Abercorn to Blackness

All this wet weather is having a devastating effect on wildlife and many breeding birds are suffering badly. Ground nesting birds are either having their nests flooded or their eggs/chicks chilled and many are failing to raise young this year. Those that nest in holes on the banks of rivers such as Sand Martins and Kingfishers are finding their nests completely submerged with no hope for the chicks.
I have hardly seen any butterflies this year so they must also be suffering.
Some wildlife, especially some plants seem to be managing in particular Foxgloves. I've never seen so many Foxgloves out in the countryside and they seem to be even taller than normal with some over two metres high (that's six and a half feet in old money).
We were out for a walk on a rare dry day along the cycle pathway that leads from Abercorn (just west of South Queensferry) to Blackness and saw hundreds of Foxgloves:

Moira refused to stand beside the Foxgloves as a height comparison as she would have to climb up a banking and battle through the undergrowth.
The colours were so varied as well, there was Pink Foxgloves, White Foxgloves............

 ........and even Pink & White Foxgloves

Another plant which seemed to be doing very well were the Ox-eye Daisies, there was a massive bank of them on the slopes near the path, it's really quite a pretty plant when you see it close up and is about ten times the size of the daisy you get in your garden (probably nearer 20 times)

There was also a strange plant which I did not recognise, most likely an escapee from nearby Hopetoun House. So if any you gardeners/horticulturists out there can tell me what it is then that would be great (I had it down as a Triffid)

The birds were all being very secretive and hiding in the bushes and trees so I have no photos of them I'm afraid. I did manage to capture a Bumble Bee on a Spear Thistle but that was the only flying object I got, and it wasn't even flying at the time.

Once we crossed the Midhope burn the path ran alongside the River Forth, so we popped down to the beach to see what was about. They have started working on the main supports for the new Forth Bridge and we could see the large caisson in position, which they sit on the river bed and then pump out the water inside so they can start to pour the concrete foundations for the main support. Don't know what the large floating crane was doing though.

Talking about large cranes, we could also see the huge crane they shipped over from China to Rosyth to help build the new aircraft carriers. I think there is a U-tube video of this thing squeezing under the Forth Bridges when they delivered it.

So there is a lot of activity on the Forth at the moment, we still have sleepy little villages though like Limekilns and Charleston below on the Fife side:

And the historic Blackness Castle on the West Lothian side:

I won't bore you with too much history but Blackness Castle was built in the 15th Century and was more of a fortress (and also a prison) and Linlithgow Palace was the royal residence.

These previous photos were taken from the beach alongside the Abercorn to Blackness cycle/walkway and to prove I was on a beach here is a photo of some shells (very artistic):

After spending some time on the beach we headed back to Abercorn, stopping to spend a little time at the lovely little church they have there. Parts of it date back to the 12th Century but it is built on the grounds of a much older monastery, so it's not a new place.









I really love the church bell which is linked to a blue nylon rope so you can ring it from the outside, that beats any door chime I've seen before.

The church graveyard has some scary gravestones and I wouldn't like to spend a night there, the one below is covered in skulls!!

Ah! they knew how to make them back in the 18th Century, this next one even has a skull and cross-bones. I wonder if he was a pirate, maybe from Carriden near Bo'ness just a few miles up river.....

"Pirates of the Carriden".................that has a familiar ring to it??

I'll leave you with my favourite gravestone in Abercorn Church where it seems the stonemason refused to change his font size to match the column width:







Sorry if that was a bit morbid, no more gravestones.

Take ca

re Tedd

y Edwa

rd.



Go Forth From Pettycur

I was fortunate enough to be able to spend an hour at Pettycur Harbour recently and even though the weather was changeable it was very enjoyable.
From the harbour wall you can see right along the Forth Estuary, from the Forth Bridges upstream to North Berwick Law downstream. Directly south across the River Forth from the Pettycur you can see the Edinburgh skyline with Leith in the foreground and Salisbury Crags, Arthur's Seat and Edinburgh Castle in the background.
Here is some photos I took from Pettycur between the heavy showers of rain:

The Edinburgh Skyline from Pettycur



Edinburgh Castle



Salisbury Crags

Gulls on the rocks (with North Berwick Law in the Background)



The Forth Bridges (with Inchcolm Island in foreground)

 It is suprising to think that Edinburgh Castle sits on a long extinct volcanic fault line, and that line of volcanic features stretches out to the east and includes Salisbury Crags, Arthur's Seat, North Berwick Law and the Bass Rock, all of which have their place in the history of Scotland.

• The Bass Rock is the world's largest single rock Gannet colony, with over 150,000 Gannets nesting there each year
• Arthur's Seat was a hill fort over 2,000 years ago
• Hutton (a famous geologist) used the rocks at Salisbury Crags to demonstrate that the earth was older than 6,000 years, much to the annoyance of some 17th century bible bashers
• Edinburgh Castle is an old building on a rock.

There are some interesting island in the Firth of Forth as well, many of them called 'inch' which is Scot's for island (derived from the Gaelic 'innes').

• Inchcolm Island (which you can see in the foreground of the Forth Bridges photo above) has a ruined abbey and WW2 fortifications on it which is very popular as a wedding venue. You can get boat trips to it from South Queensferry and it is well worth a visit (just watch out for the hundreds of breeding gulls............poo alert!!)
• Inchkeith Island is straight out in front of you at Pettycur and has a lighthouse on it as well as some WW2 fortifications.
• Inchmickery is my favourite island and it is full of WW2 fortifications, so much so it looks like a battleship from the correct angle (see what you think below). Apparantly this was deliberate so that from the air it would deter German bombing raids targeting the Rail Bridge and the naval bases at Rosyth and Port Edgar.



Inchkeith Island



Inchmickery (Battleship) Island

 Enough of the history and geology.......... here is some snaps of birds and scenery I took between showers of heavy rain (don't you just love the Scottish summer??)


Eider Drake Flying



Lesser Black-backed Gull (you should see its big brother!)



Passing Sandwich Terns



Pettycur Harbour



Love this shed roof and chimney



View from car park



Wee cock sparra coming home



Static Heaven



Train with a view

I hope you enjoyed Pettycur Harbour as much as I did, well worth a visit if you have a spare hour or so...........maybe I could get a job with the Kingdom of Fife Tourist Board??

cheers

Teddy Edward