Clava Cairns Revisited

Another instalment of my 'Gothic Travels', which is something I want to focus on this year. Today's visit is to a 4,000 year old burial ground in the valley south of Culloden. I've been there before, and you can see the previous post (with really terrible photographs!) about when I went there for a Pagan gathering ::here::.

On February 4th, my partner Raven and I visited Clava Cairns near Culloden. We drove there, and parked up at the carpark on the site, which only had a couple of other vehicles. I was surprised that there was anyone else there at all on such a cold and frosty Monday afternoon; the carpark was iced over with compacted snow for the most part, and while it wasn't utterly freezing, it was cold enough not to melt the settled snow particularly fast, and even in what is a sheltered valley there was as a certain chill - perhaps the damp air from the river that runs under the viaduct further along. [The viaduct is pretty impressive, similar to the Glenfinian Viaduct made famous in Harry Potter, and it too has a railway crossing a valley, but this one is pink rather than grey; I will give it its own post]. 

Long shadows from a low sun beside the ring cairn; photograph by me.

I apologise for the lack of clarity and resolution in my photos - my camera broke last summer and I haven't been able to afford a replacement since then, so I'm just using the camera on my phone, which is average at best. Please click on photographs for expanded versions, especially the thumbnails.

Pile of rocks in the carpark. Photograph by myself.

There's what appears to be a small cairn in the carpark, just outside the boundary to the main complex of cairns. As it's not listed on the maps, and it's not in the enclave, I think it might just be a pile of rocks from levelling a flattish plot to make the carpark, or maybe an 19thC folly addition, or even stones removed in the 19thC excavations of the cairns; basically I don't know what it is at all.

Frozen meltwater in a depression. Photograph taken by myself.

Raven and I; cooperative selfie.

Clava Cairns is specifically 'Balnuaran of Clava', as there are other groups of cairns known as 'Clava Cairns'. There's also a ruined chapel and another cairn at the far end of road, which I have visited before in the past, but didn't visit that day. Nearby there are two other cairns in an overgrown field across the road from the enclave run by Historic Scotland, and also a standing stone in a field that sometimes has I think cows in it. Either way, the other two monuments and the standing stone are not open to the public as monuments, and while there is some freedom to walk in Scotland, these fields often have livestock, so going in them could cause a problem (Highland Cattle/Heilan' Coos are very cute but they are large animals with big horns! Be considerate of cattle and farmers if visiting.

The setting sun makes for a beautiful light over the cairns.

Reflected sunlight on ice.

Photograph by myself.

The enclave around the cairns is of old trees, planted between 1870 and 1871 by the land-owner at the time, who had the Romantic notion of the cairns being a 'Druidic temple' so wanted to plant it into a 'Druid Grove' - I think there are a few Neo-Pagans (Celtic, Druidic and otherwise) who are quite grateful for that, because it really does give the site a beautiful atmosphere of being encapsulated by nature, something simultaneously apart from the world and deeply within it. I'm certainly neither the first nor the best photographer to take advantage of the late afternoon light streaming between the branches and trunks of the trees, and I felt that the melt-water and ice from where the snow had been defrosting certainly did something to make that extra-special.

Sunlight streaming through the trees across where the snow has melted.

Near-to-carpark cairn. My photo.

The cairns are approximately 4,000 years old, and they were used as mausoleums of a sort. There are three large cairns and one small kerb cairn. Two of the large cairns have passage entrances aligned with the setting sun on the winter solstice, and the centre cairn is a ring cairn - a central sealed chamber with no entrance, a sort of stony donut. I've read that the stone circles around the cairns were set after the cairns ceased to be used for new burials. The ring cairn in the centre of the three is almost a wheel design, with the ring cairn as the hub and low stone walls as spokes out to the standing stones beyond. I think the standing stones are also on a celestial alignment.

A cleft stone - was it split by time and ice, or is it a pair?

Photograph taken by myself. 

Scarf to keep my ears warm.

Selfie by the larger cairn.

The far cairn is the smallest full cairn other than the kerb cairn. There used to be an infographic explaining the sunset alignment at the cairns, but I can't remember if it's still there, and if it was, it was buried under snow. I think the far corner cairn has a cup-mark in a stone within it, and was re-used as a columbarium around a thousand years after they were made, in approximately 1,000BCE. It was excavated in Victorian times, but it wasn't excavated with the modern techniques of archaeology, and a lot of data was missed, lost, or destroyed. I don't know if they disinterred any remains, and if so, what happened to the person who was buried there, but from what I gather, the cairn was the victim of overenthusiastic dilettante archaeology in the 1870s.

