Scotland forever! (or for three weeks in my case)

[Sky]

It's good to see you back.  
And it looks like you had an awesome time in Scotland. ^_^

[Malte279]

I certainly had
I'm going to post some pictures now (might take more than one post as the number of linked pictures in a message is limited). On August 4th we, that is Mareike, Jessica, and me set out to Edinburgh where we stayed until early August 6th.
Edinburgh tour-guides can point Edinburgh as the first town in the world in which a "skyscraper" was build. However, they sort of cheated a bit. The 11 floor skyscraper is build along the wall of the crag on which Edinburgh castle is located as well. A crag is a volcanic rock formation which proved too hard to be pushed away by glaciers throughout the iceage. So crags thend to be step on one side while the other side is a gentle slope of eroded material pushed there by the glaciers. Anyway, as for that skyscraper, it will tower 11 floors above you when you stand at the foot of the crag, but when you are standing on the crag itself it is just three or four floors
Anyway, here is one of the more interesting looking buildings located near the castle. On the right you can also recognize some stands erected there for Edinburgh's large festival, the Tattoo:

Here is a part of another building in the town with the omnipresent gulls circling around it:

On August 5th Jessica, Mareike, and I climbed on top of Salisbury Crags; a crag located in a park right in the middle of the town. We sure had a marvelous view from up there:

Ascending Salisbury Crags I took two pictures of Scotland's national flower similar to one I took back in 2005:

The next day we went on to Glasgow where we met Mareikes mate Manuel. It is very difficult to find your way in the streets of Glasgow when you are on your way in a (rented) car. Left side of the road traffic isn't helping either and finding a parking lot is almost impossible. Glasgow has a very beautiful cathedral. Jessica is in the center and Manuel on the right in this picture:

Beyond the cathedral is the "Nekropolis" the "Town of the death". It is a very large cemetery with many huge memorials and mausoleums. Located on top of a hill in broad light it does not come across as "eerie" the way some cemeteries do, but some of the "buildings" there reminded a bit of some dark movies.
I'll continue with more pictures soon

[Kor]

Interesting, and very well made pictures.  Looks like you say many interesting things and had a good time.

[Mumbling]

Hey those pics look awesome malte! Looking forward to see more

Edit: whaa! I would not like to sit there *scared*

[Malte279]

The next day (August 7th) we set out for Fort William from Glasgow. Apart from Scotland's largest Loch (Loch Lomond) we also passed through Glencoe, one of the most beautiful of the Scottish Glens. The place also was the site of one of the dark events of Scottish history, the Glencoe Massacre, but I better stop lecturing and get straight to the pictures (they can't really get the impression across one gets when being and climbing there):









But huge mountains and large waterfalls are not the only fascinating things there. Sometimes small things easy to overlook are of no less beauty though not of the same bombast. I don't think this tree will grow much larger:


There are more pictures to come.

[Kor]

It looks like a fantastic landscape.  If anyone needs ideas for landscapes some of the vacation pictures here would be excellent sources.

[Petrie.]

The scenery around this area is lovely.  Keep the pictures coming!

[Malte279]

The next day (August 8th) we set out from Fort William to the Isle of Skye. We came past several Lochs such as this one:

This reflecting Loch was to become the site of horrible bloodshed that day though l There were swarms of midges and their stings itch I can tell you:

It might have become much worse though when we reached the Battle"field" of Glenshiel (field is kind of a wrong term for it is very step mountains on either side of a very narrow glen and in 1719 Jacobites held the mountains on the one and the government troops those on the other side. With both positions being pretty much invincible it was ultimately the government troops' superiority in mortars and artillery that won them the day). While I was running up the slope of one mountain I suddenly noticed a tick crawling up my arm (it had not yet bitten). I was shoulting "Zecken!" ("Ticks!") as loud as I could to the others who were some hundred meters down the slope. My pant-legs were full of ticks and the others too had a couple on their clothes, but we were lucky as none of them had actually bitten. We renamed that mountain "Zeckenzacken" (Ticktop) after that:

