A forest out of time

Savernake forest in the heart of Wiltshire is a place I have spent little time in until recently. Obviously I had heard of it and seen some incredible images from there by the likes of Nathan Hollingsworth, Stephen Davis, Lee Cooper and Ryan Seymour to name but a few! It is an ancient oak woodland that has had a Beech forest grow among it over the centuries. Rammed full of deer (and ticks presumably!), Squirrels, rabbits and many species of birds it is truly a stunning location and a real pleasure to visit. The oaks within are some of the oldest in the country with characterful names like Old Paunchy, Big Belly, The Cathedral oak and many others.

One of the hundreds of old oak trees.

We paid a visit here a couple of weeks ago where we were shown around by Nathan and Stephen, who were very kind to show us some of the more photogenic locations among this vast forest. the conditions on that day were not ideal, with no mist or fog and little to no good light either, but it was a great walk and a chance to chat to two other photographers who are just as passionate as I am about trees was great too.

I noticed durting the week that fog was being forecast on Sunday and after a discussion on the phone with my mate Dave I managed to pry him away from another visit to Dartmoor and instead explore this forest more instead. We arranged to meet up at an ungodly hour on Sunday and after a swift visit to the local McD’s to grab me a coffee we were off down the A303, chatting excitedly about the prospect of fog at our destination. However, as the journey continued our enthusiasm waned somewhat as we realised the fog was not going to be where the weather reportes were saying it would be and when we arrived at our parking spot it was pretty clear……drat!

Well, we were here now so it wouldn’t hurt to explore further and scout more locations right? And to be fair there was some ground frost around so that added a slightly different element to any potential images. We wandered off and pretty soon were knee deep in dead bracken off the beaten track, hunting out the big oaks and finding some nice scenes like the one below.

A prior composition from a previous visit but with a hint of frost this time and a tighter crop.

We decided to head over to a particular spot Nath and Stephen had shown us a couple of weeks before. I chose to go back to the car and drive to it and Dave walked. Now you may think thats lazy of me but I do suffer with bad atheritis in one knee and it was a particularly cold morning so I was struggling a bit. As it turned out I probably ended up walking just as much anyways but at least it would be a shorter trip back to the car when we were finished!

We both arrived at the spot at the same time and started to work on the various compositions that were aplenty in this section when lo and behold we spotted mist moving in! Well, this was a turn up for the books! It seemed that as the sun was rising it was unlocking the moisture in the frost and with no wind about it was forming into mist. It didnt take long until the forest was thick with the glorious gossamer blanket of white stuff and Dave and myself excitedly stepped up a gear and started to bag up on compositions. The thing with mist is you never know how long its going to last so a mild panic does tend to set in as you rush around trying to grab the images you are after. However, today the mist was hanging around and we ended up with about a 2 hour session where conditions were about as good as they could be. A bit more light would have been nice and maybe some light rays but really, thats just me being picky lol.

Overall we were two tired but happy chappies heading back to the car and I think both of us were anticipating getting behind our respective computers when we got back to edit up our selections. I must admit, I managed to get about 25 keepers from this session and although they are by no means world beaters, they are certainly the best ones I have ever taken here! I am really looking forward to seeing this place dressed in its spring greens as some of the scenes I have will just look incredible with more green leafage in them!

My depression had flared up again in the middle of the week, for no good reason other than thats depression for you. I had ended the week feeling quite down and dark but after this 4 hour wander through Savernake I am of a much improved mindset. I read somewhere this week that a walk in nature is one of the best treatments for depression, something I have long vaunted and is one of the reasons why I do landscape photography. Its good to know that others are starting to see the benefits it can have on a troubled mind too.

I have added some more images from this session to the latest image section of the website and more still to the woodland portfolio so check them out if you have time. Thanks for reading and visiting my website and please call again!