Shropshire scenes of beauty hide icy dangers

Thick frost transformed Shropshire into a Christmas card scene today.

Hoar-frosts turned the landscape into a winter wonderland and a must for photography buffs prepared to venture out in the Arctic temperatures.

Click on the image to the right to start our photo gallery

However, danger hid beneath the beautiful scenes with ice proving treacherous yet again to motorists who had the added hazard to face of patchy freezing fog.

Temperatures were set to plummet to minus 8C (27F) in Shropshire tonight and not creep above minus 3C (27F) tomorrow but the outlook is for a gradual daytime rise to a relatively balmy 5C (41F) by the end of the week when heavy rain is expected to sweep across the country.