Show Navigation

Search Results

Refine Search
Match all words
Match any word
Prints
Personal Use
Royalty-Free
Rights-Managed
(leave unchecked to
search all images)
{ 37 images found }

Loading ()...

  • It’s been 50 years since the original ‘tubular’ railway bridge burned down, so this year there has been much talk about this iconic piece of civil engineering, designed by Robert Stephenson and opened in 1850. <br />
<br />
When you stand under the bridge today, looking up at the gigantic steel arches, it’s shocking to realise just how much change occurred during the post-fire rebuilding. These steel arches never existed before. The concrete decks that now hold a highway, were not there before. The original wrought iron tubes are no longer there. The only original structures are the towers themselves. And yet whenever I think of this bridge I still imagine it’s been there forever.
    GD002556.jpg
  • GD000078.jpg
  • Early morning frost on the banks of the Menai Strait, Anglesey, with the beautiful Menai Suspension Bridge looming in the background, built and completed by Sir Thomas Telford in 1826. The stone circle is monumental rather than real.
    GD001767.jpg
  • Night time fog swirls in from the Irish Sea and up the Menai Strait, enveloping the Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826.
    GD001940.jpg
  • GD001104.jpg
  • Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826. Here the floodlit bridge spanning the Menai Strait is backed by snow covered Welsh mountains of Snowdonia
    GD000848.jpg
  • A year and a half on from my March Mist Series 2003, the Menai Suspension Bridge was once again shrouded in heavy mist. I was down at the water's edge at breakfast time and it was warm but quite eerie. The bridge occassionally disappeared into complete whiteness, but towards the end of the session a ghostly sun gently burnt through the mist, right in between the arch, and gave this wonderful mix of elemental conditions. Ten minutes later and the mist had evaporated to leave a gorgeous day.
    GD000466.jpg
  • GD000733.jpg
  • A year and a half on from my March Mist Series 2003, the Menai Suspension Bridge was once again shrouded in heavy mist. I was down at the water's edge at breakfast time and it was warm but quite eerie. From this angle, it was hard to see any of the pre rush hour traffic and in the silence, I was able to consider just how old and beautiful this bridge is, and the events and people in history that it's witnessed.
    GD000480.jpg
  • GD000684col.jpg
  • One of the most perfect stretches of road that we found in Namibia. Miles of perfect black tarmac with distinctive white markers created such geometry amongst thousands of acres of desert sand. As with most man-made things that I observed in Namibia, they all seemed slightly incongruous within such vast wilderness landscape.
    GD002285.jpg
  • This is one of the main roads into Southern Namibia, shortly after leaving the border control on the Orange River. We had passed an isolated garage and a few kms later an agriculturally based township, but then we went around a bend of an escarpment and over a hill, and were faced with this arid but incredible desert landscape. We drove for over an hour on this harsh dirt track, without seeing another car. There were no towns, no hamlets, no roadside stores, not even telegraph or electricity lines. It was barren. No animals to be seen, no birds of any sort and no signs of snakes or scorpions or in fact anything. Stepping outside the car I entered an oven of heat, into the 40ºs and surprising silence. The landscape was vast and I don’t think I’ve ever experienced such a huge, empty, lonely space - but I loved it, I enjoyed the vulnerability it created and the recognition that I was really, truly alive - as little else at that moment at least, seemed to be. <br />
<br />
I knew I was going to enjoy this country.
    GD002252.jpg
  • Thick morning fog envelops the Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826.
    GD000039-(2).jpg
  • Night time fog swirls in from the Irish Sea and up the Menai Strait, enveloping the Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826.
    GD001753.jpg
  • Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826.
    GD000041.jpg
  • The huge open desert becomes a blank canvas for Daliesque surrealism when incongrous objects suddenly appear out of nowhere. There was noyhing behind me and nothing beyond except for distant hills. <br />
<br />
To come across this derelict house, alongside a railway that stretches as far as the eye can see and on which we never saw a train, really did make us question ‘why’ and ‘who would have lived there’. Genuinely surreal and a taste of things to come in the deserted mining town miles ahead.
    GD002284.jpg
  • A hundred million years ago this huge basin in the Etosha National Park was a lake, fed by the Kunene River in Angola, but 16,000 years ago, due to tectonic plate movement the river was diverted West to the Atlantic and gradually the lake dried up leaving this vast lake bed. At 4800 km² this saltpan, the largest in Africa, can be seen from space.<br />
<br />
