Tag Archives: 53

Jul 15 2023
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Daily Post, Flora/Fauna

Golden eagle in flight

Friday 14th July 2023, 1.05pm (day 4,341)

Golden eagle, 14/7/23

Back in 2012, in the Lake District, I pictured a vague blob in the far distance that may or may not have been a golden eagle. But this one is definite. You may, of course, live in a part of the world where these noble creatures hang out on street corners, but that’s not the case in Great Britain — except, it seems, in the far north of Scotland, where this huge bird took off from some trees nearby as I passed and flapped lazily overhead for a while. Until uploading the pic later and checking the details I wasn’t sure of the species, but the wingtip feathers are the giveaway: an eagle it is.

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Jul 13 2023
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Daily Post, Landscape

Thurso beach

Thursday 13th July 2023, 11.25am (day 4,340)

OK, it’s another beach (after Monday), but Scotland is a country that does very good beaches — they’re just not very warm. This becomes the northernmost picture so far taken in the UK, a position it will retain until I finally make it to Shetland or Orkney. It will probably forever remain the northernmost picture taken on the mainland of Great Britain, at around 58º 36′ N.

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Jul 13 2023
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Daily Post, Landscape

Morning run, Cromarty Firth

Wednesday 12th July 2023, 8.55am (day 4,339)

Cromarty Firth run, 12/7/23

More athleticism. Clare is in training and demanded a hill to run up. The tiny settlement of Nigg, on the Cromarty Firth, obliged this morning. The return to the Black Isle region was motivated largely by my desire to get more photographs of it, particularly of this firth thanks to its collection of old oil rigs and vessels that are either mothballed or being decommissioned. It’s proof that industry need not wreck a landscape.

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Jul 12 2023
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Daily Post, Flora/Fauna

Salmon leap, Rogie Falls

Tuesday 11th July 2023, 4.00pm (day 4,338)

Salmon leap, 11/7/23

Rogie Falls, near Strathpeffer, are touted as a place where one can see salmon travelling upstream to spawn and doing their leaps: but I must admit on first sight, I was sceptical. These were not minor rapids but a powerful cascade, thundering over several drops, of which the highest one, pictured here, must have been at least twenty or thirty feet high. Surely no living creature could possibly get up this, against the flow — particularly not one without arms, legs or heavy machinery.

Well, I was wrong. And I have to say that I now have a new-found respect for this species. There have to be easier ways to live out one’s lifecycle, though.

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Jul 11 2023
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Daily Post, Landscape

Avoch Beach

Monday 10th July 2023, 3.50pm (day 4,337)

Avoch beach, 10/7/23

The Black Isle, just north of Inverness, is actually a peninsula rather than an island, though it is almost cut off by rivers. It previously featured, thanks to Fortrose Ness, on my trip round Scotland last May, and as it seemed a pleasant spot I have returned, this time bringing Clare along (although that’s not her in the shot). Avoch beach is just up the Beauly Firth from Fortrose; the latter remains the northernmost British location to feature on here but that is a distinction it will lose by the end of this week.

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Jul 10 2023
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Daily Post, Friend, Portrait

Roger Daltrey does his scream

Sunday 9th July 2023, 9.35pm (day 4,336)

Roger Daltrey, 9/7/23

The Who should have already appeared on this blog one way or another. I had tickets to see them in Manchester a few years ago and then couldn’t go for reasons I don’t even remember properly. In March 2020 we were one week, literally, away from seeing them in Leeds (Live in Leeds!) when Bojo The Clown decided that the rest of the country (but not him) had to cease all this entertainment rubbish — postponed a year, that gig was eventually cancelled too. BUT — here we are, finally, in Edinburgh Castle, watching Daltrey and Townshend do their thing. At 79 years old, Roger Daltrey understandably doesn’t leap about the stage as much as he used to but he can definitely still sing, and right at this point he is reproducing one of the best screams in rock history — the one near the end of Won’t Get Fooled Again, which is up there in my ‘top 5’ all-time great tracks.

So yes…. all in all it could be said that I had a good evening.

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Jul 09 2023
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Daily Post, Flora/Fauna, Sport

Watching the game

Saturday 8th July 2023, 4.05pm (day 4,335)

Dog, Penicuik Athletic, 8/7/23

What better things are there to do on a Saturday than watch some footie? The dog may or may not agree but it looks interested enough. Taken at Penicuik Athletic FC, and Penicuik, just south of Edinburgh, thereby becomes the 435th different place to feature on here; expect a few more new locations to turn up over the next week…

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Jul 07 2023
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Daily Post, Portrait, Stranger

On the steps

Friday 7th July 2023, 12.55pm (day 4,334)

On the steps, 7/7/23

I don’t yet know what I’m trying to say with this picture — it may be just a random gesture on her part. Nor am I projecting, being quite happy today. I like it anyway.

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Jul 07 2023
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Daily Post, Interior, Transport

The Netherton Tunnel, south entrance

Thursday 6th July 2023, 11.10am (day 4,333)

Netherton Tunnel, 6/7/23

My summer holiday has finally started, and being the type of person that I am, I went exploring, going to Dudley in the West Midlands largely because it was somewhere I had never been before, with not just one but two County Tops (report to follow). And it gave me the chance to walk 1.7 miles, more or less (2,776m according to the sign at the entrance) under ground, through the Netherton Tunnel, which accommodates a branch line of the huge Birmingham canal network, and was the last major canal tunnel ever built in Britain, opened in 1858.

This was taken as I approached the south entrance, which for me was the exit. A bit damp, but by no means an unpleasant experience, though the distant sound of many voices screaming that reverberated down the tunnel towards me for a few minutes — either a school sports day, or the tortured souls of Hell — was a little eerie.

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Jul 07 2023
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Daily Post, Flora/Fauna

Ladybird meeting place

Wednesday 5th July 2023, 4.25pm (day 4,332)

Ladybird ashtray, 5/7/23

The yellow plastic ashtray sat on the outdoor pub table seemed to be where it was all happening this afternoon. I helped the first one, the top one here, get out, only to see it then return of its own accord; it was then joined by the second. So I left them to it.

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