The Elusive Peak District
February 2006

I have a picture in my mind's eye. It's of a location in the Peak District that I went to last winter, but at the time the weather was very snowy - too snowy - and we turned back before we made it to the summit of the peak that I wish to take the photograph from.

The peak in question is Mam Tor, in the dramatic Dark Peak. It's a well-known landmark in the area for more reasons than just its imposing presence. It's also called the "Shivering Mountain" as it experiences frequent landslides. The sedimentary rock that it is composed of was laid down in layers, millions of years ago when Britain was under a tropical ocean. However, these layers are unstable and after periods of heavy rain, the water lubricates them and sections of the east side run down into the valley below.

But it is the view from the top that currently draws my attention the most, not its geology (although I am curious about that too). Standing on the summit of Mam Tor, you can follow a ridge that runs over to the peaks of Hollins Cross and on to Lose Hill, standing proud between Hope Valley and the Vale of Edale. This ridge runs from the southwest to the northeast, so during the winter months, the rising sun bathes the eastern side of the ridge in golden morning light. With a bit of mist lingering in the valley below, this was the image I was hoping to capture during my recent visit.

View from Mam Tor, in the Peak District, at sunset.

I parked my car in a nearby car park, grabbed my kit from the boot, and headed up the hill in the darkness. The fog was thick and as I followed the path to the summit, I was becoming slightly anxious, as I could see no evidence that I may be nearing the top of it. Also, the higher I climbed, the stronger the wind became. It was rushing past me from a southeast direction, exactly where I was hoping that the sun would be bursting through at any time. This caused me a bit of a dilemma. I only had my lightweight, and therefore not so stable, tripod with me, so would have to use my body as a shield against the strong wind. Yet the wind was blowing from exactly the direction I was hoping to be shooting. The only solution would have to be a compromise of opening up the aperture of my lens in order to make the shutter speed as fast as possible. However, this would result in a smaller depth of field and the picture would not be as sharp as I would like it to be.

But it was the fog that was causing me my biggest concern. Although I had now reached the summit, the fog was still as thick and grey as it had seemed from below in the valley. I huddled behind a rock, sheltering as best I could from the biting wind, and tucked into a banana as I patiently waited for the sun to rise and hopefully start burning away some of the fog.

People sometimes wonder how some photographers are so lucky to have caught such dramatic or stunning weather conditions and light in their photographs. While to an extent this is down to luck, you can also do your best to stack the odds in your favour by paying close attention to weather forecasts, calculating from which angle and at what time the sun will be rising or setting, checking out tide times, if you are on the coast, and being on location during the best hours for amazing light. But at the end of the day, no matter how much preparation you make, you still have to rely on Mother Nature to play her part in giving you what you wish for in order to make that photograph.

Unfortunately, luck was not on my side again, and the fog failed to clear during the hour that I was on the peak, so the photograph still only exists in my mind's eye. But I will return to the location another time to try again.

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