A Year of Sun Rises





Some mornings it takes the sun a while to break through.
On Saturday 13th October 2012 it was well worth the wait.
 

I ended 2011 by making the somewhat rash resolution to see every sun rise of 2012. As it was I saw 365 of them and missed one! It's been a memorable thing to do and I will make a point of watching the sun rise more often from now. It's really quite a magical thing.
But will I repeat the challenge of seeing every one in 2013? No! The occasional sleep-in will be much appreciated. And those 4 o'clock starts for weeks on end in June and July lost their novelty value after a while.

I ended up photographing almost all of the sun rises too, though by December I was tiring of grey, featureless skies so decided to give the camera a break.

Looking back, I actually saw the sun rise 136 times in the year. That's just over a third of mornings. Others it was obscured by a low bank of cloud on the horizon, but for many the sky was simply grey, grey, grey.
But that's not surprising really, as it's been the wettest year on record. Who could have imagined that on April 5th when a hosepipe ban came into force?

And which month yielded the most sun rises. Here's the final table.

Jan - 13                        Feb - 9                       Mar - 10                     Apr - 9

  May - 8                         Jun - 15                      Jul - 17                      Aug - 13

  Sep - 17                        Oct - 7                        Nov - 8                      Dec - 10



July and September did well, but just look at April, May, October and November.





Anyway, without any further ado, here are some of the best.



January

February

March

April

 

May

June

 

July





August

September

October

 

November

December

 

Looking back, it's been worth every early start.

The 366th Sun Rise

Well, sadly there was to be no final blaze of glory.

No, in terms of sun rises, 2012 went out with a whimper.

Monday 31st December 2012

There was time for just one more December deluge today.
It seemed rather fitting that I should spend the last day of the year getting thoroughly muddy and pretty cold and wet too.

For the chicken enclosure, like everywhere else, has gradually been getting muddier and muddier. Although the chickens have free range over the whole farm at this time of year, I decided that they need somewhere close to home where they can get a little shelter from the wind and find some dry ground to scratch around and dust bathe in. So I put a couple of old pallets, a dismantled old shed and a couple of sheets of plywood to good use and knocked this up...



After all my hard work, it was nice that some of the chooks appreciated my efforts.



The Polands and Legbar hens
quickly discovered the new hang out today,
taking shelter from the driving rain and howling winds.

The guinea fowl, on the other hand, are clearly prospecting for something better.
I think they are getting fed up with nightly drenchings and batterings perched in the open up on the fence. But that's where they keep going back to.















Looking on the bright side, the forecasters are predicting an end to the downpours in 2013.

I've got a good feeling about next year.