THE RAMBLINGS OF A STRUGGLING ARTIST ON LIFE WITH TWO TERRIERS, A PONY WITH ISSUES AND OTHER WILDLIFE AND BIRDS THAT CROSS OUR PATH

10 June 2014

SCOTLAND - PART 2


I still haven't caught up with everything so apologies these posts are taking so long to come through. I managed to upload the photos last night but didn't have the time to write anything. A quick update before I start.....the Polo was written off by the insurers but I have bought it back from them for £850. They valued it at £4,000 so, after the excess, we are left with £2,600 to get it mended. The quote for doing the work was less than that so we may have enough to cover the bill that has just come in for the Land Rover which needs constant attention to keep it running. Expensive though it is, it means we can get out of here in the winter snows; we'd be stranded otherwise. So.....every cloud. 

Back to Scotland. Tuesday.....we decided to hire a boat for a few hours to look for seals amongst other things. OB's most treasured soft toy companions since he was pretty small are called Sizzie and Sam and are common Seals, so he was very keen to see some real ones in the wild. My mum had given us £70 to spend and it cost £60 to hire the boat so off we set on a sunny afternoon. It was heaven chugging around the loch and we almost made it to where Loch Goil meets Loch Long and then goes out to sea, but M thought it was too choppy so we turned back. On the way, I managed to get pictures of this Heron in flight. Aren't its wings raggedy in the shot above?



Diving into the water:


Not sure if this was the same one as I never saw the landing....


More chugging about; it wasn't a very fast boat. OB and M saw two porpoise dorsal fins rise out of the water and disappear very quickly but I missed them.....



And then we spotted the seals, basking on some rocks by the shore. OB was delighted and so were we. I took some much closer ones with the zoom but the boat was rocking about so much it was hopeless.




Sizzie (right) and Sam looking a little worse for wear. 


There were beautiful Gannets soaring above us - again difficult to capture thanks to choppy water:



A red Breasted Merganser; a first for me:


We spotted this schooner in the distance early on with its sails down and then later in full sail. When I zoomed in I saw it was the Spirit of Fairbridge: a Gaff schooner built in 1982 and owned by the FairbridgeTrust, who help young people between the ages of 13 and 25 who find themselves excluded from society through drugs, homelessness, personal or health problems and gives them the opportunity to gain confidence and personal development. A professional crew operates the ship along with 12 young people for up to 7 days around Western Scotland and further:



We allowed OB to drive when there was nothing close by:


He drove us past our little house.....the bungalow in the middle of the picture. You can also see the house with the amazing viewing tower from the last post on the far right. 


Wednesday morning kayaking:


Me too!


And in the afternoon, we decided to climb the 'mountain' behind our side of the village. Not a big one but thank goodness it wasn't as OB and I had had enough by the time we struggled to the top. Staggering views though and definitely worth the two hour effort:






Thursday morning brought one of the highlights of any holiday ever and it only lasted about three seconds.  We had an unwritten list of things we would LIKE to see whilst up there which included a red squirrel....check,  Seals,.....check, Red Deer............no and a Crossbill.........no. As we sat eating breakfast at about 8.00am, something not on the list and that I had never expected to see in my lifetime sauntered onto the terrace: a Pine Marten. Unmistakable and frankly enormous so possibly a male. Bigger than Jack. A couple of people I've told about it thought I was talking about a bird so, in case you don't know what they look like, which I'm sure most of you do, here's a picture I found on The Guardian website:


The one I saw was much stockier and bigger than this but the colouring was the same. So, an exciting start to the day and then a lovely walk along the top track behind the house which took us high above the loch with beautiful views through both the pine forest and areas of less dense deciduous woodland.








I haven't cleaned upstairs for a long time and there are tumbleweed-like balls of fluff under beds and in corners. The bathroom is going to need an old toothbrush around the basin taps and it's at times like this I steer well clear of my reading glasses which might reveal the true state of affairs. Time to don my pinny and rubber gloves and get down to it. So, until next time and part 3 of our trip, I'll leave you with Jack on the Pine Marten terrace and the pair of them waiting for us at the gate to the beach at the end of the garden. The ladder was a bit beyond even Jack's capabilities. 



23 comments:

  1. Fantastic shots Em. I love the seals. They always look so very uncomfortable perched with their back end stuck up in the air but every one I've ever seen does the same so they must be fine!
    Yep, I could definitely live up there.

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    1. They rock on their rock if you know what I mean....their blubber must be such a good cushion against the sharp bits!

