There was an exhibition of medieval arts and crafts at Rievaulx Abbey in North Yorkshire this weekend.

It was interesting to see the artisans keeping these techniques alive and talking to them it was obvious they were passionate, and knowledgeable, about what they were doing.

This mother and son were preparing the lunch (which was cooked traditionally). The wooden boxes are a couple of mice/rat traps. The young boy explained how they worked, but despite setting them last night, he didn’t manage to catch anything (probably much to the relief of his mum!).

It was the Leeds charity Dragon Boat races today. Perfect weather for it and loads of teams having great fun. I managed to blag my way onto part of the marina (thanks Richard!) so managed to get some nice low shots of the teams as they rowed frantically for the finish line.

As promised in my last post, here’s a shot of the Flagcrackers – a traditional folk dance troop (think morris dancers) from North Yorkshire.

Although this type of dancing goes back a long way, the Flagcrackers were established over 20 years ago. Since then they have danced at events everywhere from Eire to Belgium and from Orkney to Kent.

The photographers on the Leeds Flickr day out lucked out as we didn’t know there was going to be a collection of these folk dancing troops in Knaresborough on the day we visited. Check out the Flickr discussion to see other’s shots from the day, including more of the Flagcrackers and some of the other folk dancing troops there.

Within the walls of Knaresborough Castle are several Ravens which are looked after by Her Majesty’s Keeper of Castle Ravens, Knaresborough! They’ve been hand reared and so aren’t afraid of humans and you could get quite close as you can see above.

We were also lucky to be there at the same time as some sort of festival of folk dance which had attracted many morris-dancing troops. However these weren’t your usual all-in-white morris dancers and many had more eclectic get up on. For example, the FlagCrackers (who I’ll post some pictures of soon) paint their faces black and dress in rags.

Whilst passengers are stranded all over the world and cargo logistics goes into meltdown, all due to a volcanic eruption on a small island near the Arctic Circle there is good news for photographers.

The volcanic ash aside from causing the airline industry headaches is also providing photographers in the UK with some stunning sunsets that seem to last forever.

I headed out tonight mainly to take some twilight shots of traffic on the M1. Although a did get a couple of shots of that, one of the best I came back with was the one above of the last vestiges of the sunset bleeding out of the sky with the moon rising above. There’s minimum processing on the image – this is pretty much how it came out of the camera.

Above is a video showcasing my favourite shots from the past twelve months. Enjoy!

Happy New Year – and here’s to another great year of photography!

Taken at the Christmas Market in Leeds.

As with previous years, Brodsworth Hall in South Yorkshire is running its Enchanted Garden event. After the sun sets the house and restored Victorian gardens are expertly illuminated to become a place of wonder and enchantment.

This year they changed the route around the gardens which I personally thought was good. The route seemed a little longer and in places where you are travelling in the opposite direction to other years you got to see something new.

If you want to go, the event runs until Sunday 1st November, but be warned – its far busier than previous years. Get there early!

Follow the link below for more info on Enchanted Garden or click the image above to view more of my photos from this year’s event.

Brodsworth Hall – Enchanted Garden