Apologies for no posting for a while, but I had a week in Cornwall before returning & doing my couple of weeks at Loch Dunmore preparing for this years Enchanted Forest.
Now I know every year I have to apologies for the fact that (by about 1/2 mile) this event is outside the Cairngorms National Park, but it is such an important event for not only Pitlochry , but also all the surrounding area, which includes our little village. You can imagine the influx of just under 3,000 visitors every night to the area for 30 days makes a lot of difference to traders, whom normally are either preparing to close down for the winter or a very much reduced footfall to a radius of 20 or so miles around.
Traders, be it cafes, B&B, gift shops or even the traffic wardens, all report a wonderful number of day time visitors. Every hotel is full as families make a couple of days break out of it, not forgetting the transport companies. Due to the fact Pitlochry has limited parking spaces (hence the wardens wandering around every night until 10 o’clock) , many people from Edinburgh & Glasgow arrive in coaches or on the train, all extra revenue they would never have dreamed of 15 years ago.
This year was a particularly busy year for me as an awful lot of the show was on the water, with some very tricky builds, which the only part I had to do was row the boat, one to get the various equipment to its correct spot & secondly keep the boat still while the very talented engineers constructed it.
So for these reasons, let alone seeing so many people enjoying the show, I feel it is only right to share some of the images with you.
The theme this year to coincide with the anniversary of the moon landing, is The Cosmos. Here is my partial eclipse as seen by spacemen. The Moon is an 8metre diameter balloon & the Earth is about 4metres. with 3,000 twinkling stars below it stretching 100 metres back into the woods.
On the press night the water was so calm & showed such wonderful reflections onto the water, as you can see here.
My shot really does not do justice to this little area, 3 of the satellite dishes were scattered around the site giving off a signal into space, the strands were strips of LED lights that sparkled.
Again it is the reflection that I loved over the projected images of this & the next three. The projection has occurred the last 3 years with a different 7 minute film each time. The wonderful thing that most people do not realise is that the show is projected through a very fine, high pressure, water spray.
I just love this eye, so much detail.
The gasps of amazement & joy as this spaceman emerges out of the water is incredible, the following shot is the spaceman floating in space & waving, the number of children that were waving back just added to the magic.
Every now & then you have to accept that you knocked the camera while it was taking a long exposure, which is what I did here. But funnily I rather enjoyed this piece of abstract “art”. It just echoed the movement of the whole show. Sorry for any that are unable to visit the show, but after many years of attending, this was the best ever.