The far cairn, aligned with the sunset. Photo by myself.

In South East England, where I grew up, there was a theory relating the placement of barrows to either be prominent on the brows of hills, or to be near rivers, and while I think the builders of the cairns at Clava may have been culturally different, the cairns are hardly on a hilltop, but they are in a valley with the River Nairn flowing through - but I'm not an archaeologist (yet... I'm doing my second undergraduate degree part-time, studying joint History & Archaeology), and it is something I would have to read up on. There's been some interesting papers on the placement of chambered cairns on the Isles, but I don't know about the mainland. Definitely something I need to look into. 

Frosty ground. Photograph by Raven.

The Cairns are very popular in recent years due to the success of the show 'Outlander', as apparently there is some connection to the series. I haven't watched much of it, and the opening scene with early 20thC 'Druids' was filmed on a set on a hillock with foam stones, and Clava Cairns is apparently not the site mentioned in the books (a better candidate for that would be the stones that remain of the cairn at Dunain, which I mentioned in my previous blog entry about Ostara), so I'm not sure what the exact connection is, but it's something to do with magical standing stones as part of the time-travel in the story, from what I gather. They've actually become too popular, and have been damaged by people climbing on the stones, and on the cairns, dislodging parts of the rock walls of the cairns. Large coaches and heavy traffic have also caused an access issue for the garage that runs recovery/road-side assistance from a little further down the road - and therefore for the clients they were off to rescue from mechanical trouble. If visiting during busy season, I would suggest parking elsewhere and walking down, as it is a pretty and pleasant walk (there are also several B&Bs, chalets, etc. nearby for accommodation.).

A rather rectangular stone. Photo taken by myself.

Raven. Photo by me.

The ring cairn was buried under snow, as was a stone with cup-marks tooled into it. When we got to the far end of the cairns, a tour-bus arrived with a medium group of tourist, and the peace of the place felt broken, so we walked off to get a better look at the viaduct instead. I must go back there again this year, and take photographs in different weather and seasons. I follow #ClavaCairns on Instagram, and a lot of beautiful photographs turn up in that hashtag, which is quite inspiring. Hopefully I'll be able to afford a new camera soon, and thus able to work on bettering my photography. For now, I am doing my best with my smartphone and some basic editing software. 

Snow in the dying light; photograph by Raven 

As a historical site, I thoroughly recommend visiting them, just to get a sense of the size and scale of these cairns. As a Neo-Pagan, I visit to reconnect with the sense of place, with spiritual ancestors and those past practices that inspired me to a nature-based spirituality. 

We made a tiny snowman made from two snowballs with twigs for arms. 

It's also just a pleasant place to be. There are some picnic tables near by, plenty of wildlife lives in the area, and the trees are rather lovely. Apart from solemn contemplation, it's nice to enjoy yourself, and I don't think it is any disrespect to those who were buried there thousands of years ago - as long as that doesn't spill into the sort of exuberance that could damage the monuments or make it so other people can't enjoy their time there too.
[My apologies for the formatting errors with the pictures; the blogging wizard keeps putting breaks/paragraphs where I don't want them, even when I remove them in the HTML editor...]

Vampire Prince In The Lost Garden

Or at least that's how I was imagining myself in these photographs. In reality I'm neither a prince nor a vampire, and this is actually that meadow close to my current apartment that I love posing in because it's such a pretty meadow (and I am such a vain Goth!). 

I will be moving soon (very soon) and will no longer have this lovely meadow to pose in so near by, but I am sure I will find somewhere equally pretty in my new location. All the photographs are by my partner Raven. The meadow is especially pretty now it is summer and the grass is long and the flowers in bloom. I specified this part of the meadow because of how much I like the shrubbery there.

Photograph by Raven

It was a day bordering on dreich; cloudy, overcast and dull, but not quite as damp and drizzly as a truly dreich day. The skies were grey and leaden and I like how Raven capitalised on that dreariness when it comes to both the photographs and the editing. I am really grateful to Raven for his photographs. 

Photograph by Raven

I am especially happy with my make-up this day. I did deep purplish red lipstick fading out concealer close to my skin tone for an effect I have seen done beautifully both on humans and on well-painted art dolls. I think I could have done even better had I made my lips dewy with some gloss, but as it stands, it still seems quite successful to me. I think I was a tad heavy-handed with blusher and contouring, but I am still new to it. The eye-shadow was in shimmery pinks - a completely alien concept to me - and I was aiming for a look that was somewhere between natural and a bit fey. 

