A ritual of sorts has been enacted: the all but annual trip to the Isle of May (2007 version was recorded here). Good news for me, since it's one of my favourite places. Less predictable in its consequences for readers of this blog, as it leads inexorably and inevitably to ... my photos! Hooray.

That's the Isle in question, and very pretty it is too, but here's the real reason I actually take the hour long boat trip required to reach it:




The birds, obviously. But there's no denying the place itself is so extremely pleasant it might be worth even if there was nothing with wings within ten miles of it:


The last of the bird pictures, by the way, is an Arctic tern. These are heroes of the bird world, going from the Antarctic to the Arctic and back again every year (and no, Scotland is not quite in the Arctic - for all that it feels like it occasionally. I guess our Arctic terns are ever so slightly less motivated than most of their brethren). Watching them, if you take a moment to reflect that not so very long ago these very birds were surfing the breezes of the Antarctic Ocean, perhaps even dodging Antipodean icebergs, it blows your mind just a little. I think they're fantastic.

That sentiment is not, it has to be said, mutual. This year, the tern colony has taken a collective decision to locate itself right next to the landing stage. To reach the boat, therefore, you have to run the gauntlet of righteously agitated and protective parents. I am thus able to leave you with this world exclusive video. A brief (and I do mean brief, like 2 seconds brief, so pay attention) clip revealing, for the first time anywhere, the sound a fantasy author makes when the immensely well-travelled beak of an Arctic tern connects with his skull at high velocity:

Labels: Clips, Photos, Scotland, Wildlife

So ... Edinburgh in August. Pretty much unlike anywhere else on Earth. Festival mania reigns. You've got the Festival, the Fringe, the Book Festival, the Film Festival, the Tattoo, and one or two minor hangers-on like the no doubt well-intentioned but, if you ask me, just plain spurious Festival of Politics.

I'll be taking in some potentially interesting stuff, including Beowulf, The Bacchae (with Dionysus played by Nightcrawler!), and Stardust. Half the fun, though, you don't need a ticket for. It's in the random blizzard of activity, and the sense of semi-organised and mostly good-humoured chaos that engulfs the city. And the dedicated performers going to great lengths to promote their shows:
And that, by the way, was not the first but the second person I saw lying in a coffin on the street within a hundred yards or so. Great minds evidently think alike, though I'm not entirely sure 'great' is the operative word here.

The streets heave with tourists, performers, the famous and the not-so-famous, turning the whole city into one giant show (and, supposedly, doubling its population). I'll be looking for Albannach, who are regulars at this time of year, and put on one of the best street gigs:



All in all, it's a fun few weeks. It turns out (I discovered via the Woolamaloo Gazette) that this is the last year that the Film Festival will take place during August. They're shifting it to June from next year. I really like the concentrated insanity that results from having all the festivals going on at more or less the same time. Losing films from the August mix is a bit of a pity. Not that there's exactly a shortage of other stuff going on, I suppose.

Labels: Edinburgh, Movies, Scotland

One more installment - probably the last for a little while, you might be relieved to hear - in my intermittent campaign to convince everybody that Scotland is (a) gorgeous and (b) always blessed with nice weather. Hey! Who's that laughing at (b)? Stop that immediately. (Although, to be honest, if the weather gods are listening, feel free to get summer underway any time you like now. Really. Is a day or two of proper sunshine in June too much to ask for?)

Labels: Photos, Scotland

A visit to one of Scotland's lesser-known gems: The Isle of May. Sea air. Ruins. Lighthouses. Puffins. Thousands and thousands of puffins. More puffins than you could eat in a whole lifetime, even if you really liked the taste of puffin.

Labels: Photos, Scotland

A visit to one of my favourite near-Edinburgh spots: Aberlady Bay. A place of sand dunes, bird song, big skies and bracing air.

Labels: Photos, Scotland

I mentioned weather, a couple of posts back, as an example of how the real world shows up in my books. Just thought I might as well come clean on another shocking case of plagiarism. Castle Kolglas, as described in Winterbirth, is a real place. Sort of. It certainly started off as a real place: Castle Tioram, on the west coast of Scotland. One of my favourite ruins, now sadly threatened by terminal collapse. I tweaked it quite a bit - I added a whole town next to it, apart from anything else - but that's the place, really. Deep down.

Sadly, I can't find a good, free-to-use pic of it to insert here - or can't find one quickly enough, since I'm in a bit of a hurry - but while searching for one I found somewhere else you can go to view this splendid castle in all its glory, and get a handy biography of its stony life as a bonus, so I'll just point you there instead: the rather excellent website of the Moidart Local History Group.

Labels: Scotland