Continuing my account of my recent holiday in Scotland with an account of the earthquake walk.
Comrie lies close to a fault line, and at one time was known as the ‘shaky toon’ because of this. It had earthquake recording equipment as early as the 18th century, and the building that housed that equipment still stands, and contains a more modern piece of recording equipment – a seismoscope, which records earthquakes and their intensity but not the times at which they occur. This post looks at our walk that took in that house, and features some information about earthquakes as well.
FIRST PORT OF CALL: COMRIE POST OFFICE
Comrie Post Office has some information about earthquakes on display. Apparently the post office itself shook when an earthquake hit Greece in March of this year.
THE WALK PROPER
The walk begins by heading past the church and on to the road that passed the frontage of the church – heading at this point in the direction of Crianlarich. The first noteworthy point after the church is a magnificent stone bridge across the river Earn. The ‘Earthquake House’ itself stands alone in a field, and is accessed by a path which leads off a side road – the gate from the main road into that field is very firmly locked. The house has plenty of information, and although one cannot go in one can look through the window and get a decent view of the seismoscope, though the window is reinforced in a way that renders photographing the seismoscope a virtual impossibility – I tried.
We hoped to walk along a bit of disused railway – the former Lochearnhead, St Fillans and Comrie Railway, a route that was in operation between 1901 and 1951 when it was closed – but a small spring was bubbling on to the path rendering too wet and muddy to be walking, so we saw only the start of it. Thus in the end we went back the way we had come.
PHOTOGRAPHS
Here are my photographs from this walk…
The stone bridge across the Earn.The Earthquake HouseI kept two of my attempts at photographing through the window to illustrate the problems.A mile post showing the distances to Crieff in one direction and St Fillnas in the other.
Continuing my account of my Scottish holiday with a look at the Deil’s Caldron walk.
I continue my account of my recent Scottish holiday with a post about the Deil’s Caldron walk. In Comrie Village there is a restaurant called The Deil’s Caldron, about which I cannot comment further as it was closed while i was there so I had no opportunity to sample it. The restaurant is named after a natural landmark.
THE WALK
Just out of Comrie (literally yards past a sign indicating the end of the speed limit) is a path that is signposted to the Deil’s Caldron. It is a very well maintained path, in better shape than most English paths, and the walk at this time of year is not a challenging one. One hears the caldron before seeing it, and there is a superb viewing area overlooking it, which we made full use of. We did not continue onwards to make a circular walk of it, but went back the way we came.
PHOTOGRAPHS
Here are the pictures from this walk…
The Deil’s Caldron restaurant.Officially this is classed as a villa.
A look at the Charles Rennie Mackintosh building, the village of Comrie and the river Earn. Also a waterfall video.
Welcome to the next post in my series about my holiday in Scotland. This post looks at the house itself and the the village of Comrie including the river Earn. It is in the nature of clearing the decks for the more specific posts that will follow. This is an outside view of the house itself:
This is the outside view of our accommodation. The sitting room includes the turret, although there is an internal ceiling which means we don’t get to see the whole of the inside of the turret.
THE SETTING OF THE HOUSE
The house is directly opposite Comrie Community Centre, a building that looks remarkably like a church but is not (though it clearly used to be) – Comrie Church is about a five minute walk away. Next door it in one direction is an estate agent housed in what clearly used to be a local bank in the dim and distant days when such things existed while on the other side is a pet shop. Down one side of the house is a path that provides pedestrian access to the car parking area. There is a small shopping area, while the river, not quite visible from the house, is just the other side of the community centre from it.
On the Wednesday morning I explored the river a little way in each direction. One way is a path that leads to Cultybraggan. In the other direction I got as far as Legion Park. From certain locations a hill top monument is visible – I photographed it more than once.
PHOTOGRAPHS
Here are the pictures for this post…
A community centre that looks like a church.The sitting room, showing the inside of the turret.
For those who made it to this point, here is the first of a series of waterfall videos which will feature in this series:
The public transport elements of my journey from King’s Lynn to Comrie.
This is the first of what I plan to be a series of posts about my recent holiday in Scotland. This post looks in detail at the public transport elements of the journey there.
