An afternoon stroll in Christon Orchard.

An afternoon stroll in Christon Orchard.
from the year in the year of thatchers cider series.

Royal Bath and West show

I’ve had a great couple of days shooting down at the royal Bath and West show, taking pictures for B&Q, Thatchers Cider and Butcombe Ale. Congratulations to Thatchers for doing so well in the Cider Competions (coming first in the Single Variety comp and placed in the top 3 many times) . I meet the lively and energetic Adam Henson from BBC’s Country File who was presenting a cheque for the team at Butcombe. In association with Butcombe Adam has produced a fantastic real ale called “Rare Breed” which seemed to be going down really well.

Managed to shoot some footage for Thatchers cider and the “year in the life of” film and just to round off the day I took a quick tour of the cider/Orchard tent where visitors were enjoying the cider and atmosphere as well as advice on all things apples from people like Andrew Lea, Liz Copas, James Crowden amongst other cider legends.
It was great fun meeting and chatting to other cider makers and really enjoyed tasting the the excellent and varied brews from Chucklehead, Circle Cider (in their first year) and Pilton Cider, of which a bottle of their excellent keeved cider is now chilling (man !) in my fridge.

Meeting these guys yesterday has really fired up my enthusiasm for cider and apple juice making again this year and now I’m living in North Somerset I’m looking forward to putting it’s spare apples to good use !!

new entry on my editorial photography site

4 hours chasing the Olympic torch yesterday, link here http://southwestsnapper.wordpress.com/

Wrington Pageant 2012

Here are a selection images that I took while watching the Pageant with the family. We all really enjoyed the event which was very colourful in the spring sunshine and enthusiastically acted out.

Great Fun !

Hope you like the pics

Neil Phillips and Family

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Night sky, spring, Wrington

On tuesday night I was heading over to Sandford to do some photography for Thatchers cider when I caught this view. Sometimes you just have to stop even if it makes you a little late ( I missed the sunset over the orchard, darn it !)

Strawberry Line in Apple Blossom

“Cyclist enjoying the spring blossom on the strawberry line, running past Thatchers Cider.”

“Still time to enjoy the wonderful apple blossom, so get on those bikes and enjoy the spring sunshine while it last’s” !

I spent lovely afternoon in a somerset cider orchard filming apple blossom floating through the air. Here was my only company for the afternoon. I’m guessing it’s a blue tit!!?

Blue Tit with apple blossom

Spent saturday afternoon with my cider mate Richard down at Willsbridge Mill tasting the 2011 Cider. As usual a mixed bag ranging from god damn awful to not bad. One day the planets and stars will align and I will make perfect cider. Until that day the cider is best sweetened !! Actually a couple of barrels are definitely better than last years so things are going in the right direction at least.

Wrington Blue Sky, 1st May 2012

Wrington Hill, Blue skies, at last !

Honey Bees flying in !!!

With the sunshine finally appearing between showers in North Somerset the apple blossom has began to reveal itself.

Between filming in the orchards yesterday afternoon I shot a few stills of the bees going about their work and managed to capture the image below of an eager bee making a “beeline” for the blossom.

It was lovely to be out wandering the orchards again, especially with the sun on my back and camera in hand it’s my favourite place to be at this time of year.

Busy bee makes a beeline !

2011 Apple Pressing Day

I’ve just managed to obtain a copy of the double page spread that the Bristol Evening Post (as it was called then !) ran on our apple pressing day, help back in October 2011. Photographer Jon Kent came out to photograph us and captured all the colour of a beautiful autumn day, with the apple presses at full steam.

With this years apple blossom slowly revealing itself through the April showers, It really puts me mood for lots more apple juice and cider making this year.

2011 Apple Pressing Day

A big thanks to jon for sending this through,
Happy scrumping !!
Neil