Sakura Time!

Posted on April 27, 2026 by Joe

It’s that time of year when the cherry blossom trees are blooming with silken petals, all over the city. My favourite spot to enjoy them is in the Meadows, the huge, popular park in the middle of the city, which boasts two avenues lined with cherry trees, creating a “tree tunnel” you can walk through.

While I was stuck for those eight, long, dragging days in hospital, dreaming of being able to go outside again, I found myself thinking that the sakura would bloom within a few weeks, and I wanted to be out of hospital and also to be recovered enough to walk through it. I do this every year, but this year, with the cancer surgery and ongoing treatment (chemo now awaits… sigh) it felt more precious than ever. I was dreaming of walking under those branches, heavy with blossoms, with my friend on my arm.

So, each day since I got out and moved back to the family home, dad and I would go for small walks to help me build myself back up slowly, then after a week I moved back to Edinburgh to my own flat, continuing my walks each day. On one such walk I saw the blossoms were almost full, so arranged to come back a few days later with my friend, and we promenaded arm in arm under those delicate blossoms. The Meadows was full of happy people enjoying the burst of fine, spring weather and the arrival of the blossoms, just a lovely atmosphere, and, as I said, this time with everything I have been enduring, it just felt so much more precious to do this annual ritual.

And I shot a couple of “walk through” videos to go with the photos:

Sakura Time

Posted on April 28, 2025 by Joe

The annual miracle of spring returns, and with a burst of beautiful, bright, golden, spring sunlight, my chum and I decided to enjoy a Sunday promenade below the lines of cherry trees, now in full blossom. While there are plenty of such blossoms around the city, in the Meadows there are two avenues of them, creating a “tree tunnel” that you can stroll under, and as you can see, it’s a popular thing for many of us to do as spring finally exerts its dominance over the departing winter.

This glorious little miracle happens every year, and every year I feel compelled to take some photos and share them again. After the dark, long, winter, it’s good for the soul to take in the light and the return of colours, those fabulous pinks against a clear, blue heaven above, just gorgeous.

Of course, I took a monochrome shot too, despite the colours it was also just begging for a B&W snap too.

Of course, I wasn’t the only one taking photos of it all!

As ever, click the pics to see the full size versions on my Flickr stream.

Autumn arrives

Posted on September 16, 2024 by Joe

Autumn has been creeping in the last couple of weeks – truth be told, it wasn’t much of a summer here, even by Scottish standards! And we’re still getting more rainy days than nice, just as with the washed-out summer, but when that golden, autumn light does come out, the colours are rather lovely.

Autumn sunlight backlighting leaves still turning from green to brown and gold.

Fallen autumn leaf, stuck to a wet car window; always keep an eye open, you never know when an interesting photographic subject will offer itself up, if you notice it!

Of course, it isn’t just the trees and leaves, the autumn sun is so much lower in the sky that it now casts as much in the way of shadows as it does light, which creates scope for some interesting takes on an otherwise mundane subject, such as a chap sitting on a bench by the canal:

Signs of Spring

Posted on April 24, 2023 by Joe

As April trundles on, we’ve had the usual mix of weather in Scotland, from beautiful, warm (ish), sunny spring days to howling wind, grey skies, rain and temeperatures suddenly dropping back to feel like February. We do get a variety here… Regardless, nature carries on to her own timetable, and there have been welcome signs that, despite bursts of colder weather, spring is settling in, and bringing with it a rebirth of colour.

I loved these white Daffies with the yellow centre, catching the evening light in the old boneyard of Dalry Cemetery

The cherry blossoms are coming out too – although it varies all over the city. Some have had petals blooming for a couple of weeks or more, others are barely starting to bud, others again are in almost full bloom. It’s remarkable how much it varies across the town.

I found this fallen bloom on the pavement, fallen from a vine running along a garden wall, covered in raindrops, the soft, silken petals in stark contrast to the hard, dark of the asphalt paving.

The Daffies, as ever, provide a wonderful burst of colour after the long, dark, winter months, like miniature, floral sunbursts

Autumn is knocking on the door

Posted on September 6, 2020 by Joe

Autumn Whispers Quietly in the Ear of Summer

Walking in the Hermitage of Braid today, near the foot of Morningside (Miss Jean Brodie country). The trees are still mostly resplendent in their verdant coat of summer greenery, but Autumn, Autumn is whispering in Summer’s ear “my turn is coming….”

Just outside the Hermitage, over a tall wall of an expensive house, the branches of its trees were laden with the autumn bounty of apples. And me there without my scrumping ladder to grab any…

Natural Wonders

Posted on April 12, 2020 by Joe

On the daily permitted lockdown-era exercise walk I’ve been taking photos as I walk, mostly of the unsettlingly empty city streets. I’ll post some of those later, but for now, thinking we could all use something cheering, here are some wildlife photos I’ve taken on those walks. I spotted this pair of swans this evening on the Union Canal:

This lordly heron was on the Water of Leith, next to Murrayfield rugby stadium, surveying his kingdom:

And these goosanders were splashing around just on the other side of the river from the heron:

Meanwhile in an almost deserted Princes Street Gardens, the air is filled with the lovely scent of magnolias, while the cherry blossoms are becoming full and heavy:

Blossoming

Posted on May 18, 2018 by Joe

The cherry blossoms have been late this spring, after the unseasonable bursts of late winter weather a few weeks ago, but finally it warmed up, the sun shone, they came out, and now they’ve mostly gone already – for a few days the branches hang low and heavy with the petals, then with each breeze they flutter down, a soft rain of silk, carpeting the pavement below, and then they are gone again for another year. Naturally I snapped a few photos before the vanished…

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