bitsofbobs

Brilliant weekend. Macca invited me & nic to join him and his lady friend up in Aviemore for some form of relaxing adventure. No real plan other than just make it up as we go. Loved it. The weekend revolved around food pretty much. Which is all you could ask for. Arrived late friday night after work and just chilled with a few drinks. Early night, early start with monster Bacon rolls then out Loch Insh to investigate what water sports it had to offer. It’s about 6 miles outside Aviemore along the road to Kingussie. None of us came prepared but we ended up hiring a canoe each and heading out into the unknown. £15 for an hour which got us out over Loch Insh and a little bit up the river Spey. Amazing day for it, got some great photos. Ended up trying to get up a wee fast flowing stream that was totally overgrown. Proper adventure which finished with a hot chocolate in a log cabin. Tick. You want some more info? here it is.

Back at the flat to cook an awesome big chicken and chorizo dish then out on the town. All the mist fell in as it began to frost up making walking in the dark a tad creepy. Few beers in town and a clash tribute band thrown in for luck. Aviemore is great, it’s a completely different place every time I end up there.

Sunday. Again another massive top notch fry up. Headed out in the morning, it was freezing and the ground was turned snowy white. Everything was crisp and clean, loved it. Bit of pottering about then headed out to the highland Safari park. I’d never been to one as my folks went to one once and monkeys ripped everything they could get there cute little hands on…off. I loved it. Drove round the enclosure which was filled with deer, bison, wild horses and allsorts of mad looking goats (like a really basic jurassic park). The road ends in the middle of the park where it has a more outdoor zoo type feel about it. I love this stuff. We managed to catch feeding time with the tigers which had 6 weeks old cubs (awwwwww in a cute rip your face off kinda way) with them. Snow monkeys which were up to no good. The latest arrival of mercedes the polar bear, who to be honest looked a bit bored, but must be happier than in that little concrete prison she had in Edinburgh zoo. Some cute little arctic foxes and snowy owls. All in all a great day out and an allround awesome weekend. Cheers macca!

Some more photos up on Flickr.

Was at a gig on Monday night at ABC (Bat for lashes for all those interested) and on the way home after the gig noticed how awesome Glasgow looked at night. I had no cameras with me for the sake of not getting stopped at the gig and was gutted as I could have taken about 30 amazing photos. So, decided when I got back I was going to make an effort to get all my gear out (tripods etc) and have an evening Photoshoot about town. I’m always heading out at lunch time snapping and know where all the good wee lanes and alleys etc are like the back of my hand (just don’t know the names…sorry ). A friend from work who’d also just spent a ridiculous amount on new lenses was up for it also,always better to buddy up. Was a bit nervous more than anything heading out as I thought loads of people would give us hassle, the exact opposite, loads of people stopped for a chat and ended up having loads of good banter with folks. Felt really relaxed and were just surrounded by loads of amazing architecture, we both went mental. Loved it, The whole expedition was sponsored by bar 91, black friars and adlib. Wouldn’t have been right not to have a few cheeky pints. Today I feel hungover.

Will definately be doing that again. If you’re into it and fancy tagging along give us a bell/email was a great night. More results on my Flickr.

Been using my dads old Pentax k1000 camera over past few weeks. He gave it to me years ago (he always like to remind me how I broke it in 1986 and he had to buy a new body for it), I even did a proper photography course with it, but am a bit rusty on it now. I loaded it with some ilford black and white 400 film. It’s pretty cheap to buy and always available at about £4 a roll for 36 exp. The film cost about £6 to get developed and printed on small 6×4. Got some great shots with it though. Go look on flickr. Also for all the geeks here’s more info on the camera.

