St. John's Church & Roman Amphitheatre, Chester, Cheshire, England

Making a photograph of either St. John's Church or the nearby remains of a Roman amphitheatre is made harder by the proximity of a busy road. In fact, that road almost was built over the antiquity only for its being stopped by the U.K. government; the local council was hell-bent on their scheme. More recently, the amphitheatre got a spot of refurbishment and that's when the overhead walkway was set in place. On the exposed ancient floor, there was a large scale model of a rhino (the bright red and grey thing in the photo), one of many that the local council has installed in various locations around the city as part of an initiative to promote the city much like the models of cows that appeared around Manchester a few years ago.

Behind the Roman heritage lies something of a slightly more recent vintage. That is St. John's Church and, between 1075 and 1102, this was Chester's cathedral. Part of the structure is surrounded in scaffold that is nearly hidden from view by trees. Also shrouded from view by vegetation are the ruins dating from a time when the church apparently was much bigger than it is today. Disuse has granted us dramatic ruins for our inspection today while the rest of the building remains in use as a Church of England parish church.