Walk to the Park

This morning was a crisp and cool day with the promise of a clear sky.  This was the day we had set aside to mix the Christmas pudding, but the weather was too good to waste, so we started out with a walk along Fen Park to Fenton Park.

In the distance, we could see Longton Church and the bottle ovens of The Gladstone Pottery Museum.  Between us and the church was a wood fire, casting a pall of smoke across the town.  I took a couple of shots with my 200mm telephoto lens to see what could be done with them.

The quality of image through the smoke was not good, but with a little imagination the images do evoke a feeling of the grim days when the potteries were in full swing with coal fired kilns.

 Just for fun, I thought I would 'photoshop' some chimney smoke into the last image.  Something that has not been seen in this area since the 1960's.  I can remember such images from my childhood, coming from a mining village where everyone burned coal as fuel.  The smuts and dust were everywhere in those days, just a part of everyday life!

Some of the potters terraces still have the cobbled backs where they back onto the next row of houses.  The modern street lamps and bathroom extensions are the only changes in this row, off of Fen Park Road.

At the park, the leaves are covering the ground and the trees are quite bare.  Autumn is here in all its glory this week, starting the steady slide into winter.