Despite the fact that it hasn't stopped raining for weeks – some parts of the West Country have had rain every day so far this year – we spent last weekend in our Bristol flat, really just for a change of scene. The drive on the M4 motorway was positively apocalyptic, however, both going up and coming back. At times, the intensity of the rain was astonishing: pounding on the roof of the car it sounded like gravel was being emptied over us, and even when it had slackened off the constant spray from the wheels of all the other vehicles was severely impairing visibility, with the wipers struggling to clear a view through the windscreen.
So the drive required complete concentration – there are some very bad and inconsiderate drivers out there, who have clearly never come across or understood terms like "stopping distance" or "aquaplaning" – but very occasionally I'd sneak a look sideways, and the contrast between the roiling tunnel of spray along the motorway and the placid countryside, with its intensely, um, saturated colours under a heavy downpour on either side was remarkable. Rain in a muddy field and rain on a busy motorway are radically different experiences, separated by a few yards and a fence. It would probably make a great drone shot, if drones can even fly in such weather.
Frequent spells of heavy rain do mean great clouds, though, much appreciated when I was out walking on the Downs or along the Avon Gorge. For a guy once notorious for the absence of skies in his photos, I've become something of a cloud fanatic. Unless there's something interesting going on up there, I'm less inclined to take the photo. Give me empyrean drama, please, not boringly bland blue or grey skies.
It's clear there is some sort of geothermal action going on in parts of the Gorge; I suppose the name Hotwells is a clue. It doesn't have to have been raining for large plumes of water vapour to rise up from certain spots in Leigh Woods on the far side of the Avon, opposite our fourth-floor kitchen window. When I first saw these I assumed they were the fires of people camped out in the woods, as they always seemed to come from the same places. Confusingly, smoke does also rise up from time to time, presumably from foresters' bonfires, but "steam is white, smoke is grey", I seem to recall someone, probably my father, saying at some point in my childhood. I remain puzzled, however, how even tiny individual clouds, barely more than wisps of water vapour, can be dark grey in an otherwise cloudless sky; I will have to look it up one of these days. Summink t'do wiv refraction, I expect. Maybe my old friend Science Man will intervene.
Of course, frequent outbreaks of heavy rain also mean that the few people out on the Downs – togged-up plodders with dogs, joggers, and the odd dogged blogging photog (heh, sorry, couldn't resist that) – have the entire space more or less to themselves. Even the designated viewpoints, normally busy with visiting sightseers, were deserted: you can just about make out the Clifton Suspension Bridge at the far end of the Gorge in the photo below.
But that's quite enough rain for now, thank you very much. Let's hope that those slick roads and puddled pavements don't freeze over, and some sunshine gets a chance to work its alchemy first, transmuting leaden skies into bright, beautiful cloudscapes.
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