Photograph by Raven

I really enjoy dressing in Ouji and Aristocrat fashion - with a Gothic take on such things, of course! Most of this outfit was second-hand; the trousers are from Primark originally, and I bought them in a charity shop for £2, the pirate boots were bought secondhand on eBay, the waistcoat is vintage Marks & Spencer and I bought it secondhand on eBay, the blouse is from ZanZea and was a Christmas/Solstice present from Raven - as was the cane (which comes in useful, what with my coordination disorder), and the only things I bought new were the necklace and the gloves, both from Claire's and the Jabot. The jabot I bought earlier this year, and I know I ordered it online, but I've actually forgotten where. I have a feeling it's handmade and either from Etsy or Ebay. 

Autumn Road-Trip 2: Dulsie Bridge

While we were driving between locations, we took a detour to visit the Dulsie Bridge, as suggested by Suzy_Bugs. I really don't know much about its history. We parked up at a view point above it, and went for a stroll around the gorge-top path, and then to a little field with a fallen tree and some rather fabulous and almost fantastical mushrooms that the others took good photographs of, but which I took rather dire photographs of, so none of them are shown here. 

Dulsie Bridge. Photograph by Housecat

I think it's a very fantastical-looking location, something that could have been out of The Hobbit, or Lord Of The Rings, or maybe Game of Thrones (but the river would have to run red with blood for that set of books...). It is old, and it has been converted into a modern road bridge, but there is something both about the old stone bridge, and the deep gorge (which bears the marks of flooding quite a long way up the stone sides; I presume it runs VERY high with melt-water and rain in Spring!) with trees either side made me feel like I wasn't quite in the regular world, like I had either stepped back in time, or stepped sideways into a different world altogether, one more magical.

One of my favourite thing about old structures is how between a tendency towards materials such as local stone, and the blending actions of time, they seem to just fit naturally into the landscape. Part way through our visit, it began to rain again, and the skies grew grey with cloud. It wasn't the best conditions for photography, especially for someone who is inexperienced and unskilled like myself. I got a bit higher up the gorge, and tried to photograph along the river, but I was photographing through the trees beside me and I'm not sure how well that endeavour turned out. 

Dulsie Bridge, photograph by Housecat

Overlooking the gorge is the selections of large stones shown below - I do not know if they are a natural outcrop or the remains of a stone chambered tomb or cairn that has collapsed. Either way, they looked quite remarkable, and I had fun trying to deliberately give them fantastically vibrant colours, as if they were something from an illustrated fairytale. I'm not sure if it's really very successful; being colourful is not exactly my forte! 

Stones, photograph by HouseCat

I tried my best, and I think only the first photograph really worked. It's nice to have at least some mementos of visiting. If anyone knows more about the history of bridge, and why it is well known - other than it being rather picturesque - please feel free to inform me! More photographs from my road-trip will go up over the next few days. I visited quite a few places indeed, and I feel each one needs it's own blog post because a single post would be very long indeed - the same as when I visited Edinburgh or when I went to Rait Castle, Barevan Churchyard, etc. 

Inverness Botanic Gardens & Floral Hall

❀❁✽❀Floral Fun & Afternoon Tea❀✽❁❀

Raven, K., M., and I all met up at Inverness Botanic Gardens (which you can find out more about on their website ::here::). K. and M. are primarily into Lolita fashion, whereas I am a Goth that dabbles in Lolita. I felt like wearing a Goth outfit with Lolita influences rather than a proper Gothic Lolita outfit as it was not a proper Lolita meet-up, just a gathering of frilly friends. 

Raven and I had been to the Botanic Gardens the previous week, and Raven wanted to go back to take photographs of the flowers. Raven took most of the images here, which is why he is not in many of them. Others were taken by M. All photographs are credited in their captions.

K. took this photograph...
 of Raven taking the next photograph of K taking this photograph..

As you can see in this image, I am wearing the silver wig again! This is the wig that was cut by a stranger the last time I wore it out, and since then it was retired awaiting repairs. I sewed some wefts of replacement hair in, but the texture of the new wefts was much shinier and more synthetic, so I stopped at the bare minimum to avoid the wig cap showing. I am going to buy some better quality synthetic hair to continue the replacements. In order to hide parts where the wig cap is showing - partly because the wig has thinned with time as hairs have shed, and partly because a thick lock of hair was cut off - there are quite a few hair flowers attached to the back of the wig. I felt that the flowers went with the botanic theme quite well, so were a good way of disguising that. 

