The Beautiful Pea-Souper...

...at Old Sarum hillfort, at about 12.30 a.m.

Having spent literally all day at the computer, collating the Thursday Derelict Challenge and editing live music pics from last Saturday, by early evening I was literally busting to get out and take some photos!

Weather forecast for late evening was clear, with light cloud coming in.

On the last bus up past Old Sarum, my first few pics there were in the half-moon light. Nice! But not long after, the moon literally was switched off, like a light and it went dark. The cathedral, way down in the valley below disappeared, as did the whole of Salisbury. The bright ambient light from so much light pollution dulled to near darkness.

Within minutes, I could not see these huge trees, nor could I even see any glow from Salisbury's streetlights. I've been up there before, albeit during the day in fog but this was a new one on me.

I tried this shot four times. The first three were hopelessly framed, with the main tree/s cut in half. Despite the fast f2.8 Nikkor D 17-35mm wideangle zoom, I might as well have been photographing the inside of a tent. My eyes had attuned to the light levels, so it wasn't actually dark, just very grey.

With each exposure running into minutes I was getting fed up. So, I racked up the max iso to 25,000 and a couple of seconds exposure. A totally grainy smudge appeared but at least I could see what the lens was seeing! Then, I was able to adapt that to a proper iso and a five minute exposure.

The pink hue here seems to have emanated from the ambient light from street lights from Amesbury in the north and from Salisbury behind, built up over the very long exposure.

Closer-Up foggy trees!

I was glad of my flask of coffee and of my fleece. And, for about the very first time, I was glad of leaving Old Sarum and for the walk down home. Oddly, the streets were clear of mist or fog...

Derelict Thursday Challenge

Huge response - thanks to all who contributed. A number of entries were added when I was out. I have at least since added them to the list but I haven't looked at them. Bed now, having edited and uploaded this Blip, so I shall spend proper time choosing my favourite two tomorrow and will announce them on my Blip for Saturday. We had a good number of new Blippers contributing which is excellent and so it would be wrong to rush. I hope you approve - in any case, it's my Challenge and you have no choice!