The Strid

Hi all

Over the winter I've been doing a project on the Strid Waterfall in the Yorkshire Dales. The Strid is a stretch of water on the River Wharfe, in the grounds of Bolton Abbey in the far south eastern corner of the Dales, and is pretty famous round these parts as a rather picturesque spot. Measuring around 100 yards long, and with a drop of only a few metres, it appears to be a rather delightful place, a haven of peacefulness and general Dales-type chocolate box tranquility.

It is, however, anything but. It's actually one of the most dangerous stretches of water in the whole of the British Isles. Very few people who have ever had the misfortune of falling into it have ever survived, and on pretty much every occasion when that's happened, the bodies of the poor souls who have fallen in here have never been found.

The reason is very simple: about a mile upstream from The Strid, the river Wharfe is a gentle flowing river, around 40 ft wide, and 6 ft deep. At the mouth of The Strid, however, this 40 ft wide river narrows dramatically, forcing the entire river through a 6 ft wide gap. The entire river is effectively turned on its side, with astonishing force. 40 ft wide and 6ft deep becomes, in the space of a few yards, 6ft wide and 40 ft deep.

Over the winter I made about 8 or 9 visits here. I was absolutely struck not just by the great power and strength of this rather unusual stretch of water, but also its beauty and fragility.

All photos taken with the K3, and various lenses (17-70, 55-300, 50 1.4, and a homemade tilt shift lens)

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All thoughts, observations etc very welcome as ever...

Best

Really interesting project and set of images Bill.

For me 5 and 7 are the very clear standouts. They are special. The portrait format and crop really elevates them, you get a much better impression of powerful flow down through the frame. They're almost Turner-esque.

4,6,8 and 9 are not quite on a par, but have a great abstract feel and I like them very much. The others are (for me) less special by your standards (... which are of course pretty darned high).

I know the Strid well...and interesting that the two of your images that most represent the place for me are almost all water... rather than wider landscape shots.

PS. Just looked again. 7 is just stunning.

I'll go with Northgrain... I know the Strid well, also... these capture the awsome power... and the beauty of the cut.
5, 6 & 7 are wonderful fast water study.... numbers 1, 3 & 11 capture the Strid itself....
thanks for posting these.

The close-ups really display the frightful power of this water

5 and 7 for me also as they capture the force of the waters flow but 9 is my favourite as I sometimes like the more abstract and it shows the violence of the waters flow and not just the power. (also I do love Turner!!!!!!!! and on a personal preference note I would of cropped the bank rocks from image 2 )

Just dipped in to these again. Such a pleasure to see your work like this Bill!

[and Stosser01 has a point about #9 ]

Thanks Tim x2, David and Stosser for detailed thoughts on these... very useful, as ever...

Tim A and Tim F: I'd been to Bolton Abbey quite a bit for the trees, and the other waterfall there, Posforth Gill... I'd sort of purposefully avoided the Strid, I suppose, as it's been pretty well photographed, and from everything I'd seen of it I thought it looked like it might be very nice but a bit twee, if I'm honest (my mistake)... but the first time I saw it (after heavy rain) I was really struck by it... water going not just downstream, but back upstream, bouncing instream, and also, most scarily, being sucked right down to the bottom, and spewed back up to the top... like a furious 80 mile an hour washing machine... I've done a fair amount of surfing and canoeing in my time, so I've seen a fair amount of big water up close, but absolutely nothing like this... the more I looked at it the more I was struck by the rather vicious, savage beauty of it all, the water being twisted into all kind of shapes and patterns I'd never really seen before, so that was what I was really going after with this... as you say, a fast moving water study... from a technical pov, even between 1/6 and 1/10 sec the difference in shutter speed vs water form was considerable, different on different days too...

Tim A: Yes, I know what you mean... The first and last few shots in the series (1,2, 10, 11) are sort of scene setters if you like, and not particularly extraordinary... I suppose the point I was trying to get at is how can something that looks this benign/unremarkable actually contain something this dangerous... but I think photographically as you say there might be a smarter/more unsettling way in/out of the project so will put thinking cap on and see what I can come up with...

Stosser: Thanks for you thoughts/comments... great point you make re the difference between violence vs power, which I hadn't thought of... thank you... re crop on no.2, was using this shot to put the Strid into the context of its surroundings, but you might well be right...

Thanks again all... input much appreciated...

Best