K. and M. and I kept swapping M's smartphone between us.
Photograph by Raven.  

I have a special fondness for cacti and succulents - I grow LOTS of snake plants (sansevieria trifasciata) which are currently residing with my father as there's just not space for them in my apartment, money trees (crassula ovata, also known as jade trees) and for a while grew a little cactus, the exact kind of which I don't know. I really love the bold, architectural and geometric shapes you get with many cacti and succulents. They're always very interesting to look at. Not all cacti are very spiny or spiky looking - the ones I am posing with in the picture below are actually furry, but if you look carefully, there's spines within the fur, too!

On the path down into the cactus grotto.
Photograph by Raven.

The cactus house at Inverness Botanic Gardens is on two levels, with a sunken area involving a large mirror that gives a "cave" effect, which M. and K. were sitting in front of. Raven did well to keep himself out of the mirror photograph, but did not spot me rather theatrically "sneaking" up on M. and K.! 

M. and K. giggling,  me sneaking up on them.
Photograph by Raven.

Above the cactus grotto is a path that goes to the tropical green house and past the carnivorous plant display - I quite like those, too!Of course, we did not stay indoors, and so we had a wonder around in the outdoor gardens, too. I wish we had spent more time in the tropical green-house, and that I could find the charger for my camera, because I would have loved to have taken pictures of all the beautiful flowers (and fish) in there. 

Black and white and floral.
Photograph by M. Editing by HouseCat.

The botanic gardens stretch quite a way outside - further than I had realised on our first visit. I saw this dark green shrub with huge clusters of lovely white flowers and just knew I had to stand in front of it for a portrait! This photograph was taken by M. but I did the effects and filters on it afterwards. I think the black fabric flowers make an interesting contrast with the real white flowers. 

M. and K. arrive in the magic garden..
Photograph by Raven.

There is a "Jungle Path" intended for children through some Buddleia shrubs that M. and K. decided to go through - as considerably taller than them, and wearing precarious shoes, I decided to stay outside. Raven managed to get a rather good photograph of them that makes it look like they just emerged into a magical world, and M. has such an expression of wonderment on her face in this! I like how K. is standing near pink flowers that match her dress, and M. is standing near Buddleia flowers that closer match her dress! 

Channeling my inner Khaleesi
Photograph by Raven. 

We walked up a rather narrow and rocky path (hard in high-heeled platform Lolita shoes!) to a lovely viewing point, and I tried to pose on one of the rocks. Raven managed to catch this photo of me looking imperious before the illusion of majesty was ruined by my wobbling, flailing, and needing Raven's assistance to get down off the rock. 

K. under an umbrella, looking out over the meadows.
Photograph and editing by HouseCat, using M.s smartphone.

Unfortunately it rained quite early on in our walk around the gardens, so we sheltered under a tree where there was a bench, on the little mound overlooking the wildlife meadow and apple trees. K. and M. had an umbrella to share between them, so went to explore the meadow - as yet I haven't been that far, so I certainly need to go back!

At around 16:15, we went for afternoon tea - K. and I shared a halved slice of chocolate cake because there was only the one slice left, but it was HUGE, so I just cut it in half. The Floral Hall tea room has beautiful vintage tea-cups and saucers, and mis-matched plates for cake slices, and a selection of teas. There's also old decorative tea-tins on display, and lovely tea-themed decorations on the walls. The cake was rather tasty, too! Afterwards we went for a quiet walk around Tomnahurich Cemetery, which is near by, but we did not take photographs there, as we were being far more reflective. 

All in all, it was a lovely afternoon out with friends, and I thoroughly recommend the Botanic Gardens as an attraction to visit, especially as entry to the gardens is free!

Cawdor Castle

To Cawdor Castle, of Shakespearian fame as Macbeth is Thane of Cawdor! The setting of all that death, madness and scheming!

Looking up the drive way to the front of Cawdor

Well, only in literary fiction as the real Cawdor castle was built about 400 years after the real Macbeth was born... Of course, Shakespeare is allowed to apply as much poetic license as he likes, and I liked imagining the cast of characters wandering about the place as I visited. 

I was feeling particularly stressed, frazzled by a long day with more human interaction (and more stressful human interaction) than I could really handle, and Raven, realising that I was close to bursting into tears and having a mini-meltdown, decided that it would be a good idea to take me out somewhere quiet. So we went for a drive out to the countryside around Nairn, which took us past Cawdor. Turning up the drive to Cawdor Castle was complete impulse. 

