SEPTEMBER 2024 · ADVENTURE
Aurora hunting on Lord Hereford's Knob
Twmpa (Lord Hereford's Knob), Black Mountains, Wales
There was a forecast. That was the reason. I went up Twmpa on the evening of the 13th with a tent and waited.
Golden hour came first. The Brecon valleys opened below: rolling ridges, deep forest layering away to the south-west, the patchwork of fields far below under a grey-blue sky. Wild grass and moorland in sharp foreground, the valley sprawling behind it. The light on the layered mountains was warm and specific — warm sunset across the ridges, dark forest patterns in the valleys between them. Delicate grasses backlit in sharp foreground, the hazy valley beyond them, the kind of image the forecast had nothing to do with.
Not the theatrical columns sometimes photographed in Scotland or Iceland — a wash of colour across a dark sky, the tent visible in the dark grass below it.
Twmpa (Lord Hereford's Knob) — September 2024
It went dark. Not immediately, and not completely. The sky above the Welsh hills doesn't cooperate with plans. I had the tent pitched on the summit and I waited.
And it came: pink and green above the tent and the mountain ridges, the aurora filling the upper half of the frame. Not the theatrical columns sometimes photographed in Scotland or Iceland — a wash of colour across a dark sky, the tent visible in the dark grass below it. The colours were specific. Pink in the upper register, green below it where the atmosphere was closer.
Five images. The forecast was right.
Aurora borealis glowing pink and green above mountain ridges with tent in dark grass
Golden-hour valley landscape with rolling hills and forested ridges receding into mist
Warm sunset light across layered mountains and valleys with deep forests creating dark patterns
Wild grass and moorland slope in focus, sprawling patchwork valley below under grey-blue sky
Delicate grasses in sharp foreground, backlit by golden sunset with hazy valley beyond