An Searrach, Dingle, Co. Kerry

The weather was rotten. Properly rotten. I was heading home from Dingle town, past sunset, mist thickening, and any sensible person would have kept driving. Instead I pulled over, got out into the rain, and set up a tripod to photograph a rock. My wife has long since stopped questioning these decisions.

An Searrach sits just outside Dingle Harbour. The name is Irish for "The Foal." I'd been seeing it from the Conor Pass for years, this tall dark stack standing alone in the water, and every time I told myself I'd get down and photograph it properly. Never did. It took foul conditions and a long lens to finally get it done.

I exposed for thirty seconds. The mist had reduced the headland behind to a faint suggestion, barely a shape. The stack held all the darkness in the frame while the sea went silk-flat around its base. That blue-grey light you get over Kerry when the cloud is low and thick, it did exactly what I needed. Stripped the colour back and left the rock as the only solid thing in the picture.

Here's what caught me off guard. I only spotted the climbing ropes when I got home and looked at the file on screen. They're draped across the face of the stack, left behind by previous climbers. From the Conor Pass it looks like a lump of rock in the harbour. Up close, you can see people have been hauling themselves up that thing for years. It rewards anyone who takes the time to look closely!