A Visit Home, Burnham In Mono

Last week I found myself on a small shoot close to my boyhood home town of Burnham On Sea.
After the shoot a gut reaction inspired me to take a detour on the way home to visit and walk along the seafront for an hour.

I lived on the seafront here for several years with amazing views across the sea.
I would often walk along the beach in search of images and to further my learning.
I’d turn the large bedroom in my flat into a temporary darkroom and spend hours developing and printing my images and experimenting.

As I walked along taking a few images a man on a bench spoke to me about my camera.
I stopped here for 10 minutes chatting with him about Burnham and about his working life.

I won’t disclose all of what we spoke about as some was quite sad and don’t feel comfortable sharing here.
He had lived abroad in Africa and Thailand most his life fighting in several wars as a young man.
As the conversation came to a close we both agreed it didn’t matter where in the world you travelled or lived home was definitely always home.

Before departing I asked his name and if I could photograph him which he kindly allowed.
It was a lovely encounter and I walked on with a feeling it was mean’t to be for whatever reason.

Here are a few Black & White images from my short but familiar walk.
I rarely work in mono but somehow these images felt like they were mean’t to be just like my visit that morning.