Flash, bang, wallop . . .

. . . what a picture, what a photograph. Or at least I hope so.

New camera this week - back to an SLR after a few years of a compact. I enjoyed the Nikon, it was very versatile but also a bit unwieldy if I wanted to take pictures on anything other than the 'auto' setting.

Anyway, a walk with the dog on Sunday was the first opportunity to use the new 'equipment'.

It was a pleasant walk along a newish route that I'd not photographed before, but the hound was being a bit awkward, making it a bit difficult to stop and look around.

We did find a pond we'd not spotted before - very picturesque but spoiled a bit by all the litter left behind by kids who obvioulsy used the place for drink parties etc.

This stretch of the walk takes me over a couple of bridges - a narrow footbridge and an old railway bridge, the line for which has long since been ripped up.

There was a pair of blackbrids going beserk in the garden on Sunday morning - giving the cat a right telling off. A bit of investigation uncovered this poor little thing hiding in the undergrowth . . .

Funilly enough, I was reading a piece last week about how fledgling blackbirds often get turfed out of the nest a bit early, but it was important to leave them alone because their parents continue to look after them.

Well, it survived Sunday and Monday, though I do worry that one of the many neighbourhood cats will make a little snack of him.

Sunday pm, we went into Cambridge to visit the Botanic Garden We'd just started taking a look around (a reluctance to pay the entry fee meant I hadn't been there for years) when the heavens opened. We sheltered in the coffee shop for a while, then the glasshouses, but we admitted defeat in the end and beat a wet and hasty retreat back to the car.

I did get the chance to take a few pictures, but not as many as I would have liked.