Scozmo's Photery

June 29th started well, sunny, very warm and promising for a good walk. I went down for a good breakfast before deciding what we would do for the day. We’d wanted to walk around Loch Thom for quite some time, we did it many years ago so, we headed for the Greenock Cut Visitor Centre as our start point.

The road up there is single track and can be awkward if it’s busy, bearing in mind this was a hot Sunday morning, we expected quite a bit of traffic but there was none! We found out why when we reached the Road Closed sign about half way up to the centre!!!! Luckily there was a turning space and we grumbled while heading back down, passing another car going up so we passed on the message. Turned out there was another road closure sign further back down, which was lying in the hedge!

So! Now what?

I suggested Lunderston Bay, I’d never actually been there to visit and I’d seen people walking along the shoreline so, we headed there; along with quite a few families! Most of the people there had parked, walked to the little beach area or sat on the benches near the car park, we headed off along the coastal path, nowhere near as busy, phew! If you zoom in, you can see the path leading South, following the coastline.

It was turning out to be a scorcher of a day but the breeze coming off the sea kept us cool of course but covering the fact that the sun was scorching.

Once clear of the parking area, the number of people around dropped off making this a very pleasant walk, bizarrely someone has plonked a rental chalet just off the path! They are everywhere now.

I took these three shots to merge into a panorama, to give a sense of the surrounds, looking across to the Cowal peninsula, far right on the opposite shore is Dunoon.

We walked round to that lone tree on the far left and just sat, watching and listening. Isn’t human nature strange? As we sat, another couple stopped and sat on a rock behind us, then a guy stopped and sat on a rock to our right! What? 🙂

Anyway, there were loads of butterflies around and the shoreline had plenty of seabirds dotted along it.

There was a young Pied Wagtail flitting along the high tide line, searching the seaweed for tasty morsels.

My head was, once again, on a 360 degree swivel and I spotted this odd object sticking out of the sand, just had to go and examine it, photograph it. An old rusty boats tiller?

There was a host of birds way out on the shoreline, Oystercatchers, mixed ‘gulls, a couple of Curlew and three Terns, probably Common Terns but too far for me to ID and I saw a few Gannet out hunting over the river.

There was a good stiff breeze blowing in from the sea and we sat and watched this German registered yacht tacking its way down the river.

That is Dunoon in the background and that whole peninsula is pretty remote, if you look on any maps there aren’t many roads up that way but it is a beautiful area.

After staring at the universe for a short while, we headed back along the track to the car park where there was an Ice Cream van so …….. we sat and had an ice cream while we watched humans doing humans-at-the-beach stuff before we set off back to the hotel. The whole walk we did was only 2.2 miles.

We took another walk into Gourock, just to relax and enjoy the air, before settling back into our room where I basically sat staring out the window, waiting … 🙂

The promenade follows along the road outside and lots of people walk, run, cycle and walk their dogs every day, what a wonderful place to be every day.

As you can see, the day had turned cloudy again but that can also make for great light.

There were also quite a lot of Eider ducks on the water’s edge, some with youngsters.

Then, just after 19:30 or 7:30pm, Waverley hove into view, coming back up the Clyde heading for Gourock for a drop off and ultimately, Glasgow.

You can hear ships as they pass by, the bigger the ship, the louder the thrumming sound as it passes by.

We’ve decided we’ll book on one of her trips before she heads off elsewhere in the country, she travels all around our coast offering day trips out.

I loved that single cloud being lit up. Then she was gone, up around the bend 🙂

Then, there was only the sky, the evening sunlight and the scenery.

https://flic.kr/p/2reEqzB

Then, this started happening! The sun was setting through the heavy cloud over the Holy Loch.

The last couple of sets are in the same minute with different focal lengths or zoom.

And finally 🙂

I loved the ray of light on those houses on the opposite bank of the river.

A beautiful few minutes, then gone. Such is nature and always worth watching, stopping and enjoying.

Part 3. – Visiting the Skelpies!

wanderings