New Year Bank Holiday Monday was bright and sunny - which is hard to believe today as I'm incarcerated in the house listening to a howling gale outside, watching the rain hammering on the windows and various loose objects, such as the SCC food bin, gardening gloves, secateurs, the Christmas tree and oh yes, the fence Joe and I fixed (painfully) yesterday, hurtling round the garden.

So I prefer to think of yesterday, when, after fixing said fence, we took ourselves off to Wisley. Joe wanted to try out her new camera and I wanted to try out the one she's offered to lend me for my upcoming Thailand/Hong Kong/Burma trip. I've been agonising about which camera to take. I love my old SLR but it's  a) heavy, b) flashy and c) has a lousy zoom. So she's offered to lend me her old Lumix. I enjoyed using it but still have misgivings? Is it overexposing, even after I corrected the shots? And since it's quite  bashed about, I'll have to get a compact as a safely net in any case.

So have a look at these and I'd be grateful for feedback - I don't need to know that I'm a lousy photographer and Joe's on her Facebook page are miles better. I only need to know if the camera is performing properly!

This was a wide-angle shot of the dogwood.

An extraordinary copper sculpture inside th glasshouse - the label said 'Banana Plant in Flower' but it looks more like a pineapple to me. At any rate I think it's overexposed - used a slight zoom.

The Butterfly event opens on 14th January, but there are already a few in the glasshouse - presumably for breeding purposes. This and the next two were on zoom.

I thought this turned out well, unlike the orchids I tried to take, wehich were all washed out.

I think this wide-angled shot may be slightly overexposed, though the sky looks fine.

This is my favourite, I think. It just worked.