Isle of Bute and the West Island Way

Two weeks off and we are getting hit with a heatwave like never before. In an effort to not waste my days doing nothing (for nothing read drinking cider in the sunshine), I decided to get outside.

The plan for day one was to get the train to Wemyss Bay and then get the ferry over to The Isle of Bute. So that is what I did. Leaving the house, I marched up to Drumfrochar station [a walk in itself] awaiting the train. A short journey later, I was waiting at Wemyss Bay for the boat.



Just shy of the 35 minutes sailing time and Rothesay came into view with disembarkment not long after. I had a bit of time to kill while waiting on the bus so I decided to just wander about.



Rothesay is in the unique situation in that it is a town that has the remains of it's castle in the middle of the town. I was considering a venture inside but knew I'd probably miss the forward connection because although Rothesay is a nice place to go, it was not my destination for the day. Monday's plan was to try and get back into the walking by doing stage one of the West Island Way. Using the local bus service, it was the South of the island for me.

After departing the bus at Kilchattan Bay, it was time to enter the wilderness and start the walk. Even after a short distance, the walking bug definitely came back. And I must say, when you get weather like we've been getting, it makes the Scottish scenery even nicer.

The walk is quite straightforward in terms of pathfinding. The path is clearly defined along a very rocky trail following the shoreline taken you through locks of waist height fern and bracken for the first part.



As you pass the southeast tip of the island, a small detour takes you to quite an unusual sight: the ability to get close to a lighthouse. Back on route and you enter the sweeping curve of Glen Callum Bay. Once you reach the other side of the stony beach, it is time to go up.



From here you can look back and get a full landscape of the bay with lighthouse in the background. Until this point the walk has varied in terrain. There's been rocks, gravel, fern and bracken. For the next wee bit it is back to just flat grass and a lot of thistles.



At the crest of the hill, I was literally stopped in my tracks. Do you know that way when sometimes you see something and know that it will always be engrained on your memory. The above photo [although it does not do it justice] was one of those moments for me. Ahead of you is grassland and then all of a sudden, Arran and all its Goatfell glory come into view. It was a sight to behold.



Following the path, you begin to cross farmland and pass some animals, when all of a sudden in a clearing, you are presented with the ruins of St Blane's Church. I find it fascinating that the ruins are still standing and able to be preserved in such a remote location. It was great to just sit and take in the surroundings before setting off for the final stretch.



Following the path, the last third of the walk takes you through a lot of farmland. A couple of fields later and then it was all downhill back to the village.

I have to admit, this walk should have been relatively easy but due to my crap fitness level at the moment, coupled with the heat it was quite tiring.

The reason for choosing this walk was to ease my way back in and I must say, it was brilliant. I could have probably been done a lot quicker but dues to my crap fitness level moment and the heat it was very tiring. That aside though, this was a nice intro to the potential for doing the remaining three stages of the West Island Way some day.

Full Album Here

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2013 Resolutions

Happy New Year Everyone. I hope all your 2013 dreams come true.

Two blog posts in one week, this is like a sign of the apocalypse. The purpose of today's post is to state my resolutions for the year so I can look back at the end of the year and see how they have progressed. I don't usually go in for the resolutions thing. They are mostly associated with being a farce. People set their expectations so high that they have usually given up by mid-January. My intention is to set a few smaller but achievable goals which can be tracked and evaluated at the end of the year.

The first achievement is the never ending target of losing weight. Over the last exam diet I have completely ballooned so it seems a nice time to take a baseline reading for a target to be set.



The goal is 2st off by the end of the year to improve my general wellbeing and fitness. If all goes to plan it should see me go from 18st6lb to 16st4lb.

Now, I am one of the first people that bemoan a resolution like this because if you want to do it you could do it at any point of the year. This time, I am going against my own opinion and using the full calendar year as the period in question.

Next on the list, which should work in unison with the above is to get another 5 Munros chalked off the list.



At the moment, I am sitting on 11 so I think 5 is a fair target to achieve especially when I need to rely on others going or the Scottish public transport network. Again, this is an ideal challenge to be measured over a calendar year and hopefully my Hill List app will show more than 11 come this time next year.

Next on the list is the one that I think is going to frustrate me the most.



That's right, I want to hit a maximum on the dartboard. Hopefully, if I keep chipping away at it, it will come.

I'm hoping that in the course of trying to achieve all of the above, I can also get out a bit more and start taking more [and better] photos.

Enjoy 2013 everybody.

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It's Not Prometheus

This year's no. 1 was set in stone until the events of Friday June 1st changed the course of history forever. That's right, it was inevitably going to be Prometheus but alas, it isn't so here are my movies of 2012.