What a weekend. A friend of mine I used to work with in Aberdeen came up from London to visit for the weekend. The plan was simple. “whatever”. James arrived on friday night and I was choked full of manflu, and he was feeling worse for wear after travelling 500 miles at 100 mph backwards. So friday night was cup of tea banter. Woke up on Saturday relatively early start and a massive fry up. The mission head to Central station and see what happens. Next train + ferry to place that holds fun potential…Arran. Awesome. Quickly on train and before we knew it on a particularly cold and wet ferry over to Arran. Uh oh. Somehow as soon as we stepped off the ferry there was instant sunshine and blue skies. Brilliant. We pottered around Brodick for a while before heading to the tourist information centre to find out what was going on. Turns out we arrived in the middle of a walking festival…apparently you can have a festival of walking. It was here we found out the last ferry home was at 1920…fail. That didn’t leave much time. The woman in the tourism office told us that accomadation on the island was scarce but she pulled a favour and got us a family room over in blackwaterfoot on the west of the Island. Awesome. I love random Adventure. Bit of time to kill before bus arrived more photo taking on the beach…here, disaster. My digital camera battery died. Noooooooooooooooooo (think platoon) bought the battery charger but not the power cable…fail. From here I asked every shop if they had the cable, was running out of places fast. Last stop, Books and crafts, to be more precise a helpful old man at the back of the shop. They didn’t actually sell any of these cables but he did have the cable minus plug and gave me a plug. Brilliant. Bus through the middle of Arran to blackwaterfoot where we were loaned a screwdriver to make my battery charger. We were in business. Brilliant.

Blackwaterfoot itself was a lovely wee place, a massive strecth of beach that lead to kings caves, A massive Cave carved out by the sea. Worth a look with A relatively challenging walk (which could, as we found out, be avoided). A full day of photography and walking in the sunshine finished with a roast dinner and a pint.

Up bright and early for our breakfast and a bit of banter with the other guests. Todays mission. The goatfell, Arrans tallest peak. Just a little under munro height. We headed off and caught the bus that took us round the north of the Island via Lochranza which looked lovely. More banter on the bus with a travelling couple also keen on Photography doing the same walk as us. We arrived in Corrie on the east of the Island to start the walk. The path up was amazing. All the stones had been arranged to the point where it was almost cobbled to the summit. Good banter all the way up from travelling couple pierro (italian studying in sterling) and Jackie (Australian living in London) The last 300m were a killer. Massive steep steps and lots of pulling up. Took about 3 hrs to hit the summit from Corrie.

The views from the top were amazing. Best day for it. Clear skies, could even see northern Ireland. Strange as a few others from work were climbing around Arrocher and were caught in drizzle and poor visability…nae luck. From the top we set off back to the ferry. A 6 mile walk back to Brodick. Nice wee walk back over streams, through forrest and finally back onto beach all in a t-shirt. Great stuff. One last visit to make. Back to the books and craft shop to return the power cable (assembled of course) just incase someone else gets caught out. Ferry back. Perfect timing for a perfectly random weekend of “whatever”. Shattered now.

This weekend I’ve been in Dundee. Been ages since I last made it to christerrys domain. I arrived on Friday we just sat and drank played computer games. But who knew Saturday was going to be a scorcher. Up bright and early and straight out the door to Broughty ferry for breakfast. A nice little cafe called toast. Sat outside and ate. Free coffee refils…jackpot. From here we still didn’t really have a plan what to do. Already by the sea it was decided we had to go fly a kite. TO MY AMAZEMENT CHRISTERRY HAS NEVER FLOWN A KITE. so it was settled. Off to toymaster for a £3 winnie the poo kite…YAS! It was here we noticed quite alot of air traffic and old planes flying about. RAF leuchers was on not far down the road. Let’s do it. Nice scenic coastal route to Leuchers. Bit of traffic not too bad though. Got to the end of the line where they were directing into RAF leuchers. £20 to get in…”turn round christerry, turn round!” Just before this turn off was another one to a coastal path. JACKPOT Abig empty field to get parked near with hay bales fresh for hungover sleeping and plane watching.

