Richard Bell's Nature Diary, Scotland, Saturday & Sunday, 21-22 August 2010
AS
THE COACH
leaves the
old A1 at
Tranent
and goes
down the
slip-road
onto the
modern dual-carriageway,
we see Edinburgh
in the distance
across the
fields,
between
Arthur's
Seat in
the north
and the
Pentland
Hills to
the south.
We cross the little North Esk, framed by trees - a little vignette of what could easily pass for a highland river - and I can't help thinking that in West Yorkshire a small river like this would be enclosed in flood barriers and festooned with a strandline of litter. But I'm being a bit unfair to West Yorkshire and I put this feeling down to it having been too long since we were last in Scotland. I feel the pull of wild open spaces.
We're staying
with my
sister and
from the
guest bedroom
you look
out across
the Firth
of Forth
towards
the Cleish
and Lomond
Hills beyond.
Seeing those
hills beyond
the Firth
makes me
want to
visit the
Highlands
again. Last
time we
were here
you could
see the
flashing
light of
the lighthouse
on Inchkeith
island,
but now
silver birches
in a neighbour's
garden have
grown, all
but blotting
out the
little island.
City
LinkWe take the City Link coach from Edinburgh to Glasgow through Scotland's Midland Valley. There are echoes of West Yorkshire here as we cross the coalfields but the spoil heaps that dominate the landscape are red rather than grey; for a century until the 1960s, oil-shales were mined here. The grey burnt shale which is left when the oil has been extracted rapidly turns red as it oxidises.
I add watercolour to my sketches on the return journey.
GlasgowWe're here for a family wedding just 8 minutes train ride across the Clyde from Central Station (left) in western Glasgow. We stay overnight in the city and have the Sunday morning to explore. We head for the Gallery of Modern Art in the imposing mansion house built for William Cunninghame, a Glasgow tobacco magnate, in 1778. Walking around the galleries is an Alice in Wonderland experience. On the top floor we dip down past a flashing neon sign into a short dark corridor, passing an exhibit that evokes the French Revolution by including three baskets each containing a dramatically lit plaster head, and then come out at an elliptical classical rooflight with a view down through the lightwell to the first floor.
The artists' work is beautifully lit and displayed and the content is thought-provoking but I'm afraid photography and video - even of this impressive quality - don't engage me like drawing and painting. You're not directly connected to the eye and hand of the artist. These works seem intended to make serious points about sociology, personal identity and ethnography; they're not there to engage people like me who tend to get absorbed in drawing or painting.
We then head for The Place to Eat at John Lewis's in the Buchanan shopping centre where, over a cup of coffee and a pancake, I draw The Cleland Testimonial, built in memory of Dr James Cleland (1770-1840), Superintendent of Public Works for the city.
Corbridge
After
all the
worry about
Barbara's
mum over
the past
month, it's
been good
to have
a long weekend
away. We
enjoyed
the leisurely
journey
here, calling
at Corbridge,
Northumberland,
the perfect
halfway
stop for
us. I drew
these views
of Forum
Books and
Crafts from
Martha's
Tearooms
on the journey
north on
Friday (left)
and on the
return journey
on the Monday
(right).