I’d wanted to see this surreal landscape for a long time, and surprising though it may seem to others, this appealed to me even more than seeing the wildlife in the park! There is this deep need within me to experience vast empty spaces; it’s all part of that humbling vulnerability that I seek. I wanted to feel minute, isolated and insignificant in every possible term. It was difficult of course with anyone else around but fortunately I had a sense of it with just Jani and her two cousins around. We drove out onto the lake (on an ‘official’ stick marked track) and stepped into the baking heat. There was simply nothing ahead of us, almost 50kms to the far side and almost 60 kms to the left and right – it was vast indeed.<br />
<br />
The earth was soft and crumbly rather than rock hard. I can imagine in rain it would get very soft indeed. I’ve read that in prolonged heavy rain the whole lake bed floods up to 10cm deep creating an incredible mirror –like surface which attracts thousands of migrating flamingos.
    GD002260.jpg
  • Thick morning fog envelops the Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826.
    GD000037(4).jpg
  • Thick morning fog envelops the Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826.
    GD000038-(1).jpg
  • Sunlit Anglesey lane winding its way down to Beaumaris and the Menai Strait
    GD001277.jpg
  • Never seen anything like it. We were on the road to wind blown Atlantic coastal town of Luderitz and a few miles before we arrived the effects of the wind could already be seen. At some points you could hardly see in front of the car and at other sand drifts had built across the road. I stepped out of the car on this near deserted road and was instantly sand-blasted by stinging grains of fast-blown crystals. I was amazed that there was even a road as the sand blew so constantly across the landscape.
    GD002286.jpg
  • After wild and exposed stretches of the Skeleton Coast, we drove past the very busy port of Walvis Bay. The differences were huge, the narrow but endless roads were suddenly busy with heavy trucks and traffic leaving and entering the port. As we drove further south however the traffic eased once again, but signs of man, settlement and ‘civilisation’ were present for many miles further before gradually evaporating once again. These man-made structures appeared incongruous in the blowing desert sands, creating a surreal landscape of man and nature, but more than that – it was the tenacity of man and invention that enables society to survive in otherwise barren terrain.
    GD002274.jpg
  • The landscape altered, subtly at first, but shrubs and small trees started to grip the pure rock and dirt of the previous day. <br />
<br />
Two minutes after this image was taken, a motionless small tree ran across the road in front of us - our first wild ostrich! Nature was quietly making an appearance the further North we drove.
    GD002256.jpg
  • Winning entry in the 2019 (31st) SUN Shot up North Awards<br />
<br />
In the middle of nowhere in a vast and inhospitable landscape, we came across an elderly looking man removing large stones from the dirt road. It was certain death in that climate but about a mile further on, we came across this mobile shelter, a workman’s refuge. <br />
It was surreal, almost incongruous in this desert environment. We could only assume that at some point later in the day, a work bus would come and free this man from this vast workplace.
    GD002253.jpg
  • Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826.
    GD001281.jpg
  • GD001447.jpg
  • Generally we didn’t see much in the way of large wildlife as we travelled across the high open roads of Namibia, sometimes Ostrich, sometimes Baboons but here on the Skeleton Coast not much at all.<br />
<br />
As we watched volcanic hills to the right and acres of white sand dunes to the left, slip past us as we motored North along the baking-hot salt roads, I was quite taken aback to see a sudden movement off to our right. There were two Black-backed Jackals, one scampering about, skittish even, but the other almost motionless. We pulled the van over and waited a few moments to see if they’d be bothered by us, but nothing changed. I very gently stepped out of the van and lay on the burning ground so that I could steady the telephoto lens and also include some of the background hills.<br />
Although the active one immediately moved away after I exited the vehicle the other was clearly eating something and confidently remained in place. I was surprised that he’d found anything to eat in the deserted arid landscape, but knowing that they’d even eat spiders an scorpions I suddenly started worrying about what I was lying on! I couldn’t help but see them just as a dog, like a small Alsatian, and I had this urge to call it over and give it a stroke! No chance however, for as soon as I started to move from prone position, it began to walk slowly away. As I lifted the camera to take another pic it shifted further away again. It was clear my Doctor Doolittle dream was just that as soon they were just dots on the dusty horizon.
    GD002268.jpg
  • A hundred million years ago this huge basin in the Etosha National Park was a lake, fed by the Kunene River in Angola, but 16,000 years ago, due to tectonic plate movement the river was diverted West to the Atlantic and gradually the lake dried up leaving this vast lake bed. At 4800 km² this saltpan, the largest in Africa, can be seen from space.<br />
<br />
