My first day properly taking out my camera and wandering the streets. I had to have my car serviced which meant three hours in Weston Super Mare. Ten kilometers on walking and discovering this town isn't so bad.
It was beautiful sunshine, I walked the highstreet as I did when was thirteen on my first shopping trip. Its got bleaker and sadder. The gardens have been replaced with concrete, the shops emptied and the efforts to modernize have resulted in a coldness. What remains of the grand Victorian seaside town is crumbling desperate for restoration.
But my walk gave me hope. The old town is stunning, a mini Bath. If Bath overlooked the sea.
Crescents, delicate balconies and scaffolding were going up as people with vision see this towns old architecture as pure potential. Give it fifteen years and it may just get there.
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This photo is sadly not completely real. I did take a similar photo with a child in a cap running under the pier but this child comes from the land of google, photoshop and lightroom. You couldn't identify the child but they were part of a school trip and I was asked to delete the photo.
I wasn't prepared for this and just did what the man asked as he was being rather rude telling me I shouldn't photograph people and should just look at seagulls or get my own children. Nice. I understand he needed to protect the child.
I so badly wanted to argue my case for art and photography but instead walked away crying feeling like I was a creep.
I now know the law and that in public you can be photographed. See Avon and Somerset police statement here. Yes I have learnt a lot today.
