Patrick Arends
Photography

Overview fortravels

Dad's Army – May 2013

One of English Heritage’s great country houses, Brodsworth Hall is located in Yorkshire. This series of photographs shows a fun packed sun packed full weekend of World War II re-enactments.

It’s strange to see loads of grown up men ‘play soldier’, very much like the BBC’s ‘Dad’s Army’. Being completely taken back in time with their perfect uniforms and excellent haircuts and even old-English, their attitude was bang on. Always staying in character, for instance not understanding what a visitor’s mobile phone is. (more)

Old Harry Rocks & Durdle Door - July 2013

The south coast of England could easily be mistaken for an exotic coast! The Old Harry Rocks are three chalk formations, near Bournemouth and Poole and mark the most easterly point of the Jurassic Coast, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

It once used to be connected to what is now known as the Isle of Wight, but erosion over many years has left its traces. Around the corner is Durdle Door, a chalk arch. With a speedboat captain who looks exactly like David Hasselhoff when 65 years old, you can’t go wrong! (more)

'No results for Nottingham' – May 2014

‘No results for Nottingham’, is what English Heritage’s online search engine shows. Even though Nottingham Castle and the legend of Robin Hood is probably second to Stone Henge the best worldwide known ‘product’ of England. Nottingham Castle is council owned, hence not being listed on the English Heritage website. It is definitely worth a visit. The current ‘castle’ is more a mansion on top of where once the original castle would have stood. It’s the third building in this place, and is home to a fine art gallery.

The original tunnels underneath the mansion remain, supposedly used by Robin Hood to escape from the castle! (more)

Library shelves - May 2014

“Bloody architects!” What do you do when you design a book rotunda in a library and the librarians can’t reach the top shelves? Even though these are solely designed to showcase books from the archives, somehow the books need to be put on the shelves.

All that's required: a ladder, a scaffold, a health & safety guy, and a few architects to do it themselves! (more)

Camera Trauma

Even though this travel was over a year ago, I never got around posting anything about this fantastic journey yet. The Grand Canyon is 446km in length, up to 29km wide, 1.6km deep and is about 17 million years old.  That is impressive!

It’s quite difficult to get the amazing spatial experience across through photography, as anything that could give away the scale (for instance people) are so tiny, you can't even see them. But look at the photographs, and thou shall find!

My personal moment of camera trauma happened when we were on a hike inside the canyon. I’ve set up my camera on a tripod, and with the self-timer on the way, I could see the camera tipping over, very slowly. Not slow enough for me to catch it before it actually hit the deck – and took the trauma selfie! Luckily the camera hit the rocks on its back, so the lens was fine. Not too much damage, the lens needed to be calibrated to the camera body again, and the evidence is an Epic Fail Selfie! (more)

12 minute decision - April 2015

Some travels are a long time in the making, some only take 12 minutes. Having spent a nice day in Bath, strolling along the river Avon, visiting the usual historic highlights as the Royal Crescent, the Circus, and Bath’s best curry house Rajpoot, we decided to jump in the car and travel further down to Bournemouth and book a hotel for that night (all done in 12 minutes). (more)