When I arrived in Edinburgh at the end of last week the weather was rather frightful. Not to worry, we were off to sample some of the delights of the North West. By the time we arrived at Glen Coe there had been a drastic improvement of the weather - it wasn't raining. Not being hugely au fait with the Scottish hills, please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong but I've identified them as well as possible.
Just before the road enters Glen Coe we stopped and took a photo of Stob Derg, at 3353 feet high, it is the highest peak in the mountain Buachaille Etive Mor (which means the Great Herdsman of Etive - it is at the head of Glen Etive)
To the South of Glen Coe rises Bidean nam Bian. There are three ridges on this mountain, collectively called the Three Sisters, that look spectacular from the car park in Glen Coe. I have two pictures of them here. This is Gearr Aonach (short ridge)
and Beinn Fhada (long hill)
The Glen Coe visitor centre has a convenient tea retailing outlet. As an added bonus, it also has this cracking view.
With our Glen Coe tea, being a little too hot to drink straight away, we drove on a little till were out of the glen and back down at sea level. Parked in a hotel car park at Ballachulish, this is the view over Loch Linnhe that accompanied our tea break.
The view a little further to the left. A clever photoshopeer could probably join this picture onto the last as they overlap.
A few miles on from Fort William is Glenfinnan, where, just in case you had missed the fact the the scenery is pretty near perfect, a memorial has been raised to Bonnie Prince Charlie. After landing on the mainland nearby, it was here at Glenfinnan that he waited a few days to gather his army. On the 19th August 1745 he raised his royal standard here before setting off south for the ill fated attempt to put his father on the British throne as James the III and VIII in the second Jacobite uprising.
As if it didn't have enough already, Glenfinnan sports an excellent viaduct.
Arisaig (from the Gaelic for safe place) is renowned for it's lovely sandy beaches and delightful sunsets. Though there were a lot of clouds in the sky, against expectations we got a sunset. Here I am wondering if we were the only people in Scotland to see the sunset that night.
13 comments:
What spectacular photographs! The beer sounds - and looks great too.
lovely series of photos, specially the dramatic sunset!
Red Cuillin is an excellent beer, I've not drunk Black Cuillin for years though,
It is a beautiful part of Scotland isn't it. The scenery is breathtaking and your pictures are lovely.
Do you go camping often - we haven't been camping for years. I'm thinking I'm maybe a wee bitty old for it now.
Lots of amazing landscapes there. I think my favourite may be the last one with the monument in it, but they are all lovely to look at.
When you say "The Black Cuillin is made of basalt making it black and the Red Cuillin is made of granite which has a reddish tinge in certain lights", you are referring to the mountains and not the beers, I take it?
Amazing landscapes which I recall dimly from walking the West Highland Way many years ago. The weather seems much the same too and we also drank more than is medically advisable hence the dim memories, I suppose.
Great photos. That took me back! All those familiar places... Not been to Glencoe for ages.
When you get to Skye, you can find the Talisker distillery, which is where the wood for my mandolin came from :)
Fantastic shots. Whenever I'm up there in Scotland visiting my eldest son, my camera is red hot taking all that wonderful scenery.
Thank you Gretel, the beer was great. I was impressed by the glasses too - makes a change from the straight glasses you tend to get in pubs now.
Juliet - I'm sure I'd had the Red Cuillin before when I come to think about it. It did seem particularly good at the time - perhaps we needed it more.
Ellie - Tsk tsk. Too old! I'm not one for roughing it - no sleeping bags for me - I take the duvet and have a machine that blows the lie low up for me. It's also good to ensure there's a convenient pub to do your cooking for you. It's just getting the right camping equipment to accompany the extra common sense gained with maturity.
Shundo, I like the idea that they make beer out of Basalt and Granite in Skye - in fact I've decided that I'm just going to believe that :)
John - it seems a good idea to dim the memory at the time, pleasantly with local brews. If you don't do it at the time, time will do it for you eventually anyway.
Thank you Dominic
Kim, we passed the road end for the Talisker brewery. I wonder if those craftsmen at Fylde soaked themselves in Talisker to gain empathy with the wood.
Technogran, my camera has bearly cooled down yet.
Cracking pictures Sandy. The beer looks good too.
On my tour of the islands a couple of years ago I sampled Berserker. I guess it's an acquired taste, but after three or four bottles I think I acquired it.
Great sunsets.
Thanks Jim, 3 or 4 bottles is enough to aquire the taste of most beer.
P.S I meant to ask, do you know these guys Sandy ?
Scruffy Buzzards
Indeed Jim, Kim's (the bazooki and mandolin player) been playing the odd session down our way since I came back down a few years ago.
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