KING’S LYNN TO PETERBOROUGH
I booked my train tickets to and from Peterborough because it is significantly cheaper that way and also the train journey to Peterborough involves a change at Ely. With the train on which I had a reserved seat leaving Peterborough at 10:18AM I assessed that the right bus to be on was the 8:30AM bus, which meant I needed to leave before 8 o’clock to be sure of catching it. This did not prove to be any great problem. The bus ran smoothly and I arrived at Peterborough with plenty of time to find the correct platform and the correct place on that platform to wait to board the train at the right point (I was in coach H, which was shown on the information screen as needing me to be in zone 5 of the platform…
PETERBOROUGH TO EDINBURGH WAVERLEY
This was the longest leg of the journey, but compensated by also being the fastest. Finding my reserved seat was straightforward, and no one had unthinkingly occupied it, so I was able to seat myself without having to ask anyone to move (even though reservations are very clearly indicated as such it is not unknown to find a reserved seat already occupied, and I will get the person occupying it to move if that is the case). I had booked a forward facing window seat, and on this occasion that was what it proved to be – and it was on the better side of the train for photography. This route provides plenty of fine views, especially between York and Edinburgh (though there a few good bits south of York as well). The task at Edinburgh was to locate the train I was to travel on as far as Stirling, which I did…
EDINBURGH TO STIRLING
This was on a stopping service which was ultimately headed for Dunblane, and passed through a few interesting places. At Stirling I had to change trains for the final leg of the journey to Perth, but this did involve moving platforms, for which I was grateful.
STIRLING TO PERTH
This was a non-stop journey on a Scotrail Intercity service heading towards Inverness. Unfortunately I was unable to secure a window seat for this final leg of the journey, though I did spot one or two interesting things on arrival at Perth. The train arrived at Perth at the scheduled time, which meant that seven and a half hours of public transport travel involving one bus and three trains had ended with the traveller in the right place at the right time – which in 21st century Britain comes close to qualifying as miraculous.
PHOTOGRAPHS
Taking photographs through the windows of buses and trains is often frustrating, but yields enough good pictures to be worthwhile….
The first 15 pictures are King’s Lynn pictures, some taken on the Monday evening, a couple while walking to the bus station on Tuesday morning.This picture and the next two were taken while passing through Wisbech.The train pictures start here.Our first stop.On the approach to Alnmouth.The train would soon be crossing this viaduct.Looking along the Tweed as the train moves from England into Scotland.This is now a Radisson hotel, but it would have been built by the original railway company as the station hotel.
Setting the scene for a series about my recent holiday in Scotland.
I usually have a short holiday around the time of my birthday. This year, due to the place my mother was able to organize for us to stay at only being available for a few days I had the main celebration yesterday and have spent most of today travelling. This post sets the scene for what will be a series of blog posts about my brief sojourn in Scotland.
GETTING THERE
We were staying at the Charles Rennie Mackintosh building in Comrie, which was one of that worthy’s earliest design projects. I arranged to travel by public transport between King’s Lynn and Perth, the nearest major town to Comrie. The public transport element of my outbound journey consisted of four stages: King’s Lynn to Peterborough by bus, Peterborough to Edinburgh Waverley by rail (an Azuma train, the new stock being used by LNER, with a very streamlined front), a Scotrail stopping train from Edinburgh Waverley to Stirling (ultimate destination Dunblane) and then a Scotrail intercity train from Stirling to Perth. By the time I reached Perth, where my parents were meeting me by car for the rest of the journey to Comrie I had been underway for just over eight hours, and another hour would pass before we reached our destination. I will be covering the public transport element of the journey in fuller detail in a later blog post but for the moment here is sampler gallery…
This frontage is in Wisbech, near the start of my journey.Durham, in the middle of the journey (two pics)NewcastleLeaving England and heading into Scotland (this is Berwick, where the train did not stop)This tower with the gold coloured ornamentation is near Linlithgow, nearing the end of the Edinburgh-Stirling leg of the journey.
THE HOUSE
I will be covering the house and its immediate surrounds in more detail later, but here are a few pictures to whet the appetite…
Everything in these three pictures is Mackintosh designed.
ACTIVITIES
As you might imagine the Tuesday evening was pretty much a dead loss as far as activities were concerned, but Wednesday and Thursday were well filled. I explored along the river Earn on the Wednesday morning, and we all walked up to the Deil’s Caldron just before lunch that day, before doing some of the Earthquake Walk in the afternoon (Comrie used to be known as the ‘shaky toon’ because of its proximity to a fault line, and was possibly the first place in the world to have earthquake recording equipment, with the house in which that equipment lived, and where there is a still a functioning seismoscope, being the centrepiece of the walk). On Thursday we visited a WWII POW camp at Cultybraggan, also had a look at an old Roman fort, and near the latter we also saw a much younger but still impressively old stone packhorse bridge across the Earn and also paid a visit to Crieff, once an important staging post on an epic cattle droving route that began in the extreme west of Scotland and ended in Stirling. The birthday meal was Thursday evening. Here is a sample gallery from some of these activities…
Three shots of the Caldron (the colour of the water is down to dissolved peat from the uplands – water in Scotland is not in the hands of greedy privateers).A couple of items at Cultybraggan and the packhorse bridge.
