I Am Only Making One Post Today,

as there are lots of photographs,

Diana had already left for work, so after my morning exercises and a shower I was out, revisiting St. Dunstan's, we had in fact been there just at the weekend, but this time I had the infrared set up with me,

in case you are not familiar with them, here they are, I use them with a cable less remote shutter, 

the camera on the left is the infrared converted one, on the right the normal camera, the reason for the remotes is if you want to take a long exposure and have two cameras taking pictures of the same scene in a different way, in my case one normal and one infrared, it is difficult not to have the cameras suffer from camera shake when touching and pressing both shutter buttons, so as well as the mounting rail, I use both cameras timers to give a 2 second delay in operating, note the difference in colour in the screens, as one camera 'sees' differently to the other, 

so as we have been here before,

just a couple of photographs of St. Dunstan's,

 

one last look and I was on the tube to,

 Brompton Cemetery, 

it might seem a strange place to visit,

but I just love the statuary that the Victorians used on their loved ones graves,

Brompton Cemetery was consecrated by the Bishop of London in June 1840,

the founder, architect, inventor and entrepreneur Stephen Geary, had previously created the cemeteries at Highgate and Nunhead,

this cemetery amongst others was established in the 19th century to alleviate overcrowding in existing parish burial grounds,

except a few pigeons and a few people in the distance,

I nearly had the place to myself,

the 39-acre cemetery is located in west London, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, and it acts as the western border of the Brompton neighborhood,

if you are thinking if visiting there are two entrances to the cemetery, the South Gate is just off Fulham Road, while the North Gate is off Old Brompton Road, the closest Tube station is West Brompton on the District line, which I used, just turn right as you leave the station and the North Gate and café is just 100 yards or so along the road on the same side, several buses serve the local area, including the 14, 74, 190, 211, 328, 414, 430, C1 and C3 , but note there is no parking in the cemetery itself,

The Friends of Brompton Cemetery offer informational tours of the cemetery every Sunday from May to August, and on two Sundays each month from September to April. Tours begin at 2 pm outside the chapel and last about two hours. Private tours can also be booked for other days of the week, but, big but, due to the current restrictions tours are not available at this moment in time, 

the cemetery is usually open daily from dawn until dusk, it is closed on Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Day,

now for the fun part,

it appears that some visitors here have a hobby,

grave spotting!

as I walked around the graves,

some visitors had note books out,

and were comparing notes as to which graves they had seen,

rather like in my school days,

the 'I-Spy' booklets where you had to see birds and note where and when you saw them,

it seems the same thing happens here,

the Brompton Cemetery burial archive comprises 140 leather-bound registers,  

there are more than 200,000 people buried here, and it is open for a limited number of new burials every year, Emma Shaw was the first person to be buried in the cemetery – on June 22nd, 1840,

here are some notable names that you might recognize including

.     Dr John Snow – He discovered the cause of cholera.

·         Emmeline Pankhurst – A suffragette leader.

·         William Banting – He popularised the concept of dieting.

·         Frederick Leyland – A shipowner and art patron.

·         Sir Samuel Cunard – Owner of a shipping company.

·      Sir John Fowler – The engineer of the Metropolitan Railway and Forth Bridge.

·         Samuel Leigh Sotheby – An auctioneer.

.         Brian Glover – A television and film actor.

so there area few to be going on with when you do visit!

keeping to a famous person theme,

 

Ms Potter lived nearby in Old Brompton Road, and many believe she used names from tombstones in the cemetery for her characters. For example, names of people buried in the cemetery include Mr Nutkins, Mr McGregor, Mr Brock, Mr Tod, Jeremiah Fisher and even Peter Rabbett, 

I continued my walk,

looking at the legends,

and the statues,

as I made my way towards,

the main thoroughfare,

towards the mausoleum,

the cost of some of these must have been huge then,

and would I am sure be the same now,

Hope, above the mausoleum in the photograph above,

I continued towards the entrance to the catacombs,

flanked on both sides,

by these buildings,

but then I turned to the right,

to go behind them and took this photograph of where I had been,

looking towards the left,

and arriving half way around,

I walked to the center,

just above the staircase to the catacombs,

I decided to walk down to have a look,

the gated and locked entrance,

I then walked to the central avenue,

and looked at some of the statuary there,

this one slightly lopsided,

I walked around the main building,

to the rear,

and started making my way back to the North Gate,

where I spied this ferocious guard,

down what appears to be a newly made path,

this mausoleum,

I was now only a few hundred yards from the North Gate,

and at last the sun had come out,

which did not really help me at this stage as I was shooting into the sun,

but there it is,

I have to admit, macabre as it sounds,

it was really quite enjoyable,

walking through these sometimes long forgotten graves, and the good news is that with taking both cameras, I will have lots of infrared images to play with in the winter months,

visit over time for a coffee,

the outside seats placed as they should be, coffee finished back on the train to sunny Beckenham, it really was a lovely day out, Diana arrived home in the early evening, so one from Midsomer Murders, and a late showing of New Tricks and we were off to bed.