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Gallery: a July selection (2026)

July 31, 2026 / 51 Comments

Warm summer sun, shine kindly here

Mark Twain

Warm summer sun is definitely welcome, and we’re getting plenty of it in London this summer. No, actually what we are mostly getting is hot summer sun – very hot!

Two years ago I wrote a post for Sunday Stills on ‘the lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer’. In it I was bemoaning the fact that summer seemed to have deserted the UK, moaning about ‘the chill and the rain’. What a contrast this year! London hasn’t seen any significant rain now for 42 days (and most parts none at all in that period). The temperature has swung between the high 20s centigrade (reasonably comfortable) to the low and even mid 30s (not so comfortable!)

Two years later and Anne has set a similar theme for this week’s Lens Artists challenge, Summer Daze. So I thought I would use my monthly round-up to share my July with her. This is how I’ve spent the most recent ‘summer days’.

This past month …

We haven’t been away at all in July but have been enjoying London life while trying to avoid the worst of the heat.

July and August are festival season in our local park. Ealing Council stage a series of them and we always go to a few. This month saw us at the beer festival and we’re looking forward to the blues one next month.

We had three cinema visits (cinemas are air conditioned here!):

  • Shoot the People, an interesting documentary about the work of photographer and activist Misan Harriman (and Harriman was there to answer questions after the showing)
  • The Invite, which I really liked
  • The Odyssey, which almost lived up to the hype and was incredibly impressive in its scale and cinematography

Another treat was seeing Luminescence at Westminster Cathedral (not the Abbey – this is the city’s Roman Catholic cathedral). The light show was very effective, and I’ve included a couple of images below, but I’ll do a fuller post on this at a later date.

I went to a meeting of my photography group, mainly devoted to planning our forthcoming exhibition. Having volunteered to help with the curation I worked with two other members over a couple of sessions to make the final selection, decide on a hanging plan and finalise images to be sent to print. Not only was this interesting, I also got to know them much better over the odd glass of wine!

We had an interesting evening at the offices of expedition cruise specialists HX for a presentation, over wine and nibbles, about their trips to the Galápagos and Greenland. I’m trying to persuade my husband the latter would be fascinating and I think (hope!) he warmed to the idea a little. But (and don’t tell HX!) we would probably go with Quark having so enjoyed our Svalbard trip with them.

And there’s more …

A good friend of mine from my time working as a consultant was spending a few days in London with her husband, so we met up with them for drinks and dinner in a local pub garden.

On top of all that I continued to enjoy U3A activities such as table tennis, several learning groups and a visit to Regents Park, where my feature photo was taken. I’ll say more about that last one in a future Monday Walks post. And I also kept up with my aquarobics class, the cool of the water being very welcome.

I even found time for blogging!

Technical notes

Most of this month’s photos were taken on my phone but I took my new compact Lumix to Regents Park, on a walk in our local park and out into the garden for a couple of flower images.

As always most have been edited in Photoshop Elements and many also with Nik Color Efex. The final image was edited with Nik Silver Efex Pro.

And again as always, I’m linking my selection to Ju-Lyn’s and Brian’s Changing Seasons challenge, and to Natalie’s Monthly Wrap-up.

Please use the arrows to navigate the slideshow if you want to see all the images.



51 Comments

  • Annie Berger

    August 8, 2026 at 12:31 Reply

    I couldn’t help but smiling while reading the post, Sarah, as you so often comment on how packed our travel days are, yet your home days seem equally full of nonstop activities! I hope you and Chris do decide to visit Greenland with Quark; we had one of the most ‘exciting’ trips to that out of the way country last year, but we did it ourselves. Does Quark mostly do the west or east side?

    • Sarah Wilkie

      August 8, 2026 at 13:28 Reply

      Thank you Annie 🙂 I know we sound busy but we do have quieter days too! Quark have several expedition cruises to Greenland which between them cover both coasts, including one that also does the Northwest Passage which I would really love to do (but that’s quite expensive, so …) If we go I think we’d choose the west coast as we’d be most interested in visiting communities.

  • Brenda's Thoughts

    August 4, 2026 at 04:16 Reply

    Despite the heat, it sounds like you had a busy and fulfilling month. Your photos are amazing, Sarah. I especially love the Luminescence ones, but they are all spectacular. Wishing you a happy and cool August! 🙂

  • wetanddustyroads

    August 3, 2026 at 10:52 Reply

    Ha, I’m amazed to read that you found time for blogging, Sarah 😁. Even though you said you weren’t away, you had lots of other things keeping you busy! It seems that quite a few flowers survived the heat – that orange rose in Regents Park is beautiful.

  • Melissa

    August 2, 2026 at 23:37 Reply

    Isn’t it truly amazing how much we can experience and accomplish within a month’s time?! Your July sounds so full and absolutely divine!
    If I had to pick a favorite from your gallery, it’d be the pavement graffiti, mostly because it’s a solid reminder at the height of Summer’s busy-ness! I hope August has started wonderfully for you, Sarah!

    • Sarah Wilkie

      August 3, 2026 at 08:49 Reply

      Thanks so much Melissa 😊 Yes, August is off to a lovely start – yours too I hope? I passed that graffiti several times before stopping to take a photo but I liked the message so much that in the end I had to have a shot to share!

