Category: Travel photography

Visit to Hever Castle home of Anne Boleyn

By cpadmin

Visit to Hever Castle the home of Anne Boleyn

Visit to Hever Castle home of Anne Boleyn. Shru visited the childhood home of Anne Boleyn during the tulip season on a bright still day.

Visit to Hever Castle the home of Anne Boleyn
Hever Castle the home of Anne Boleyn on a bright spring day

Two moats

Captured from the outer moat of the castle, this shot shows the topiary reflected in the outer moat. Hever castle has two moats and two drawbridges. The water in the foreground sweeps the eye in and the viewers’ attention is led over the first wooden bridge. We are then lead and onto the castle forecourt and over the drawbridge, where the draw chains are visible. Eventually we arrive at the caste door where the portcullis is ready to drop on us!

A green image

There is lots of “green” in Shru’s early spring image, provided by the topiary, the bushes and the climbers. There are soft clouds overhead which highlight the stern crenelated yellow brickwork of the castle itself. The topiary designed by the gardeners also brings softness and humour.

This was a great visit that I would recommend it to you.

Equipment

Canon EOS 7D Mark II EF-S 18-135mm IS STM

F5.6   1/200 ISO 100

What a view! La-Roche-Guyon

By cpadmin

A view from the top of the rock?

What a view! La-Roche-Guyon. This post contains two complimentary views. One is from the road in front of the Chateau and the other from the top of the Donjon looking back at the river. There are three ‘parts’ to La Roche-Guyon: the village itself, a large 14th century Chateau, and the medieval Donjon (in English we would say “Keep”).

La Roche Guyon
La Roche Guyon – The Chateau looking up to the keep

La-Roche-Guyon stands on a broad bend in the Seine River. It is 10km east of Vernon in the Ile de France (Paris) region of France. The village is officially classified as one of the ‘most beautiful villages of France’. It originally developed below the medieval Chateau next to the river.

What a view! La-Roche-Guyon.
What a view! La-Roche-Guyon – a view from the keep

Two views are shared to show how high the keep is and how exhausting it was to climb. The view is well worth the climb though. 

From the left of the image the chalky hillside arcs round to the centre of the image almost as if it is a container for the river. The village is central to the image. On the right of the image the patterns of the formal ‘potager’ (kitchen garden) can be seen between the Chateau and the river. This is a lovely sleepy village to wander round. La-Roche-Guyon is a few minutes from Giverny where Monet’s garden is found. 

More History

The Chateau de La Roche-Guyon had an interesting military use in the Second World War when Field Marshall Rommel established his base here to direct the German response to the Allied invasion of 1944.

Historically the region managed to remain under independent control despite the powerful regions that stood either side – the lands of the Loire Valley and the Kings of France to the south and the lands of the Dukes of Normandy to the north.