At the End of the Valley of the Dinosaurs

            If I were forced by some imaginary omnipotence to pick just one location in which to spend the rest of my days pointing my camera towards the sea, I don't think I'd look beyond Porth Nanven. It's never been lost on me that growing up in Cornwall has spoiled me with a glut of local hotspots, several of which I happily return to time and time again. Some photographers choose not to return to places after a visit or two, while others are content to retread their steps over and over, learning a location under all of its aspects. There's room for all of us of course. Yesterday unexpectedly, there was room for Katie, a friend I haven't seen for a while who is a wild swimmer and takes some spectacular underwater photographs. She's as beautiful on the inside as she is on the outside and greeted me with the worst display of social distancing since it was invented by bounding towards me and wrapping me an enormous hug. I've missed hugs. It was a delight to see her. She's one of those people who make the world feel like a good place to be in. She'd been swimming of course, and was making ready to leave. time was moving on and she's an early riser who confesses to being no use whatsoever after 9pm. Sunset was due after 9:30.

In one of the more distant counties of our nation, this corner of delights is particularly remote even for those of us who live here, and the approach to it from the lonely windswept outpost of St Just is a descent into what feels like a primordial other world. It starts with a twisting drive on a narrow road flanked by high Cornish hedgerows adorned with foxgloves and campion, before a sharp descent takes you past the last few houses, one garden boasting enormous Canarian echiums covered in tiny spikes bearing thousands of purple blooms. A little further down on the final bend, a massive gunnera, leaves at least a metre wide spreads towards the road. The final drag down to the small car park is festooned with ferns and bracken. Finally you arrive on a beach consisting almost entirely of huge egg shaped chunks of granite, worn smooth by year upon year of Atlantic attrition. Hence the nickname, "Dinosaur Egg Beach." And then you look out to the ocean to witness the view, in this case with an ominous bank of threatening cloud that had the audacity to interrupt my sandwich and found me racing to set up the camera more quickly than I usually would. I'm pleased to report that I stayed dry, and it seemed from the wet roads that the cloud had instead dumped its contents 30 miles to the east over Redruth as I arrived at home later on after one of the most enjoyable evenings with the camera for quite some time.

Taken in: UK / England / St. Just / St Just (show map)

Taken on: June 13, 2020

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Camera: Canon EOS 5D Mark IV, f/11.0, 1 sec, 45mm, ISO 100 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Canon EOS 5D Mark IV
Lens:	EF24-70mm f/2.8L USM
Aperture:	f/11.0
Exposure Time:	1
Focal Length:	45mm
ISO:	100
Exposure Bias:	0 EV
Flash:	Off, Did not fire
Exposure Program:	Aperture-priority AE
Exposure Mode:	Auto
Metering Mode:	Multi-segment
White Balance:	Auto
Color Space:	sRGB
Software:	Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 9.2.1 (Windows)
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