” is considered so heinous, or why “not releasing” is a punishable offence, I’m often made to feel particularly out of kilter with the rest of the world by my in laws. While in much of England the oval ball game is often regarded as the preserve of the upper echelons, in Cornwall it belongs to the people; especially in the part of the county that I call home, where Rugby is practically a religion and Ali’s family regard my lifelong love for football with barely disguised bemusement. Her nephew Brett played professionally for a while, although not for long as he still has a straight nose and ears that look like more or less like ears – it’s a brutal game. I stopped playing as soon as it was no longer compulsory at school and never felt tempted to return to the field.
The upshot of the weekend levity was that Monday would bring a small delay to what would almost certainly be my final chance to capture the transient autumn hues, and Lee and I had decided to start at Respryn Wood and then double back to Ladock later on. The morning delivered a pleasant walk through the beautiful woodland alongside the River Fowey, but the lack of colour, the jumbled assembly of trees and the harsh mid-morning light found us beginning to understand why photographs of trains fill the page if you type “Respryn” into the search bar on this platform. Yet again the colours that we’d found so abundantly along the roadside were almost completely absent on entry into the canopy, and what we did find proved to be compositions that were beyond our photographic wits. We didn’t linger long, both of us having skipped breakfast in anticipation of an early lunch break at Cornwall Services, and for much of the day it seemed that the pizza outlet in the middle of the concourse would provide the highlight of the entire outing. In fact, perhaps it did.
We arrived at Ladock early in the afternoon, where I was keen to return to a composition I’d spotted on an earlier visit in May. Slipping and sliding along the muddy paths where tractors driven by lumberjacks had churned the mud into a soupy slurry, I led the way to the place that sat so clearly in my mind from six months earlier, only to find that it had seemed to have mysteriously moved to another part of the forest. That’s the thing about Ladock Wood – you think you’ve got your bearings but then it gradually dawns on you that you know nothing beyond where the car park is. Much of the forest is planted with rows of dark Spruce trees, tall and sterile, where nothing else grows and birdsong is eerily absent. Here and there you’ll find patches of indigenous woodland; much prettier, although usually more difficult to photograph as well. When I did finally chance upon the glade of Alder trees I’d been searching for, it quickly became obvious that the light wasn’t going to hit this part of the wood in the way I needed it to at this time of year. Worse still, there was no foliage left at all, just bare branches stretching away from the silvery trunks. I sighed and wondered whether it was time to abandon woodland capers until next spring. It seemed a lot easier in the bluebell season you know.
Further on we skittered along the heavy sludge filled path that coated the sides of our wellies, with little sense of purpose, eventually heading off in different directions, occasionally crossing paths at the edges of the dark silent Spruce filled plantation. As the pockets of light began to disappear, I realised I was alone, blundering through a variety of compositions, never truly convinced by any of them. At the end of the golden hour, I found myself somewhere in the north western side of the forest, on a patch of high ground with my camera pointed at the last stubborn group of orange trunks among the shadows. This, I was sure was the moment I’d been waiting for, and as I skated along the perilous path one last time, congratulating myself on not actually having fallen over at any point, I felt sure I’d got the shot I was going to share with you. Although it seems I hadn’t because it’s not the one that I’ve posted alongside this tale.
Later in the pub, we examined each others’ photos over a pint as we usually do. Lee had taken a shot of the sun bursting through the trees with lovely leading lines made by shadows that I was sure would be a winner, while he burst into excited animation over a flaming orange copse on the back of my camera. So of course, it was inevitable that we would each ignore the other’s reactions completely and both post a shot from the same moment of the day. It was immediately after the disappointment of the Alders that we walked towards a patch of dazzling illumination through the deep cover of the Spruces and found this small tree, caught by vivid sunlight for a few fleeting moments.
So that’s it. Autumn is over and we agreed that it was a bit of a relief to be thinking about all things coastal in the coming months. I know where I am on a big empty beach when the tide is out or the storms are raging. It’s a lot less confusing than trying to arrange unruly trees on a three inch screen and it’s a lot easier to take a passable shot. On the plus side, my success at staying on my feet on surfaces that seemed hell bent on sending me tumbling to the ground has seen me completing my entry form for the next season of “Dancing on Ice.” As the common law uncle of a former minor league sporting icon in a small town at the back and beyond of nowhere in particular, I feel confident that the celebrity credentials required to appear on such a programme are suitably fulfilled. If it goes well, one day I might even have servants to clean the mud from my wellies for me.