Lux: W Europe # 4 Birmingham

Up at 9 and ready for the 5 hour drive back down to the middle of England to get to Coventry early enough to have dinner with one of my mom's oldest friends and her husband and daughter and to make plans for photographing nearby Birmingham. Proud to say I drove most of the way, my brain managing to flip everything around successfully. Two things might have helped my ability to switch to the English side of the road; my being a lefty and looking at the world upsidedown and backwards all the time through my camera... Mid-dinner at the Adams' a serious thunderstorm arrived breaking a few weeks of warmth the brits have been baffled by. A relief from the heat but another bout of interesting timing for my shooting schedule...Rain hammered and poured off the greenhouse roof that extended out from the house in a series of relentless shoots. I just gave into the idea that this was a city I might have to redo at the end of the trip or next summer... I had plans for us to meet a contact I'd made through my friend Anna in Southwest Birmingham at sunset (8pm). Hoping the rain might stop Neeta and I decided to just head over. I called our new friend Andrew who was 30 min away and he said not a drop of rain was falling where he was in Birmingham which seemed so strange. Low and behold 10 mins before arriving at his house the rain was no longer pounding on our windshield! A very nice and generous Andrew jumped in the car and guided us to an overlook called Lickey Hills which offered a view of the sprawl of Birmingham. Not spectacular but definitely workable. There were quite a few sketchy groups about but we set up the cameras on this funny castle structure in the middle of the hill which allowed for a slightly higher viewpoint.

Again I set up a 2 hour exposure which had a few showers squeezed into it during which we all took turns holding large umbrellas over the cameras. To get the chills out of our bones around hour 1:30 we ran around the ''castle'' in circles to keep warm. A wet but nice night on a dark green hill with good company and the silhouette of flying bats set against the orange glow of the city. A nearly full moon peaked in and out of the rain clouds, too high to be in the shots but as always welcomed company. Shoot 4 done. Recover at Neeta's in Hamstead Marshall and on to Madrid wed...