Tag Archives: Scotland

Jan 10 2023
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Daily Post, Landscape

Upper Annandale

Monday 9th January 2023, 11.25am (day 4,155)

Upper Annandale, 9/1/23

Took a different road home, at least between Edinburgh and Carlisle, and was rewarded with many magnificent landscapes, particularly with the mix of sun and cloud that characterised the day. Not that there were always places to stop the car and take advantage. Had I been able to stop on the Forth Bridge, I might have been able to capture the photo of the year (OK, I know it’s early in the year): sun rising behind the other two bridges, wreathed in mist etc. But this one will do, taken from the point at which the A701 starts its drop down into Annandale and the town of Moffat.

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Jan 08 2023
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Daily Post, Landscape

The Lomond Hills (masochism)

Sunday 8th January 2023, 10.55am (day 4,154)

On West Lomond, 8/1/23

It was a nice sunny morning in Dundee, some 20 miles, as the crow flies, from where this picture was taken. I was not the only walker lulled into a false sense of weather security as a result. The damp splodges on this shot are unfortunate but, really, unavoidable. Anyway — here we all are on West Lomond, the highest point in the county (and ancient kingdom) of Fife. In the background, East Lomond, which I may haul myself up one of these days — but in better weather, I can assure you. (For more detail feel free to consult my County Tops blog.)

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Dec 22 2022
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Daily Post, Portrait, Stranger

Desperate Dan, and others

Wednesday 21st December 2022, 11.45am (day 4,136)

Desperate Dan, 21/12/22

The Winter Solstice was spent getting the Christmas shopping done in Dundee, which among other things, is the home of D. C. Thomson, publisher of the famous (in the UK, anyway) comics the Beano and Dandy. The latter no longer comes out except as an annual, but for the 75 years that it was published, the character Desperate Dan was in every issue: and here is his statue in the city centre. The other shoppers don’t seem bothered, though.

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Dec 20 2022
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architecture, Daily Post

Edinburgh Castle

Tuesday 20th December 2022, 1.15pm (day 4,135)

Edinburgh Castle, 20/12/22

This is a fine building — or, rather, a complex of buildings. Taken, with a long zoom, from the slopes of Allermuir Hill, the north-eastern terminus of the Pentland Hills. Behind, across the Firth of Forth, the shore of Fife. It’s somewhere other than home, anyway.

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Sep 18 2022
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Daily Post, Interior

Abington services, M74

Sunday 11th September 2022, 12.20pm (day 4,035)

Abington services, 11/9/22

The drive home. The convenience of Abington service station on the M74, two and a half hours from Dundee, and usually three hours from home: unless the bastards close the M6, like they did this weekend. But that’s a different and undepicted story. I hope, at least, that this couple, also heading south, still felt affectionate once they got home.

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Sep 18 2022
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Daily Post, Landscape

Darrach Hill (an arse)

Saturday 10th September 2022, 11.25am (day 4,034)

Darrach Hill, 10/9/22

Darrach Hill lies a short (but not easy) way north of the town of Kilsyth, in central Scotland. Ot becomes the fifty-ninth County Top that I have surmounted — and if you’re interested in that parallel project please do follow my other blog. The summit of this hill is only 1,171 feet/357m above sea level — sounds easy, right? Don’t you believe it. The crap that one has to negotiate to reach the summit fully justifies my use of the anatomical reference in the title of this post.

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Jul 11 2022
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Daily Post, Transport

Dundee station, Sunday morning

Sunday 10th July 2022, 10.50am (day 3,972)

Dundee station, 10/7/22

For the duration of this visit, and certainly today, its final morning, Dundee has basked in balmy sunshine that is atypical for the city. It contributed to a pleasantly chilled out wait for the train heading back south, which I think this couple epitomise. (My journey was fine all the way to Bradford, after which it descended into a farce of the kind only Northern Rail seem able to manufacture, but that’s another story, hours in the future.)

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Jul 09 2022
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Daily Post, Interior

Indoor tyre yard, Dundee

Friday 8th July 2022, 12.10pm (day 3,970)

Indoor tyre yard, 8/7/22

In the Blackness area of Dundee there is this huge old industrial complex, now abandoned and crumbling. Open doors and windows allow views inside here and there, like this one, which I nearly entitled ‘Arson attack waiting to happen’: tyres burn most satisfactorily, and for a long time. The place is for sale, and I wonder whether there is profit in buying it and keeping it this way, as a film set or somewhere that urban explorers can simply be let loose to play.

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Jul 07 2022
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Daily Post, Landscape

The Firth of Forth, from the train

Thursday 7th July 2022, 1.55pm (day 3,969)

Firth of Forth, 7/7/22

My son might have chosen to live out his university years in a place (Dundee) that is about as far as he could have got from us in West Yorkshire, while staying in the UK. But, there are compensations. Over in the distance, Arthur’s Seat and Edinburgh. Closer to the camera, the Firth of Forth, all taken just before passing through Burntisland station.

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May 25 2022
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Daily Post, Landscape

Fortrose Ness

Wednesday 25th May 2022, 2.35pm (day 3,926)

Fortrose Ness, 25/5/22

Spectacular landscape #2 of 2. The Black Isle — which is a peninsula rather than an island — has never been seen by me before but turns out to be spectacularly beautiful, a smorgasbord of photo opportunities. I did my best to pick one that summed up all this.

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