I’d wanted to see this surreal landscape for a long time, and surprising though it may seem to others, this appealed to me even more than seeing the wildlife in the park! There is this deep need within me to experience vast empty spaces; it’s all part of that humbling vulnerability that I seek. I wanted to feel minute, isolated and insignificant in every possible term. It was difficult of course with anyone else around but fortunately I had a sense of it with just Jani and her two cousins around. We drove out onto the lake (on an ‘official’ stick marked track) and stepped into the baking heat. There was simply nothing ahead of us, almost 50kms to the far side and almost 60 kms to the left and right – it was vast indeed.<br />
<br />
The earth was soft and crumbly rather than rock hard. I can imagine in rain it would get very soft indeed. I’ve read that in prolonged heavy rain the whole lake bed floods up to 10cm deep creating an incredible mirror –like surface which attracts thousands of migrating flamingos.
    GD002259.jpg
  • I don’t even know how it got there but a way off the dirt track had slumped this old truck, its faded layers of eroded paintwork peppered with shot-gun holes. <br />
<br />
Abandoned and left to nature and the elements, this vehicle jolted within me the recognition that nothing lasts forever, that eventually everything becomes dust, but in the meantime is a marker for own place along that road, literally.
    GD002255.jpg
  • It may sound daft, but I was as fascinated by the unending miles of open dust road as I was with the incredible volcanic desert landscape. <br />
<br />
I’ve never been anywhere else in the world (yet) where I can drive for hundreds of kilometres on dust roads without seeing a car for hours. In one way it was a little freaky, for if you break down it could well be a LONG wait in 45º of sweltering heat before anyone might come by and help you, but equally, that same sense of isolation and vulnerability is what made the journey so adventurous and awesome.
    GD002279.jpg
  • Almost a dirt track, this red dusty road cuts through dry grass covered hillsides near Figueira near the Algarve coast. Dark clouds loom on the horizon from approaching stormy weather
    GD001930.jpg
  • An eary morning mist over the tidal Menai Strait, shrouding the idyllic church and graveyard of St Tysilio Island, Anglesey. Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826. It stands proud of the small church island
    GD001752.jpg
  • Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826. Here the floodlit bridge spanning the Menai Strait is backed by snow covered Welsh mountains of Snowdonia
    GD000847.jpg
  • Night time fog swirls in from the Irish Sea and up the Menai Strait, enveloping the Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826.
    GD000684BW.jpg
  • Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826.
    GD000047.jpg
  • I’ve seen elephants in zoos of course, restricted, moving around in circles, stared at by the thousands of noisy visitors - such a desperate form of existence. In the 22,270 km² Etosha National Park in NW Namibia however, I was for the first time able to see these truly magnificent creatures in their natural habitat. Watching David Attenborough programs on TV is always a delight, but nothing prepares you for the sheer awe of seeing these animals in real life in their own world.<br />
.<br />
From the heavily corrugated dust track we were on, the first thing I saw was what looked like a huge rounded granite boulder over the top of a hillock, but as we drove to the crest of the mound we realised it was in fact the head of a huge African elephant standing at a waterhole! This was real and I’ve never felt so small or humbled by natural wildlife. There are strict instructions never to leave your vehicle whilst in the park, so I had to accept that looking out of the window of our 4x4 was the best I was going to get.<br />
.<br />
All around us herds of Zebra were also drinking, running & frolicking with each other. Springbok daintily skipped past & Oryx & Giraffes were all there too. Hundreds of birds flitted about and falcons and other birds of prey circled overhead. It was a visual tapestry of wildlife with so many species all measuring each other up and acknowledging the hierarchies at the hole. What struck me most was the grace of motion of the elephants. Every movement of foot or trunk was slow, fluid & purposeful. At times they were just like living statues, almost motionless, just studying the world about them & at other times when walking, able to cover big distances so quickly but so gently. I was aware that they were aware of us, large eyeballs measuring us up but not seeming irritated or intimidated.<br />
.<br />
It was hard (especially looking from the car window) to take in the reality of it all rather than still imagining it was a TV program. I also felt deeply sad that it’s only a mat
    GD002258.jpg
  • Thick morning fog envelops the Menai Suspension Bridge (Welsh: Pont Grog y Borth) which is a stone built Victorian suspension bridge between the island of Anglesey and Bangor and mainland of Wales. The 100ft high bridge was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1826.
    GD000040(3).jpg
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
x

Glyn Davies, Professional Photographer and Gallery

  • Portfolio
  • FULL IMAGE COLLECTION HERE
    • All Galleries
    • Search
    • Cart
    • Lightbox
    • Client Area
  • About Glyn
  • Awards & Media
  • Print Info
  • Exhibitions
  • Publications
  • Contact
  • Privacy & Personal Data
  • LATEST NEWS