The bigger picture

• The Great British Public get ready for the general election

For some reason, if I try to copy an image from google earth, and paste it into a photo editing program (I use a thing called GIMP, which is an open source photoshoppy thing) it says there is no image data in my paste buffer.

Trying for a workround, I found that I could email the image to myself, then copy the image and paste it.

What I'm trying to do is create an enormously wide picture by stitching several images together.

A bit time consuming but should be relatively straightforward.

You'll see the result at the bottom of this post, assuming I can work it out.

Today, we went for a walk along the Dee marshes. In a similar vein to the walk we did a few weeks ago in Mostyn in North Wales, but this time, I found that we could walk along the old road past the firing range. There's no vehicular access, but you are allowed to walk.

There was a big red flag flying, but that's always there. As I mentioned last time, the road has been closed to vehicles for getting on for 20 years, and I was interested to see how it had deteriorated. It was actually in fairly good nick, considering. I think perhaps the sheep help to keep the grass and weeds from taking hold. Or maybe the fact that it's nothing more than the occasional tractor driving along it has something to do with it.



The ravages of time do show up in some things though.



We went just a little bit past Burton Point, where there used to be an Iron Age settlement. There are spectacular views across the marsh to the Clywydian hills. Surely Moel Famau is a mother mountain if ever there was one. Today it was in silhouette, because we got there as the last dregs of daylight turned everything red and gold.



As to that big pic? Still trying to sort it out. It involves layers, and it's getting too complicated for my tired brain.