There wasn’t much we didn’t see (other than maybe sleeping for a bit, hungover) We decided pretty quick planes with propellers were rubbish but jets were awesome. Was an amazing day of sunshine and were both satisfied with our random field over beach choice. It was still pretty early in the day and we decided that we’d pretty much seen all there was to see, then the red arrows turn up they’re always good. Seen them and headed back for more adventure. next stop 3 miles down the road tentsmuir.

What a place this was. A big massive stretch of beautiful beach off a massive big forrest. £1 to park. OOfff. Straight in the sea, still big planes flying over. Pretty cool. Eventually we headed off to meet a late running Sam before heading into Dundee bit tipsy. Dancing until silly AM then finally returning home only to switch all the lights off, crawl into a sleeping bags the wrong way and race down 2 flights of stairs. I won. Fundee

Well it was about time again for a bit more camping as most of the weather forecasts had “predicted” it wouldn’t rain most of saturday. So straight after work me and a few others headed straight to central to catch the ferry. It’s amazing how much further your money goes out on these wee islands. Lets see, edinburgh day single…one train about £10. To rothsay £8.60 one train and a ferry. I know which adventure I’d rather have. SO to rothsay where we grabbed a taxi ro take us to kilchattan bay to the start of the west island way. I had camped here before and managed to get right round to the southern tip but as we arrived a little later the light was dimming and I’d already fallen on my arse. So we found a great spot about a mile and a bit along the path. Setup camp. The weather was awesome…still and really quiet. Found a load of drift wood on the beach so got a fire going. We bought far to much stuff for even 2 nights. The co-op on bute does have amazing disposable bbq’s though. Loads of stars out even seen a few shooting ones. Great fun in the dark on the beach looking for wood…even found a beach toad…who knew?

Up in the morning and cooked up an awesome breakfast on the beach the wind had picked up a bit and the rain had even started a wee bit.

Some fellow campers went home on the early ferry while me and lee stayed on the bus and went round to port bannatyne for a bit of fishing off the pier. The sun had come out to play at this point. Much luck with the fishing few others there to, all fishing for mackerel. Mostly fishing with feathers, seems to be the way to go. Quick chip shop dinner (couldn’t be bothered cooking our fish as the rain was on) then back on the ferry home in time to watch overboard…just the job.

What a weekend indeed. The scenario, 4 girls are a man/women short for a cruising weekend starting at largs friday 8 o’clock heading into god knows where. This is where I step in…knowing full well I’m rather vomitous when it comes to sailing. The boat was a 37ft and could have probably slept about 8. But we had a comfy 6 including our skipper david…who wasn’t far off our age we’re guessing but rather than owning his own bought just skippered these courses ran from the sailing centre on cumbrae more info here. Friday night we were running a bit behind schedule as the traffic was a bit messy out of glasgow. So we spent the night in largs marina drinking alot of cider and allsorts. Saturday morning it’s up and staright out after a massive fry up on the boat. All the food was included in our booking price and turns out you can’t eat it all…we really tried. We headed up ultimately out to portavadie , a well posh marina. On the way out sailing by arran and stopping in st ninians bay for a wee swim with the jelly fish. I should point out at this point I’d had a wee spew and was feeling ever so slightly rough.

The weekend cruise turned out to be a bit of a course after we got speaking to our skipper who said it was an option. I’m guessing you can do the cruises and just do what you want be we thought it would be a good idea. So learning the ropes, sails, tacking and all that good stuff turned out to be genius as now we’re all half competent crew with a view of becoming ocean masters..ha. The sunday turned out to be well choppy with swells of about 1.5 metres. I was determined not to be sick so volunteered to head down the boat to help nic raise the jib (front sail) half way down the boat stopped for a massive spew…not ideal. I was pretty much out for the count until we got to the kyles of bute which was amazing. Flat calm and sunshine. Few dolphins splashing around. From here we sailed back round to largs back through a bit of choppy open water but I held down my cuppa soup. All in all a great weekend even if I was horribly ill, learnt loads and would def do it again. Good value for money and great fun. Thumbs up.

