May is the month of expectation, the month of wishes, the month of hope
Emily Brontë
May in England has been marvellous this year! Lots of warm sunshine and almost no rain. Not so great for farmers and gardeners perhaps, but wonderful for getting out and about. Our parks have been full of picnicking families, ball games and even sunbathers!
I should more properly have called this a ‘partial’ May selection. I’m drafting it with a week still to go in the month as I’m off on my travels again! I’ll be spending the last part of the month in Sicily and Malta with Virtual Tourist friends. So this gallery only takes you through three weeks of what was a fairly busy month at home, with all our usual activities of meals out, cinema visits etc.
I went to an interesting U3A talk about King Arthur (did he really exist? The expert’s view was disappointingly no). I also went on an outing to the Poppy Factory in nearby Richmond, where the poppies for Remembrance Sunday have been made since the 1920s. The tour guide was excellent and we had the chance to have a go at making our own poppy!
Chris and I had a wonderful visit to the London Wetlands Centre with a friend, which I shared in a previous post. I went to the Deutsche Börse exhibition at the Photographer’s Gallery with some of my photography group friends. I had a lovely lunch with blogger friend Margaret who was visiting family in London, and another with Australian friends from Virtual Tourist who were here for a few days as part of a European trip. And Chris and I had a very enjoyable visit to a VR experience about the Titanic in Camden. All that packed into just three weeks, and yet it never feels like we’ve been excessively busy!
Oh, and I continued my obsession with photographing tulips, as my feature image, and others below, demonstrate!
Technical notes
Many of these shots were taken with my phone but I took my Panasonic Lumix bridge camera to the Wetlands and also used it for the parakeet shot. Some of the garden photos were taken with my smaller point and shoot Panasonic.
Most have been at least a little edited with Photoshop Elements and some more heavily edited with Nik Color Efex. The couple of black and white images were edited with Nik Silver Efex Pro.
As always I am linking my selection to Ju-Lyn’s and Brian’s Changing Seasons challenge. Use the arrows to navigate the slideshow if you want to see all the images.
34 Comments
Heyjude
May was a wonderful month! June is misbehaving though. Hoping she will improve! Love that iris and you will never be shot of things to photograph living in London.
grandmisadventures
Beautiful collection of what was a beautiful month. The iris though is stunning- but I’m biased as irises are my favorite flower
Sarah Wilkie
Thanks so much Meg 😊 I’m glad I found such a great specimen of your favourite flower!
Klausbernd
Dear Sarah
What a beautiful picture of the iris 👍
Well, King Arthur existed – but where? We suppose in the romantic minds, and surely in the literature.
The Fab Four of Cley
🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you very much 🙂 Yes, we can say that in literature King Arthur very definitely exists!
ThingsHelenLoves
A lovely collection. The parakeet has a cheeky look, I do enjoy seeing them in the London parks when visiting.
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you Helen 🙂 I guess the parakeets are pretty cheeky!
Marilyn Armstrong
There are and have always been serious scholarly disagreement about Arthur’s existence. A friend of mine (not a blogger, but doctorate with a specialty in Arthur and the early middle ages, is sure he did exist. I believe he existed, but not quite the way depicted.
Otherwise, what a glorious romp through your photography! Each shot was better than the last!
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you Marilyn 🙂 Our speaker, a historian, talked us through various of bits of evidence that people have pointed to over the years (references in texts to battles, kings etc.) and concluded that they were not robust enough to suggest that Arthur existed. But it’s good to know that there are other experts who would disagree with her!
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Rose
I love the month of May, and it’s even better when the weather cooperates. You have done May justice with all your lovely photos – love the flowers and the robin.
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you 🙂 May is one of my favourite months too and to cap it this year I had a lovely time in Sicily and Malta with my friends. I got back yesterday, so more on that anon …
Anonymous
Beautiful shots and it does sound as if you never stop, but it’s also motivating to read. I love your poppy photos. I, too, find the centre so mesmerising.
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you, although I think you must mean tulips? There are no poppy photos here (though I do love them too!)
wetanddustyroads
Ha, as I look at all the places you visited in three weeks, I start to think the months are too short for everything you want to do/see 🙂. Love the tulip photos.
I envy you being in Malta – an island we would love to visit again (and Sicily wouldn’t be too bad either). Enjoy.
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you 🙂 I just got back from Malta today – I enjoyed it but didn’t perhaps see enough to fall in love with it. However I had a great time with all my friends, which is the main purpose of these meets!
Anabel @ The Glasgow Gallivanter
I love the robin the most, but the free hugs made me smile the most.
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you Anabel – I thought that was a fun sign, although I couldn’t see anyone actually offering the hugs!
Sue
Well, you had quite a month, I would say! Lovely flower images, and the photographers eye can find some amusing juxtapositions as with your lady reading!
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you Sue, it was a good month for flowers 🙂 As for that young lady, she is on her phone of course!
thehungrytravellers.blog
We seem to have missed a better May than normal! I really like the railway shot….I find railway lines are so evocative, they spell out the word TRAVEL….
Sarah Wilkie
Yes, it was pretty good on the whole. And I agree about railway lines, although these are the most ‘ordinary’ I know, the Tube lines to and from London!
margaret21
A lovely and varied collection here. And you even seemed to sneak a few in from our time together though I never saw you flash your camera about!
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you Margaret 🙂 Only the Chinatown one is from that day, as it happens!
margaret21
Aha!
bushboy
Wonderful florals Sarah. I love your Robins too. What was in the jars at the restaurant? It did seem like a busy month (part) to me. I was disappointed to find out about King Arthur too. Nothing worse that killing off childhood dreams and imagination in the world of books.
Thanks for joining in The Changing Seasons 😀
Sarah Wilkie
I’m not sure what was in those jars. There were several frames like that with tiny jars, each set a different colour – red, yellow, blue … I must have a closer look if we go again. As for King Arthur, our speaker demonstrated that not only did the mythical Round Table king not exist, but there probably wasn’t even a real more prosaic one as I’d always understood there to be! Thanks Brian 😀
Monkey's Tale
Oops, I hit send too early. Lovely May in England, my favourite is the lady reading a book below the underwear models!! Maggie
Sarah Wilkie
Thanks Maggie. She made me smile when I saw her 😀 As for King Arthur, our historian speaker was very thorough in proving that he didn’t but some of us were definitely reluctant to believe her!
Monkey's Tale
King Arthur did exist!! 😅 Lovely May in
Egídio
Beautiful gallery, Sarah. The grass and those close-ups are amazing.
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you very much Egidio 😊
Teresa
I heard that it has been warm there. At times warmer than it is here in Melbourne. But I guess because it is summery there now.
Sarah Wilkie
We had a drier and warmer spring than usual. And yes, now we are moving into summer 😀