The Castle from behind.

We didn't actually go to the castle to visit the building (out of character, I am aware, but it was reasonably busy with tourists) but to take in some fresh air in the beautiful forest behind the castle.  It has a number of winding paths, a small river/large stream, ponds, pools, and a few bridges (built by the Army) and a lot of old and beautiful trees. I felt hugely better after both getting far away from the madding crowd and in having a nice stroll with my other half. 

A skyline to inspire fairytale and fantasy

It was not intended in any way as a photography outing, but I did take a few photos of the castle on my phone, which I am displaying here. The building was started in the 15thC, and built in several stages right up to the 19thC, and is very beautiful; quite the apt setting for a play full of such Medieval intrigue and magic! At some point I will return with a proper camera (the camera on my phone isn't terrible, but would be a lot better if it didn't constantly get mucky from being in my handbag!) and take some more artistic photographs of the castle. 

Cilgerran Castle & Teifi Gorge

I've been on holiday! 

Day 1 of my holiday was in Wales, in the South West of the country. I visited Cilgerran Castle in Pembrokeshire with Raven. Raven, though Irish, lived in Wales for over 20 years and has been teaching me snippets of Welsh vocabulary. 

Afon - River

(Hence the River Avon in Somerset, West England, as 'f' is pronounced like 'v' in Welsh)

Pysgod - Fish

Raven drove in the sunshine across the Welsh countryside along narrow winding roads with spectacular views until we got to this small village above the Teifi Gorge. We went down a particularly steep and narrow lane to a car-park down beside the river where there were some remarkably posh stone-built public toilets with a sheltered display on the outside wall of informative plaques telling of the river's history in both Welsh and English. As it was Easter Sunday afternoon and actually sunny, it was quite busy with families out to enjoy the outdoors.

Path above the River Teifi

Photograph by the Housecat

We strolled along the riverside and up the wooded slope, and rapidly I figured that a long skirt and even low-heeled granny-boots were both a bit impractical as I snagged my skirts on brambles and walked very carefully up the many steps indeed. Raven rather enjoyed photographing every interesting thing he came across, as did I. In the end I took over 100 photographs that afternoon, even if I am only showing a few here on this blog entry - things could get rather slow on the loading time otherwise! We walked past an old slate quarry and up alongside the river. 

Taking notes
Photograph by Raven of Chance Photography

I sat for a bit in this wonderful slate-encircled seating area amongst the trees, which if I go again I will note as a nice picnic spot. In the photograph I am writing in a notebook I bought especially for this holiday, to take notes for both my diary and my blog. 

The Sally Gate
Photograph by the Housecat

We walked beneath the castle for a bit, looking up at the towers and in through the 'Sally Gate' as I heard someone call it. I over-heard a father tell his son that it was not named after a woman called Sally but thus called because one sallies through it! I took several photos of the gate, but I liked these two detailed photos most of all. 

A closer detail of the gate.
Photograph by the Housecat

At this point I could hear distant strains of music on the wind. I couldn't make out quite what it was that was playing (I presume it was a radio or other recorded music) but it sounded like a woman singing in Welsh. It seemed quite beautiful and a bit magical to hear just these snatches of wonderful singing. Anyway, around this point I dropped the pen I had borrowed off Raven, so I didn't take many notes for a while! 

Castell - Castle

Tŵr - Tower

(These two are quite similar in both languages)

We then walked a bit further along and down to the river at a different point. Raven skimmed stones and I walked on the shallow shores where the water was an inch at most above the water and had a go at skimming stones too, but I am quite useless at this! 

Raven at the River Teifi
Photograph by the Housecat

I was wearing a scarf about my hair because even though it was sunny, it was a bit breezy and my hair kept blowing into my eyes. At least you get to see the skull scarf I was wearing, which is a cheap one from Primark, but does have a nice lace-like skull pattern on it. 

Looking out across the Teifi
Photograph by Raven of Chance Photography

After a brief hunt for the lost pen, we walked up to the castle and entered it properly. The castle is pay-to-enter and owned by the National Trust. Raven paid for my entry and I used my entry money to buy my little niece a children's book called 'The Little Dragon' and deep plum-coloured quill to carry on my note-taking with. 

Tower and cloudy sky
Photograph by the Housecat

There has been a castle on the site since around 1100CE, but the castle in its present form was built between the 13th and 14thC, with a lot done in 1223 by William Marshal Jr. (See, reading those plaques in the Castle grounds is educational!).