Summer holidays are indeed awesome.We booked this hotel for 3 nights in newquay. I’ve been wanting to get to cornwall for ages.The hotel made the trip. It only has 7 rooms each with their own balcony over looking the harbour. To add to the awesomeness it has a secret entrance only accesssible at low tide. The food was amazing, all locally caught fish…nom nom nom. Our original plan was to go up and down the coast for day trips..st Ives etc but the weather was so good and the hotel so good we never ventured too far. Loved it.

The actual centre of newquay was pretty tacky and filled with touristy shops and expensive surfer boutiques, however round by the harbour all is quiet and tourists never really ventured further than the main busy beach. The hotel sits on a cliff overlooking the harbour and it’s only about 20 mins walk from train station. The hotel backed onto a coastal walk which took you round the cliffs to fistral bay where all the surfers hung out. The last night the weather turned which resulted in thunder & lightning which was amazing to watch from the balcony as well as that I woke up a few mornings for sunrise. Loved everything about it…can’t recommend it enough.

I’m jumping from holiday to holiday at the momment. Just booked up the next one. Went onto Trainline.com put in all the dates and places blah blah….BOOM bit pricey, down the bottom “you may be cheaper with 2 singles” YEAH I WAS! scoop! how does 2 train journeys turn into 14 tickets?

Should have blogged this ages ago but i’ve not been very well and under the influence of ALOT of lemsip products. Last weekend Me and a few from work had some cheap flights to Dublin booked. Been pretty busy at work so only really decided what we were going to do a few days before we went really. Camping…It was the cheapest way to go. We found a wee campsite just outside a place called Rush which we could get to straight from the airport. We took lees massive tent as baggage. Ryan air fleeced me on the way in as I didn’t properly check-in on-line so had to pay £20 for some miserable women to stamp a piece of paper…nae chuffed. We found the campsite pretty easy once we had swapped a bus at a wee place called Swords. Instantly it hit us how expensive the trip was going to be. There wasn’t a great deal of difference between the euro and the pound. Everyday items seemed to cost a fortune…even in the quite clearly cheap places.

We eventually Arrived in Rush a lovely wee place with the campsite clearly marked straight from the bus. The campsite was magic, right on the beach and the weather was gorgeous. Tent up we went exploring and quickly found out eating out could be a tad pricey. Lee had a wee camping stove this turned out to be our saviour.

Between this an disposable BBQs we didn’t eat out once (had a cheeky chinese take away)…brilliant. The weather for the whole trip was amazing. Got sunburnt but damn was it cold at night…to the point where I went to the local shops and got some cardboard boxes to sleep on. Even with 2 jumpers, 2 trousers, shorts, gloves and a hat on I could still feel the chill. The town of Rush has plenty of shops, take aways and pubs. We tried to stay away from them as much as possible as everything was so expensive. Most days we walked along the coast to the wee villages along the coast on our way up to a place called Skerries. here was had more shops and it turned out to be a bit cheaper for supplies. Also here we found Bobs family entertainment centre. proper old skool amusements where we played what my Auntie calls the penny pingers. Also here they had operation wolf, outrun and afterburner…very geeky…very exciting.

The last day we decided we should go into Dublin itself…we’ve come this far. To the guiness factory we went. A bus runs straight from rush into Dublin, takes about an hour but you could get an all day bus pass for 6 euro which was pretty good as it covered all of Dublin. The momment I arrived in Dublin I didn’t like it. Think I had got used to the idea of having a whole beach to myself. We walked to the guiness factory It was a good walk. We didn’t hang around Dublin we did the guiness tour and left straight away. The guiness Tour was good. I’m not a huge fan of guiness but the tour was well put together and they had a section on all the design and advertising.

Back to the campsite to pack up tent and swim in the sea of course…we said we were going to do it when we arrived….stuck to our word. The result was I was off work for nearly a week…the others were fine…I’m just weak. Can’t recommend that campsite enough. Great location, Friendly people nice showers etc. All good…Ireland…tick. I’d maybe wait until the euro vs pound situation was a bit better though.