THE RETURN JOURNEY
The public transport element of my return journey started with a journey from Perth to Edinburgh Waverley, not by way of Stirling, then the fast journey from Edinburgh Waverley to Peterborough and finally a bus from Peterborough to King’s Lynn. The train from Perth ran late, and there were moments of worry about making the interchange at Edinburgh (the train from Perth arrived only eight minutes before my second train, to Peterborough, was due to depart, but I hustled myself between platforms and in the end reached my seat with six of those eight minutes to spare. I haven’t yet edited the photos from I took en route. I end with a mini-gallery from earlier in the stay…
A stone bridge over the Earn, which we crossed on our way to the Earthquake House.the Earthquake House from the road.
A look back at two matches that in different ways link back to WG Grace and a very large photo gallery.
Today is the fourth and final day of a round of county championship matches. I am following Essex’s attempt to beat Kent, which at the moment seems to be going their way. Yesterday two matches saw events that in different ways harked back to WG Grace. This post looks at both matches, one of which I listened to and one of which I heard about.
HAMPSHIRE V SURREY
Surrey won the county championship in 2022 and 2023, and are well placed to make it three in a row this year. However, even the strongest sides occasionally get things badly wrong, and at Southampton over the three days that the match lasted Surrey most certainly did. Surrey won the toss and chose to bat. A poor morning with the bat for Surrey was immediately followed by a devastating post-lunch burst from Kyle Abbott which yielded him a five-for in next to no time, and Surrey had mustered a measly 127. By the close of day one Hampshire were 102-1, Fletcha Middleton gone for 35, and Toby Albert and Nick Gubbins looking solid though not scoring with any great pace. Both completed centuries on the second day, Albert’s being his maiden first class ton. With this solid base to build on the later batting was more aggressive, and by the end of day two Hampshire were 495-4, with Ben Brown 99* and Liam Dawson 74*. The only question by then was whether Surrey could save the match. Brown completed his hundred and went rapidly on to a career best 165*. Dawson was out for 81, while James Fuller helped Hampshire towards their declaration with 34* off 27 balls. Hampshire’s declaration came at 608-6, leaving Surrey just over five sessions to bat to save the game. Burns was out early, and a good catch by Albert off Organ removed Sibley for 28 (86). Thereafter only Foakes showed the necessary application to bat for a long time. Lawrence scored 42 off 50 balls, a most inappropriate innings for the circumstances, while Steel, Clark, Sean Abbott and Atkinson managed 21 between them. With the result settled Surrey number 11 Dan Worrall emerged as top scorer for them, hitting his way to 48, with his dismissal leaving Foakes undefeated on 19 having survived 107 balls. The margin was an innings and 278 runs, the worst defeat Surrey had ever suffered in a county championship match, though the 1948 Australians beat Surrey by an innings and 296, as did an England XI in 1866, the match in which WG Grace scored his maiden first class century, a then ground record 224*. Full scorecard here.
GLOUCESTERSHIRE V DERBYSHIRE
This match is a ridiculous run fest and will end in a draw. However when Gloucestershire were 131-4 in reply to Derbyshire’s 526 it might have got interesting. At that point James Bracey and Graeme van Buuren came together for Gloucestershire, and their fifth wicket stand ended up producing 277, an all time Gloucestershire record for that wicket, breaking one of the oldest county records, set by WG Grace and William Moberly in 1876 (Moberly was also an excellent rugby player, captaining Oxford University to victory in the first ever varsity rugby match and appearing for England against Scotland in 1872). In the run up to lunch today Gloucestershire had a clatter of wickets fall, but Aussie import Beau Webster smashed a rapid 76 to take them into a first innings lead – 530 against 526.
PHOTOGRAPHS
I have a large photo gallery to share. My next gallery will be a bit different as early tomorrow morning I head north for a brief holiday in Scotland, near Perth to be precise (a journey accomplished by means of fast bus to Peterborough and trains from Peterborough to Perth). Here is today’s offering…
An explanation of the effect that the weather has had on today’s cricket schedules and a quick look back at yesterdays T20I between the England and Pakistan men’s teams.
