Buttermere under the Stars

The M6 nearly ended this one before it started. Snow on the motorway, cars stranded, and a decision to keep going anyway — I made it through with enough time to park up at Buttermere, make dinner, and watch the sky through the van window.

By 8pm it had cleared enough. I pulled on a jacket, walked down to the water’s edge in the pitch black, and set up. The mountains were holding their snow from the day before — Fleetwith Pike to the left, High Crag and Hay Stacks filling out the right — and the stars were coming through in the gaps between the cloud. 0°C, minimal wind to speak of, just the lake and the fells and whatever the sky was deciding to do.

The clouds are the bit I keep coming back to. They could’ve been a problem — a clear sky would’ve been the obvious win — but that sweeping band cutting across the middle gives the image a depth a pure star field wouldn’t have. The lake, rougher than it looks, was smoothed out by the exposure into something close to glass.

Worth the white-knuckle drive up.