accomplished
rwrylsin get enough sleep and recover from fencing training today ?(time passes as I get distracted and watch TV)
Argh ! The final episode of the season is To Be Continued as well ! Too late for
rwrylsin to stay up and watch it, so it'll have to be tomorrow or Tuesday night sometime ...Anyway, today,
rwrylsin was at a sabre training day in Stirling, and I drove her there and picked her up afterwards. What did I do for 6 hours in the meantime ? Well, I popped in to Stirling Castle again, but the weather was grey and dull and I didn't feel photographically inspired. I drove around a bit, passed through the town of Doune (did have a vague plan for the day to visit Doune Castle again and spend some serious photography time there with fewer people around, but again, it was grey and cloudy and drizzling by then, so I went further on), and ended up at Bracklinn Falls, just near the town of Callandar.
There was a bit of walk to get there, but it was well worth it, as they were spectacular ! Lots of very large rocks, looking like they'd been tumbled out of a giant sack down the river, and lots of water, 'cos, you know, it does rain every now and then in Scotland. The forest area around it was ferny and mossy and very, lovely and enchanting.
At the falls, there were some stone steps that led down to what used to be a bridge across the river - instead there's a 3 metre gap between two large lumps of rock. As it turns out (after some quick Googling, originally to check the spelling of Bracklinn), the landscape was "rearranged" somewhat on August 18th this year, as in the photos here .
The before and after pictures of the bridge are amazing - the rocks have been completely scoured clean, and that's when the bridge itself got wrecked. I did my mountaingoat!David thing and clambered around on the rocks taking photos from various places - see the image behind the cut showing my tripod on a ledge, about 2 metres above the main bridge rock. Eventually, it started raining again, so I went wandering around the forests a bit (intrepidexplorer!David) admiring the mosses and ferns and lichens and general prettiness of it all, then finally went back to the car (with another little forest detour or two along the way) and ate some crisps and chocolate to gather energy for driving again.
Water.
Lots of water.
Looking downriver (and down at the river) from the bridge.
My tripod perched somewhat precariously on a ledge about 2 metres above the main bridge rock. I wasn't brave enough to leave the camera on it while taking this photo with the digital camera.
Everything's so greeeen ! And mossy. Don't stand still for too long in there, you'll have something growing on you in no time.
This was near the carpark, down a little hill. Must go back there sometime with more light.
A nice view on the trail leading to the falls.