The second ODI between the England and Pakistan women’s teams should be in full swing at the moment, but the weather has intervened in no uncertain terms and the radio people have delivered their verdict on the likelihood of their being any resumption of play by switching over to the IPL final between Sunrisers Hyderabad and the Kolkata Knight Riders. Yesterday the England and Pakistan men’s sides contested a T20I and I will look back at that. While I have been typing this post and then preparing it for publication news has come through that the match in Taunton has been abandoned.
A COMFORTABLE WIN
For much of their innings England looked set to score over 200 from their 20 overs, but a poor last five overs prevented that. They ended with 183 to defend, an innings built around a blistering 84 from Jos Buttler. Moeen Ali bowled four of the first nine overs of the Pakistan reply, and collected 2-26, a splendid effort, especially given that the second of those wickets was that of Babar Azam, Pakistan’s best batter. Pakistan never got on terms with the target, and the final margin was 23 runs. Jofra Archer returned to action, and was very impressive and indubitably fully fit for action. If there is a problem with this England line up it is that the only front line batter who bats left handed is Moeen Ali, which means that England either have to send six successive right handers to the crease, or promote him up the order to break the sequence.
PHOTOGRAPHS
It has not been the best weather for photography recently, but I do have a gallery to share…
A brief look back at the closing stages of the first ODI between England Women and Pakistan Women, which took place yesterday.
Yesterday saw the first ODI between the England and Pakistan women’s sides (the day before should have seen a T20I between the men’s sides but unremitting rain all day long led to the authorities at Headingley concluding an hour before the scheduled start time that it would not be possible to get the match on and abandoning it). I was at work for the majority of yesterday’s game, but did get the closing stages.
A SCRAPPY SUCCESS
Pakistan look in with a chance for over half their batting innings, but having got the target below 100 at what should have been a manageable rate with six wickets standing they lost both incumbent batters in quick succession. The over that killed any prospect of a Pakistan revival was a wicket maiden by Sophie Ecclestone which meant that after nine of her ten overs she had figures of 3-24. Although the Pakistan tail reduced the deficit they never looked like challenging in the closing overs. They survived until the final over, but by the time the last ball was bowled they needed 38 from it to win the match, and only scored one of them, so England won by 37 runs. However, it was undeniably slipshod from England’s bowlers, with Extras contributing 40 to Pakistan’s total, including 31 in wides, and a better side than Pakistan would certainly have punished them for this. I missed the batting efforts, but that no one got to 50 (Capsey’s 44 was the highest score of the match) tells a story. So far in three T20Is and one ODI between these sides there has been one individual half century – Wyatt’s 87 in the third T20I, and she was dropped on 12 in that innings. Ecclestone’s 3-26 from 10 overs secured her the Player of the Match award. Full scorecard here.
PHOTOGRAPHS
I have a fine photo gallery to share today…
This is some variety of Frog Leg Beetle.This ‘mint humbug’ type snail was resting on the outside of my front door.A floating moorhen nest.I think this is a female cranefly.This was the first photo I took on my out this morning.No two photos of starlings look the same – their appearance changes according to how the light strikes them.Perhaps the best Frog Leg Beetle image I have yet produced.My first Red Admiral of 2024.Some variety of damselfly, spotted near a stretch of Bawsey Drain (three images).
I use a recent acquisition to showcase some of the more iconic buildings in King’s Lynn.
This is the first post I am creating that is inspired by lot 526 at James and Sons’ May auction. This item, a 1950 Temporary Guide to King’s Lynn was knocked down to me for £5. In the post that follows I will be showing each of the images I produced when photographing the item for auction and then producing pictures of the buildings concerned taken by me in 2024.
FRONT COVER AND MAP
The first two images are of the front cover and the map. These have no present day equivalents.
The Map…
COMPARISON PICTURES
The first image that offers modern comparisons from my own stock of pictures is this one…
There are four landmarks in this image – The Red Mount Chapel and The Archway in Broad Walk, or as it is correctly known Guanock Gate, on the left side as you look, the South Gate Approach (no direct equivalent, but I have got the gate itself) and Leziate Golf Course (no equivalent).
My pictures for comparison are presented as a gallery – to see a larger version of an image just click on it.
Front on view of the chapel.Close up of the upper door to the chapel.Close up of the name plaqueA more side on view of the chapel.The Guanock Gate town sideThe Guanock Gate out of town side.The South Gate looking towards the town.
Here is the next image from the booklet…
On the left is Greyfriars Tower and on the right what was then St Margarets Church and is now King’s Lynn Minster.