  • Marie

    August 2, 2026 at 06:01 Reply

    I still find the escalator shot to be very sci-fi. Are they headed for a train to nowhere? Must have had too much caffeine today. 😎 Love the flowers. Marie (tried posting and it didn’t work. Hope this one does)

    • Sarah Wilkie

      August 2, 2026 at 08:19 Reply

      Haha, I see what you mean about those escalators – Westminster station does have a rather futuristic look in places 😀 Your previous comment posted just fine, so I’m not sure what the issue was at your end that made you think it hadn’t, but WP can be very odd sometimes!

  • Marie

    August 2, 2026 at 06:00 Reply

    I still find the escalator shot to be very sci-fi. Are they headed for a train to nowhere? Must have had too much caffeine today. 😎 Love the flowers.

  • Natalie

    August 1, 2026 at 17:31 Reply

    I love your close-up photos of the flowers. The Luminescene colours look fantastic. Thank you for linking up with my Monthly Wrap-up.

  • photobyjohnbo

    August 1, 2026 at 14:20 Reply

    It’s nice to escape the heat in a theater. I’d like to see The Odyssey projected on film for its technical photography, but it’s quite a hike to Minneapolis. I’ll be there in September, but I don’t know if the film version will still be playing. Of course, I could see the 70mm digital version.

      • photobyjohnbo

        August 1, 2026 at 16:10 Reply

        Back in the day (early 1960s), I saw some of the first Cinerama movies, the ones with three cameras and three projectors tied together. They cemented my love for giant-screen cinema. I am hopeful to see the film version, but I’ll take the 70mm digital, or even the 35mm, if necessary.

  • Steven Berger

    August 1, 2026 at 06:31 Reply

    I think you and my wife must be the two busiest people in the world! How you both do it all is beyond me.
    I love your photos so please don’t slow down.
    Stay safe,
    Steve

    • Sarah Wilkie

      August 1, 2026 at 11:02 Reply

      Thank you very much Steve 😊 This sounds quite busy when I write it all down but it’s spread over 31 days and I have plenty of downtime too – blogging, TV, reading etc.

  • Heyjude

    August 1, 2026 at 00:12 Reply

    A lovely colourful gallery. My OH liked his Panasonics compact Lumix cameras and his older bridge camera too. Though he did start to use his phone eventually.

    • Sarah Wilkie

      August 1, 2026 at 10:59 Reply

      Thank you very much Jude 😊 I use all three, depending on where I am – bridge for main travels, compact for city breaks and UK visits, phone when I don’t want to carry a camera and for impromptu shots when I spot something interesting, also often for night shots.

  • Egídio

    July 31, 2026 at 22:44 Reply

    Oh my, what a beautiful month! Your garden is producing beautiful flowers. That final shot is mind-bending with that column (?) going above the escalator. Amazing!

    • Sarah Wilkie

      August 1, 2026 at 10:56 Reply

      Thank you Anne 😊 As we have no a/c (it’s not usual to have it here, though that may change), staying in isn’t much cooler than going out, if at all!

    • Sarah Wilkie

      July 31, 2026 at 19:13 Reply

      Many thanks Susanne 😊 I’ve used Panasonics compact Lumix cameras (as well as their larger bridge cameras) for some time and have several friends who also swear by them, not to mention my husband. They have very good zoom (30x) Leica lenses, fully manual or auto settings, can shoot RAW or JPEG. The only catch as far as I’m concerned is that the latest model doesn’t have a viewfinder, which is why I went for a refurbished one. This new one is the DC-TZ90 if you want to check it out. It’s a bit bigger and heavier than some compact cameras but much less so than bigger ones and does a very good job.

  • Monkey's Tale

    July 31, 2026 at 15:19 Reply

    Looks like the hot weather has been good for flowers, they’re beautiful. The ceiling in Westminster Cathedral is stunning, the colours are so vibrant. You’ve had a great, event filled July. Maggie

    • Sarah Wilkie

      July 31, 2026 at 17:04 Reply

      Actually a lot of plants are struggling, but my husband keeps our little garden well watered (we have a hosepipe ban but it’s small enough that it can be managed with a watering can). The grass in the parks is brown, not green, and farmers are worried about their harvests. We’ve had several major wildfires too.

      Luminescence used light projections to show us how colourful the cathedral would have been if it had been finished to the original design. As I said to Sue, I’ll share some videos soon so you can better see the effects. Thanks Maggie 🙂

  • bushboy

    July 31, 2026 at 14:05 Reply

    What a fabulous start with the yellow hibiscus (I think) You did have a lovely month in London. See a doco and having the photographer there would have been so interesting. I love all the flower photos. Westminster Cathedral looked a treat. The abstract of the ladies of HX is so good. I like that saying too. The B&W tube escalator looks so factory like as the humans are sent along the production line 😂
    Thanks for joining in The Changing Seasons 😀

    • Sarah Wilkie

      July 31, 2026 at 14:47 Reply

      Thanks so much Brian – I’m glad you found so much of interest in my slideshow 😊 I see what you mean about the Tube station shot! That feature photo is of a rose – Regents Park is famous for them and we were there at just the right time of year!

Do share your thoughts, I'd love to hear from you! And please include your name in case WP marks you 'anonymous' - thank you