It's 10am as I write this.

At 4.15am this morning, my eldest son and I drove to Alderley Edge (of Wizard, and Brissingamen fame) for sunrise. We parked the car alongside a few others and walked through the almost silent woods to the Edge. Rabbits ran around through the woodland, and a few birds flew overhead.

We sat with our feet dangling over the Edge facing North East towards the hills of the Derbyshire Peak District. All the features of the foreground were perfectly visible in the subdued pre-sunrise light. There were a few clouds around, but not enough to spoil the morning; the all important horizon was perfectly clear. A few clouds well above the horizon were illuminated gently by the sun behind the hills.

The sun peeped over the horizon and everything changed. The very light mist that had previously been invisible and sat in the folds of the land before us, became illuminated, hiding some of the features, yet showing off others.

Very light shadows formed, silhouettes of trees, buildings (churches stood out well with their towers and spires), small hills. The sky changed from red to gold and back again, almost imperceptibly. The clouds almost became alive. Soon, as more of the sun rose beams of light around the shadows formed, exaggerating yet again the feature of the foreground. Later, as the golds and reds faded, the beams of light from the sun shone through the foreground towards us, adding yet another appearance to the countryside.

We weren't alone on the Edge, a group of four and a group of two people were near us. The couple, like us, sat silently watching the spectacle. The group of four performed some sort of ritual; the stood variously holding hands in a circle, then facing the sun with arms outstretched, then held each other closely in a huddle.

Soon after sunrise a group of four came to sit nearby. They may have seen the sunrise from somewhere else, but I rather think they missed it. There were others around on the Edge but we didn't see them. A horn was blown about five minutes after sunrise, somebody's whoops were heard through the woodland.

Once the sun was clear of the horizon, the features began to lose their magical appearance, and things returned to normal.

It was certainly a magical experience. My son was impressed by what he had seen, I was as glad about that as sceptical student I hadn't expected much but scorn for going tramping the countryside at that god-forsaken time of the morning…….'You're doing what? Why? You can see the sun ANY day' etc etc. But no, he enjoyed it.

I took loads of photographs, but I'm no photographer. When the photos are developed they'll mean nothing to anyone else, but lots to me.

We left for home after 40 minutes or so, and were soon climbing into our beds. Timothy could stay in bed all day if he wanted (he probably will), I had to be up for work around 8.00am.

It's a good job a friend phoned me at 9.20am and woke me up! There are many advantages to being self employed, flexible hours being one of them A major disadvantage is: no work = no wages. I'll have another coffee and then cycle off to work!

I can't wait until next year.

John (The bleary)