2024 versions…
This was the next image I produced for auction…
This is the iconic Guildhall of the Holy Trinity, also known as King’s Lynn Town Hall.2024 images of the building (six pics – click to view at a full size).
The next image I produced for auction was this:
The Custom House, the most iconic building in the town.
The Custom House is the official dividing point between the two medieval towns that together form King’s Lynn. Here are some 2024 pictures…
The next and final image in the gallery for auction was this one…
The South Porch of St Nicholas Chapel.
This is what this looks like in 2024…
There has recently been restoration work done on this chapel (witness the scaffolding in the top left corner of this picture.
A look back at the first two matches I followed in this round of County Championship matches – Surrey outclassing Worcestershire and Essex beating Warwickshire after Alex Davies ushered them back into the game by refusing to enforce the follow-on.
The current round of county championship fixtures is nearing its conclusion (I am now tuned into Somerset v Kent, which will shortly resume after an innings break, with Somerset needing 189 to win in 54 overs) and in this post I look back at the first two matches to command my attention since play started on Friday morning.
SURREY V WORCESTERSHIRE
Worcestershire won the toss and put Surrey in. Initially it looked like working very nicely for them, when Surrey tumbled to 15-4, but Jamie Smith and Dan Lawrence righted the ship well enough (Lawrence’s 84 was especially impressive) that with the addition of a late flourish by Jordan Clark (42*) they managed to top 200. By the end of an action packed opening day Worcestershire were already seven down in their own first innings, and they managed a mere 128 all out by the end of it, Dan Worrall claiming six cheap wickets. Burns, Sibley, Smith, Lawrence and Clark all demonstrated that batting was not impossible on this surface. Lawrence made 87, and Clark got within sight a century, Surrey eventually being all out for 427, a lead of 512. Surrey themselves chased down a target of over 500 against Kent last season, but such targets are rarely successfully chased, especially against a seam attack of Roach, Worrall, Atkinson and Clark on a pitch offering them a bit of assistance. Although there was some late hitting from Nathan Smith (60 from number 8) and Ben Gibbon (75 from number 10) Worcestershire’s fate was sealed by then – even with this late flourish they reached only 231, which meant Surrey won by 281 runs. Dan Worrall followed his first innings 6-22 with 4-35 at the second time of asking. About the only genuine bright spot for Worcestershire was provided by first class debutant Yadvinder Singh (a product of the South Asian Cricket Academy), who claimed four wickets in Surrey’s second innings to give a hint of his potential. For those wondering about the pitch, it was never a death trap, but Surrey undoubtedly prepared a ‘result’ pitch, believing that they were more likely to benefit from such than the visitors, and they were right – they had the bowling to make full use of whatever was there for them and Worcestershire didn’t. Scorecard here.
ESSEX V WARWICKSHIRE
The match above concluded on the third evening, and I followed various other games for the remainder of that day, but had noticed an interesting scenario unfolding at Chelmsford and resolved to follow that game to its conclusion today. Essex started today 224-4 chasing 330 for victory. However it was the story of how that situation arose that made the scenario particularly interesting. Warwickshire had scored 397 batting first and Essex were rolled for 162. At this point, with whoever batted next facing an awkward mini-session before the close, and the Essex batters probably not in the best of spirits after failing once already that day Warwickshire skipper Alex Davies made a bizarre decision not enforce the follow-on with that lead of 235, thereby exposing his own side to that awkward mini-session of batting. Warwickshire were five down by the close of day, and the Essex bowlers finished the job on day three with Warwickshire mustering a beggarly 94 all out. Warwickshire needed early wickets on the fourth morning and did not get them – the target was down to 42 before they finally struck, Jordan Cox holing out for splendid 112, his second first class hundred for his new county. Pepper, the new batter, fell early to make it 293-6, but Simon Harmer, fear of whose off spin in the final innings may have influenced Davies’ fateful decision not to put Essex back in when he had the chance, batted nicely, while Matt Critchley was playing a splendid innings and richly deserved to join Cox with a three figure score. Unfortunately he was denied this, being on 99* when a boundary to Harmer gave Essex a four wicket win. When it comes to enforcing the follow-on there should be no ‘always’ and no ‘never’ – each case should be assessed on its merits, and my strong view here is that Davies messed up – with an advantage of 235 and whoever batted next facing an awkward mini-session before the close (which also meant his bowler’s would have a nights rest to break up their labours) it was clear cut to enforce it, and his decision to inflict that awkward mini-session of batting on his own side ultimately cost him and them the match. Full scorecard here.
aspiblog 