Over the course of a day, my friends and I were able to drive along most of the coast of Cornwall, navigating the impossibly narrow streets and stopping to explore scenic locations along a loosely planned route, with intentions to eventually watch sunset at Lizard Point, the southernmost tip of the mainland UK. While we were drying off near the car following a frigid beach swim, the sun began to sink dangerously close to the horizon, so we rushed to pack up and start driving toward our destination. Along the way, we had to pull off in a patch of decent cell connection for a friend to make an urgent business call, but we were losing our race with the sun’s soft golden hour light. I felt antsy, so I decided to go for a short walk to see if there was anything interesting to shoot along the road we pulled off of. I stumbled upon this scene completely by accident, took this one shot, and headed back to the car. After wrapping up the call, we ended up making it just in time for sunset, where I enjoyed the views but didn’t end up capturing any particularly special images. This image, on the other hand, is one of my favorite landscape photographs I’ve ever taken. We never would’ve otherwise stopped to explore this relatively insignificant village on the map, but seemingly inconvenient circumstances led to creating something special.

Other images from the drive, our frigid swim, and the inevitable sunset at Land’s End are included below.