Driving on we got to Eilean Donan Castle, a castle which everyone has seen but of which nobody knows the name Sad as it is this castle was mostly built in 20th century on the ruins of the fortifications that had been destroyed in the 18th century:

On the island itself I got this interesting perspective:

We arrived on the Isle of Skye that evening and set out to get a look at the sunset from the coast cliffs:



There were very interesting basalt rockformations down on the beach which you can see on this picture:

[Kor]

Very interesting and great pictures, thanks for sharing them.

[Mumbling]

That looks so cool ahh, I'm sure you had a good time!

[Sky]

Wow.
I'm sure that was one awesome adventure you had.  

[Malte279]

^ It definitely was
Here are some more pictures. Now tell me, of which movie does this picture remind you?

[Petrie.]

Here are some more pictures. Now tell me, of which movie does this picture remind you?

Looks like the Great Valley bowl to me.

Was there a purpose to studying castles specifically?  You seem to have visited many of those.

[kjeldo]

wow, uh i should go to scotland too, it is cool,

[Kor]

Looks like it may be a picture of a part of the Great Valley.  It is to clean looking to be a picture of a part of Mordor.  

Maybe doing a comparative study of castles, or how castle architecture changed over the centuries or based on region?

[Malte279]

^ Actually Mordor (Lord of the rings) was what I had been thinking of when I took that picture (as for LBT I came through a Valley called "Great Glen"). I did cheat a bit though by cutting the upper and the lower edges of the picture. This is the complete version:

And here is the sunset which we had set out to see:

Was there a purpose to studying castles specifically? You seem to have visited many of those.

You know Adam that I'm a little bit interested in history and as for castles in Scotland, they are quite frequent there. Usually they are more of an eyeopener than modern day concrete buildings. At the risk of annoying you, here is another one, but only in ruins (and I didn't even show you every castle we saw on our journey ):

On August 9th there was what I consider perhaps THE highlight of the whole journey, namely the climbing of the Storr, a mountain on the Isle of Skye with a famour rock formation named "The old man of Storr"on top. The weather was... well, we enjoyed it anyway and we were literally climbing through clouds, so we expected what we got:

The rocky needle on the right is the "Old man of Storr":

But personally I found this rock here even more fascinating. In the moments where there was a bit less fog it looked very much like a huge stalagmite from a cave placed on top of a mountain:

Clouds and fog sure did create a somewhat mysterious atmosphere:

Later the same day we visited Kilt Rock, a cliff formation on the coast which resembles a crinkled kilt and also has a high waterfall in front of it:

As for the Scottish weather (about which we certainly couldn't complain as we got our fair share of sun too) here is one of its more glorious features:

Here at last is a picture taken on August 10th on the battlefield of Culloden 1746. It was the last pitched battle on the British islands which is often mistakenly described as a battle between English and Scots while in reality the character of that battle was that of a civil war with English and Scots fighting on both sides besides mercenaries from France, Ireland, the Netherlands, and Germany. The order to give no quarter (which was obeyed to the letter by the government troops) made this battle a particularly gloomy chapter of history:


PS: I moved this thread into a more fitting section.

[Kor]

Thanks for the great pictures, they are very interesting to look at.

[Mumbling]

whooo fog Ah it all looks great :^.^:

[Amaranthine]

My goodness I don't know why I didn't comment on this!

Scotland and Ireland are definitely similar. They have arcitecture that's similar, mostly with the stone ruins and such. Hmmm I'm listening to some relaxing music right now and I'm staring at that sunset...I really feel going to sleep now...

The green is definitely familiar too. Actually where I live there's a lot of influence from Scotland and Ireland. You see green hills, some cliffs, and there is an ocean too.

[Kor]

Sounds like beautiful scenery that you are seeing.