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  2. It seems that your holiday improved greatly after the rough start with the flight. Wildlife sightings are wonderful--and frustrating when a decent photo doesn't happen. I am fascinated by herons--the great blue heron here--the shapes as they fly or perch are so graceful.
    Don't remind me of the lurking fluffballs--the house we live in is being neglected for the house we are renovating.

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    1. It certainly did improve MM! The fluff-balls have been dealt with now and I feel much better.

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  3. More stunning pics, the countryside and mountains around there are so beautiful. I'm very envious of your Pine Martens, an animal I have yet to see (when I lived in Scotland they were VERY rare in them days), and it was nice to see the RB Mergansers, a real Scottish speciality. Chugging about on the boat and kayaking on the loch looked good fun :-)

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    1. It was pure fluke watching the window at that split second when it appeared on the terrace and all the more visible for not being in the forest!

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  4. Beautiful !
    The seals photos were wonderful.
    I never wear any of my glasses when walking around my home. It is always so dusty.

    cheers, parsnip

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    1. I'm a slave to the hoover with the dogs and general countryside detritus!

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  5. It must have made your week having a pine martin visiting you! We often have a heron landing by our pond but I have never manage to capture it in flight. I enjoyed seeing the scenery and the other wildlife. I always think the seals look so lazy! Sarah x

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    1. It definitely made the week and I agree with you about the seals. I suppose we never see them under water being energetic.

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  6. It is all so beautiful!! How amazing that you got to see a Pine Martin, they are so hard to spot from what I have heard. There is certainly a lot of different wildlife to see spot isn't there, and of course beautifully photographed by you and your new camera! Glad to hear that you are getting the car situation sorted out and that it ends up being good news for the Landy as well! I look forward to part 3 when you have dealt with the dust bunnies! xx

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    1. Those bunnies filled the empty hoover completely. Shame.

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  7. Oh. My. Goodness!!! A PINE MARTEN. You lucky, lucky thing. There are meant to be some possibly in Brechfa Forest, and Llandovery way too, but they are good at hiding I think.

    What a lovely area you stayed in (I know Loch Long vaguely, as we've driven along it en route to elsewhere). I do miss Scottish holidays - we had a couple when the children were younger and the memories will never die.

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    1. I used to go to Mull as a child a lot but this is the first time for...er....31 years. Gulp.

      I think seeing Pine Martens in the garden is the way most people see them these days so perhaps their numbers are increasing. I'm racking my brains as to what was said on Spring/Autumn/Winterwatch once but I can't remember!

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  8. What a fabulous trip! I would love to see the wildlife.

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  9. Gorgeous photos and well done on the Pine Marten - I've never seen one. So glad OB saw the seals. We had a huge list of wildlife to see when we went up to Scotland when the children were young and it was such fun ticking off species. Although we never did see Crested Tit or Capercaillie. I would so love to go there again but OH was not impressed with the long drive :(

    The location you stayed in looks so beautiful. Glad to hear about the polo - hope its not long before its back on the road.

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    1. Hiring the van was much cheaper than we expected and the flights weren't too bad so perhaps your OH would fancy flying and hiring a car instead???

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  10. I think I loved every photo here! You have great instincts when it comes to composition and I don't know if you process the photos before posting them, but if so, you do a great job there too. Perfect contrasts, nothing over-exposed, vivid but not false colours, etc.

    How exciting to see the Pine Marten! It made me want to read up more about it, and I was interested to learn that it is credited with 'pushing back' on the spread of the introduced Grey Squirrel. Loved the seals too, but mostly just that fabulous scenery absorbed my attention.

    Look forward to part 3!

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    1. Thanks Christian....compliments much appreciated! Funnily enough, these are the first photos I've had to fiddle with. Because the camera was new and I didn't have time to read the manual, I just stuck it on 'Auto' and snapped away. Because the weather was so amazing, there was a kind of haze in the distance in many of the landscapes, which meant, when I downloaded them, they weren't anything like they should have been. So.....I'm afraid I had to fiddle with the exposure and saturation a bit. Not happy about it but it had to be done. Anything with a subject close up was fine - it just couldn't handle the haze.

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    2. Oh don't apologise for processing - the results are amazing! I just assume that working on a photo is standard - I do it will all of mine. No matter how great a camera is, it will just never compete with the real life experience of seeing the subject with your own eyes, so I think subtly working on a photo is fair play.

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  11. You have captured Scotland in all your photos, brilliant photography and I loved the heron photos....

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  12. I am so pleased that OB saw his seals. It is lovely to see him enjoying himself in the photographs Em.

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Thank you so much for leaving a comment. It's great to read them and I will always try to reply.