"Scottish Snippets"

"Colour Supplement"

6 October 2007

Each week the Rampant Scotland Newsletter includes a number of photographs which illustrate the weather and the seasons, plus the flora and fauna of the current week around Scotland. This separate "colour supplement" displays some more pictures, in a larger format. Here is this week's crop of Scottish views!


This is a view of the Gare Loch and Garelochhead, Argyll. The sea loch is aligned north-south, with its southern end opening into the Firth of Clyde through the Rhu narrows. The deep water of the loch and its sheltered position has meant that its eastern shore is dominated by the Faslane Naval Base, the home of the United Kingdom's Trident nuclear submarines. Faslane is out of this shot, on the right.


The steamer Maid of the Loch was the last paddle steamer built in Britain. It is the last of a long line of Loch Lomond steamers that began about 1816, within four years of Henry Bell's pioneering passenger steamboat service on the River Clyde. It provided pleasure cruises on Loch Lomond until 1981, but has been laid up at Balloch since then. Enthusiasts began restoration work in 1995 and the aim is to (eventually) have her sailing again on Loch Lomond.


Loch Lomond has the largest surface area of all of Scotland's lochs and is now part of Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park. The island of Inchmurrin, the largest island in a loch/lake in the British Isles, blocks the view up the loch in this picture - Loch Lomond is 14 miles long.


Global warming - combined with the smoking ban in all public buildings - has encouraged the proliferation of pavement cafes in Scotland. This one is in Cochrane Street in Glasgow, with the City Chambers (Town Hall) behind.


Loch Long in Argyll extends from the Firth of Clyde at its south-western end and measures approximately 20 miles long, with a width of between one and two miles. The loch was used as a testing ground for torpedoes during World War II and contains numerous wrecks. The Finnart Oil Terminal is located on the eastern shore of the loch, linked to the Grangemouth Refinery, via a sixty mile long pipeline, with chemical tankers sailing up the loch on a regular basis.


The sun was sparkling on the water of Loch Long when this photograph was taken.

If you want to look back at earlier editions of this Colour Supplement, there is an Index Page





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