Not to be eclipsed by the birds
On Saturday, 29th March 2025, I was setting my drone up in the dark, ready for a flight over Newport in a park situated at Pill, Newport.
It was 4.30 am, and even by my standards of getting up early - it was "crazy o'clock". I was a man with a plan that morning ( or should I say night!). For a long time, I have wanted to get some cityscape drone pictures of a good sunrise with the Newport Transport Bridge in it as a feature. Earlier in the month, I had a great shoot at Belle Vue Park and I was very happy with the pictures I achieved using the drone that morning, but the location was tantalisingly just a bit too far away from the Newport Transporter Bridge ( you can read all about here).
An advantage of arriving at a location for a shoot in the dark, is that you get an opportunity to also do some nightscape photographs before the sunrise action commences.
I think urban areas look amazing at nighttime with all the various street, offices, factories and people's homes lights on.
I had done some reconnaissance in the area on a previous visit so I was happy I could put the drone up safely and avoid any hazards and people.
Up went the drone and the Newport Cityscape looked amazing.
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| Nightscape view across Pill, Newport |
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| Pill and Docks |
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| Newport Transporter Bridge |
The major roads through the area look like they are on fire from above. It was almost high tide and the River Usk was brimming with tidal water.
I had to keep an eye on my watch as the time quickly flew by and I didn't want to miss the sunrise. I landed the drone, swapped out the battery and got it airborne again in readiness for dawn.
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| Sunrise cityscape |
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| The sun came up behind the bridge |
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| Sunrise cityscape |
The sunrise did not disappoint. I could not really ask for much better. Clear skies with some lovely streaky clouds that turned red, no wind and no haziness. I was able to capture a shot of the sun rising behind the Newport Transporter Bridge, which ticked off one of the items on my bucket list concerning photography projects.
After landing the drone again my mobile phone rang, it was my friend Paul Joy asking what I wanted from Greggs :) as he made his way to Goldcliff Lagoons where we planned to meet up for some birding.
I am sorry to say on this occasion Paul failed on his mission to Greggs, and we both walked into the reserve with rumbling empty stomachs. Paul had arrived too early at Greggs as it does not open until 7 am!
The light at Goldcliff on a nice morning can be amazing. The early morning sun will bathe the lagoons in a gorgeous golden light.
From the first hide on Monks Lagoon a nice flock of waders had gathered pushed in from the estuary by the high tide. Curlews only roost in numbers on the reserve when the tide is over 12 meters in height.
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| Curlews in the golden light |
I scanned the Curlews for coloured rings but could not see any.
Goldcliff is very busy on the wader front at this time of year. It's the Spring Migration period so many birds are either arriving to breed at Goldcliff e.g. Avocets, Ringed Plovers or using it as a staging post before they migrate to their Arctic breeding grounds.
One species of wader that has been in huge numbers is the Black-Tailed Godwit. The flock this year has been huge 1500+ birds with some of the highest counts ever seen.
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| The Black-tailed Godwits |
The reserve is also a fantastic place to see Marsh Harriers. There have been three of these raptors frequently visiting the lagoons. Two females and one male. They appear to have a preference for the reed bed in Priors Lagoon but they will fly all over the site.
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| Female Marsh Harrier |
The morning thus far had been absolutely amazing - a fantastic sunrise, a massive wader flock, Marsh Harriers causing chaos and a lot of banter with many of my birding pals, I could not want for more really.
But I was in for a surprise. With all the excitement that had been going on, I had completely forgotten about a widely reported partial solar eclipse that was going to occur around 11 am. It was 10.35 am as Paul and my other friend Steve walked out of the reserve. Paul Joy gave us a demo of his new drone and then as we started packing our kit away and preparing to leave Paul walked up and showed me the back of his camera. I looked and saw a great picture of an eclipse. Surprised I asked when he had taken that and he laughed, pointed up and said it is happening now!
As I looked up the sky was starting to turn cloudy so I quickly grabbed my Nikon Z6 camera, attached the ND filter to its lens and took some pictures of the partial eclipse!
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| The partial eclipse was captured with my Nikon Z6 and an ND filter attached. |
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| Picture courtesy of Paul Joy (© all rights reserved) - a great picture by Paul using his Canon kit and an ND filter. You can even see a sunspot as well. |
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