5) The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey



4) Margin Call



3) The Muppets



2) The Avengers



1) Brave

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Bonnie Bonnie Banks

The bank holiday weekend was fast approaching and a plan was hatched. My brother and his fiance were both off so it was arranged we would finally tackle a hill together. Ben Lomond  was the intended target on the Monday of the long weekend.

Nothing could go wrong in the run up. Or could it. Last Saturday, during the heatwave, I decided to have a quick stroll up the The Greenock Cut (pics here). Halfway along, something went in my foot and the usual 40 minute return leg took just shy of 2 hours.

That's fine, it'll be fixed by next Monday I thought. All was going to plan, it was healing nicely until Thursday it started getting worse again. The text was sent and confirmed I probably won't be walking.  But by some miracle, I woke up on Saturday and it was completely cleared so a quick check to confirm Monday's weather was to be a scorcher and it was full steam ahead.

This morning arrived and the trip to Rowardennan began. We parked up at about 09:30 to be greeted by a plague of midges. So much so, my arms look as if I have got the measles.



After getting kitted up, the expedition was on our way. Ben Lomond is considered one of the easier ones and it definitely is. There isn't much technicality to it and the path is in such good condition it is a case of march on. And, that's what we did.




Following the path, upwards and alongwards, we were making better than expected progress. However, the dodgy joints started to make an appearance. But trudge on we did.



I have to admit though, I didn't mind the occassional stops as the views towards Loch Lomond in this weather was breathtaking.

Something of an unusual occurrence on a hillwalk, I found myself marching off ahead into the distance. I was quite proud of myself to see that my recent efforts at fitness have not been completely wasted.


After the first two crests, my continual marching got me to the summit approach. I was like a man possessed. Even more so now that the end was in sight.



And there it was. The Ben Lomond summit. It's true what they say, Ben Lomond is very popular, and even more so on a sunny bank holiday.

AS some of you may have noticed, there has been little mention of the rest of the expedition. Mind I said I marched on. Well it appeared I did. It wasn't until the summit approach that I saw Gaz was not too far behind but no sight of the third amigo.

This afforded me a good bit of time on the summit to just sit and relax and take some pics and soak up the views. The full Loch was ahead of us. It was also nice to get a distant view of Loch Sloy sandwiched between Ben Vane and Ben Vorlich.

Gaz was not long in catching up with confirmation that we were a man down. Turned out she stopped about the 760m mark but stopped due to a niggling leg injury. Got to admit though, that was a tremendous effort for a first attempt. Well done.



That was that then, Munro No. 2 for us together. A quick bite to eat than it was time for part 2 of the fun - the descent. This is where my knees start to go.



AS lovely as the view is, I really don't like this kind of descent. The view stays the same the whole way and makes it seem longer. Although, with the weather we usually get, it's not a bad sight to stare at for the next two hours.

Once we got down to the 700m mark the full compliment was back together when we caught up with Elaine who started to saunter back not too long ago.

Down and down, passing bus loads of folk and we finally got back to the vistors centre. And right on cue - Midges.



After a quick change of gear and the best bit of a walk - the trainer change - it was time to head on and wave farewell to the Bonnie Bonnie Banks until next time.

Today was a great day out. The weather and company were both good. As usual, the full picture gallery can be accessed by clicking below. I have fallen out of favour with Picasa so this is the first post to try out my new Smugmug account.

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Xenemorph

[This post does contain spoilers]

The exams are done and that meant the flood gates are open for the summer with the following three events to look forward to:

1. Prometheus
2. Brother's stag do
3. Brother's Wedding

Let's set the scene. Alien is my favourite sci-fi movie of all time. In a genre where you are meant to put yourself in either the Star Wars or Star Trek camp, I went a bit off piste and decided I don't like either. For me, you can't look past facehuggers and xenemorphs.

1. Alien - the first one was immense. A limited cast scifi horror which used darkness and suspense to create genuine terror and claustrophobia.
2. Aliens - One of the few films where the sequel stakes a genuine claim to the first. A new director was involved and the terror and suspense was swapped for an all out Man v Alien acionfest.
3. Alien 3 - Another new director and a return to the feel of the original. It doesn't quite match the setting of the Nostromo but does a good deal to move along the evolution story of the Alien.
4. Resurrection - An abominiation
5. AVP/AVP:R - A disappointing realisation of a fanboy's dream

So imagine the excitement when it was announced they were going to revisit the world that Weyland Industries operates in with Ridley Scott taking the helm. The internet went into overdrive. What were we going to see? Is it a prequel? etc etc etc.

