I was fast asleep on Tuesday morning (even too early for dreaming) when the phone rang. It was 4.17am so immediately I wondered what was wrong, had there been a family accident?
As a photographer the phone rings at all times of the day, but you still dread the early morning calls, wondering what could be so urgent.
I was fast asleep on Tuesday morning (even too early for dreaming) when the phone rang. It was 4.17am so immediately I wondered what was wrong, had there been a family accident?
As a photographer the phone rings at all times of the day, but you still dread the early morning calls, wondering what could be so urgent.
I answered to hear a friend telling me to get my camera and take photos as it was snowing outside! I peeped outside to see the grass covered in a white blanket.
I knew this was going to be cold, so before even opening the door, I covered myself in many layers, and then some more, including a beanie and my running gloves.
I grabbed my camera, went outside and walked past the sensor lights to make some light for the photos, as it was raining and I was not sure if the snow would be still on the ground once I could see better.
While walking towards the one sensor light, I walked over a thick slippery layer of snowy ice spread across the driveway, leaving a thick shoe imprint (and some freezing cold toes).
As a photographer I have photographed almost all situations, from the extreme heat of bush fires to the inside of freezing cold fridges, but I always dread photographing in the rain.
I don’t like getting wet in the cold (especially at 4.30am), but the camera is also rain shy. However, this was a bit of Grahamstown history and an excuse to get up close.
While I was out, it began to snow again at one stage, only for a few minutes. But this soon stopped and was followed by rain which started coming down harder.
I walked down out our steep driveway to get different angles, taking small steps at a time as it was extra slippery. While in the garden, I realised I was surrounded by snow but I still did not know what to compare it to as snow last fell in Grahamstown 34 years ago.
I remember that my parents had taken my brother and I to play in the snow but as I was only two so I don’t entirely recall that snowy day.
So for me this was my first real experience in the snow so I took full advantage of it and began packing some snow together to build a mini snow man.
My wife, Terri-Lynn was unable to join in as she was on crutches from an ankle fracture. So there I was, playing in the snow, on my ace!
After playing and taking photos of the snow, I went back indoors and decided it was too exciting to go back to bed, so we waited until sunrise.
Just before 8am I got some more pics, and took a drive around Grahamstown capturing the early snowy morning, although there was a lot less snow than there had been a few hours earlier.
I placed the photos on my website (www.penneyspix.co.za), told a few people to check them out, and before I knew it, I had themost visitors on my site in any one day.
The previous record on my newly designed site was 29, so I was excited when 46 people took a look. The website is a platform for many of my photographs, as well as a site for the Run/Walk For Life Grahamstown, of which my wife and myself are the Grahamstown managers.
This is where our members will find running fixtures, results, photographs, and other news articles. Frith van der Merwe and Terri-Lynn are often in the news on the website, as they are both among the top road runners in the Eastern Cape, while Terri- Lynn has a page dedicated to her as she has been chosen to represent South Africa in the World Triathlon champs in September 2010 (you read more on her page).
But getting back to the snow, we went home home for lunch to find my snow dude was the only evidence that there been any snow earlier that day!
By the end of Tuesday, there were a recorded 1 133 visits to the website. Thanks to the technology of Facebook and Twitter and all those other fancy communication tools (I can send SMSes!), word got around about Grahamstown’s snow, attracting people from 42 different countries to the website.
