Sunrise? What sunrise??

I loved BlipCentral's idea of capturing "a day in the life of daylight". And where better to capture it than... Avebury.

I was up at 6 and set off. As we had nicely clear skies yesterday, I was hoping for the same today. Unfortunately, I could see right away that it was cloudy this morning. And by the time I was halfway to Avebury, it was raining heavily.

I got there by 7.30 (sunrise due at 8.11), parked, and trudged into the south-east quadrant of the circle where people were starting to gather. It was at this point that I realised how ill-equipped I was for the weather. (In my defence, I was expecting fine weather as per the forecast!) Within the first few minutes in the wet ankle-length grass, my trainers were soaked through. And I hadn't taken anything to wipe either the lens or my glasses (I went contact lensless given the early start) - a bit of an issue, as it rained pretty much all the time I was there, fairly heavily at times. Luckily, under my leather jacket and fleece I was wearing a tee-shirt that could do a reasonable wiping job...at the expense of occasional contortionism and exposing myself more than I would have liked to the December cold!!

Anyway...as I'd come to expect by this point, the sunrise didn't happen - or to be accurate, wasn't visible! But I had the fascinating experience of witnessing a pagan Winter Solstice ceremony, conducted by a Druid called Terry and a Wiccan priest called Gordon, with a few dozen of us standing round in a circle. It was very enjoyable and entertaining, despite the lack of sun! I stayed until about 9, headed home with the car heater on full blast, got out of my wet clothes and warmed up with several cups of coffee.

The shot I've chosen to blip certainly isn't my best of the day, but it's the one that sums up the fruitless wait for sunrise, with some people in the stone circle, others up on the boundary bank, all braving the rain and cold and ready for the mystical moment.

I've put some more shots here. If you want to just dip into some specific ones, they include:

* The weather at its worst (through a wet lens).

* A much braver photographer, lining up to capture the sunrise from ground level.

* An onlooker suddenly surprised by a standing stone!

* The celebrants, Terry  and Gordon, in action.

* A couple of quick portraits of Gordon  and Terry that they graciously let me take when we chatted at the end.