Skip forward a few years the motley crew were gathered in Cineworld with our 3D specs on as if we were a Roy Orbison tribute act.

Skip forward a couple of hours and it was over. My initial reaction - disappointment. Where was the Aliens, where's the linkage, the ship looks similiar but it's the wrong bloody planet.

However, I thought I'm not going to rant and rave about it now. I'll let it settle and see what my views are in the morning. This is the result.

After thinking about the movie, my feeling on it is better than it was last night when you look at the bigger picture. Yes, the movie was to serve as a prequel to the original franchise but it was always stated it would explore the extreme beginnings and try and explain who the big dude in the seat on LV-426 was. I think I kind of lost this in my hype and excitement.

That's what it did. It focused on the 'Engineers' who were involved in the creation of man and their motives in creating what appeared to be an organic weapon of mass destruction. SO in fairness, it did do what it set out for this part. You can now go and watch Alien and say, that's who the Space Jockey is and where he came from.

But it still leaves a major plothole in the series - How come all the eggs appear on LV-426 and how did the Alien race evolve from black goo to an egg laying queen?

Another area it focussed on was the 'Company'. They appear throughout the franchise but they began somewhere and the virals and movie go someway to showing the exploration ambitions of Weyland Industries.

All in all it was a good scifi movie. Visusals were great, majority of the cast was good with the Fassbender putting in another great performance. Besides the obvious lack of series linkage my main gripe is that it lacked suspense. The beauty previously was the use of darkness and pulse sounders to create the atmospheric suspense which was completely lacking here.

So what next? There were more new questions asked than answers answered. But it does leave the door open for a follow up to bridge the gap and evolve the story up to the point of the LV-426 crash. If part one deals with the 'Engineers' the next part should hopefully deal with the 'Engineered'. The Company knew about the Aliens in the original so between then and now we should hopefully see a proper linking prequel with a good deal of human interaction.

Until now, I have not read a single review and limited my pre movie hype to the official virals. So everything I have stated above could be way off, but it is my 2 pence on the situation.

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Halfway There

The plan was always to get back into some routine of exercise in the run up to Easter but as with most plans, it never really kicked off. So, after a few medical ailments, I decided it needed to kick-off for my own well being.

A rare day off where Gaz was available and the prospect of good weather meant a wee trip to the hills to see how we'd cope after a nearly 9-month absence. The intended target was Beinn Narnain.

Checklist made and lunches prepared it was Arrochar bound. Heading up it was becoming apparent that my weather forecasting skills have a lot to be desired. One all-day parking ticket later and it was time for the trek to begin. Which coincidently was about the same time the rain decided to start it's day as well.



I have to admit, I like the Arrochar area but the zigzags at the bottom are a never ending pain in the backside. With that in mind, we decided to take the first part of the alternate route which bypassed the bottom section up to the bench.



A nice pleasant walk got us to the bench and we commenced the upper part of the zigzags which leads to the dam. Apart from the rain in the lower reaches, the weather held off a bit for now.

After the zigzags we got out into the open and the long and winding track began. A relatively steady trek to the boulders ensued but the day was starting to take it's toll on me. On top of feeling generally done in, I started to get a blister on my right heel that even a Compeed patch wasn't easing.



After a sandwich stop at the boulders, we set off again and the intended target [or lack thereof] came into view. But, the journey was not to last much longer. The temperatures had plummeted and with the general way I was feeling we decided that we'd call it a day.

The intention was to get this one done on a good clear day with a few other people so we were not too disheartened to not finish it.



I have to admit though, getting over the halfway height was a not bad effort for having a chest infection the week before.

Hopefully the weather is better for an Easter outing.

As usual, you can click below to view the full album but I'll be honest when I say I'm not too happy with the photos this time. It's my first outing with a Panasonic TZ3 I was given and I think the settings were off. A bit of tweaking is required before next time.

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2011 In Film: Aliens, Apes and Drivers

The end of another year is nearly upon which can only mean one thing - the [blogging] world goes list crazy, and being someone who is a bit list-centric, it is time for my offering. Here are my movies of 2011.

5. Paul



Standout moment: The phone call offering specialist advice to the creator of another famous movie alien.

4. Senna



Standout moment: Behind the scenes insight into the drivers' briefings.

3. Super 8



Standout moment: The train crash.

2. Drive



Standout moment: The motel shooting.

1. Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes



Standout moment: "NO!".

Although, it was just pipped by the Apes, Drive did offer a soundtrack which will not be beaten this year. From the opening to closing credits, the soundtrack was able to stylise and give the movie a feel that was very reminiscent of To Live And Die In LA .

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