Walkways within the castle
Photograph by the Housecat

One of the wonderful things about visiting the castle is that you can walk inside the buildings as it is reasonably well preserved for a ruin, and as bridges have been built between the remaining stairwells. Raven took a photograph of me from above - he on a walkway, I in the base of the tower.

The Housecat with camera
Photograph by Raven

All the roofs are gone, as is often the case with ancient buildings as the timber rots once the slates or tiles fall or are salvaged (I would imagine slates at this castle, as there is so much of the stuff locally) but the stone, if built well, seems to withstand the centuries so much better. I took the photo below looking upwards in one of the towers. 

Into the light!
Photograph by the Housecat

One of my favourite things about looking at ruins is it gives such a glimpse into how the building was built. The rows of holes in the wall of this tower are where huge wooden beams would have once kept the floors up, for example. The whole castle is built of quite small (relatively) and flat blocks of slate - the local stone - and it is interesting to see something other than roof tiles as an architectural use of slate. I also like seeing the 'fans' of slate above the windows - you see that done nowadays still! Slate is quite an interesting material, with a good variety of uses. 

Anyway, I hope the castle photographs are pleasing, as there is another castle post on its way tomorrow. 

Trip To Dundreggan With Trees for Life

I will unashamedly say that I think Scotland is Paradise. If it wasn't for the lack of mead and boar, I'd say this was the afterlife and that I'm already dead :P 

Today I went to the Dundreggan Estate (::read more here::) to help with the efforts of replanting the Caledonian forest. I left Inverness train-station at 09:00 this morning, so I was up fairly early in order to get ready and to the city for that. The journey to Dundreggan was certainly scenic. I saw deer. It was a silvery landscape; everything was covered in glittering crystals of hoar-frost. Mist from the sea, the lochs and the rivers hung trapped between the mountains. Things are beginning to look distinctly wintery, but the snows haven't come this far down yet; the peaks shine white, but the slopes and the valleys are still autumnal.

River Moriston

Dundreggan Lodge was at the end of a lovely drive, shrouded in mist. Things were less wintery, more autumnal - the trees have golden leaves, which have begun to fall, and the grass, while frosty, was definitely not snowy. At the lodge we went indoors for a cup of tea, and a discussion of the plan of action. The discussion turned to life in bothies, being snowed in, and living in winter without running water and being cut off from modern life - I recalled fond memories of Raven's parent's farm in Wales, during deepest winter. I met a Buddhist lady, talked about life, and eyed up the Lodge's piano (but didn't touch!). 

Misty Avenue

We then went to the tree nursery, where I observed young saplings being tended, before heading off to the carpark to get organised. I borrowed some waterproof trousers, and hopped into a minibus that took us further up the mountain. Our trip was, for reasons I don't yet know, being filmed. As I got into the minibus after a group had already been filmed getting into it, I had to get out of the minibus, stand out of camera shot, and wait while the minibus was filmed arriving and everyone getting out was filmed, and then the minibus was filmed arriving again, and everyone getting out was filmed... again. 

We then hiked our way to the exclosure (it's an inclosure if it keeps animals in, this fence was built to keep deer out of where the young saplings were growing, so it is an exclosure), through some very, very lovely countryside. I really, really wish my photographs from my walk by the river, through the trees and up to the exclosure had turned out reasonably well, but sadly they were mostly blurry or badly taken. Instead, have a photograph of some melting hoar-frost. 

Glittery, glittery, glittery.

The exclosure is out on the heather, on some very open and wind-swept slopes.  The view was spectacular, but it isn't a place of many colours, only leaden sky and bronze slopes. 

Trees for Life have so far planted over a million trees - the millionth was planted in May of this year - and today I planted 96 more. Our target for the day was 1,000 trees, and we may well have exceeded it. Our saplings were as 'plug-plants', and all we had to do was dig a hole, put in a sapling, fill in around it, and tap it down - hard to do when the ground is frozen and there are crystals of needle ice growing OUT of it! (Although, when the needle ice formed, the ground had not yet frozen.) I also spent an awful lot of time talking with a chap who turned out to be a fellow LARP enthusiast, gamer, guitar player and person with an interest in swords, knives and weaponry (and who once fenced sabre) - it's amazing the places you meet like-minded folk.

Trying to put up a fence,
Dec '11. Photo by M. Drury

It rained, then sleeted, and I got very wet, and my waterproof trousers proved not to be very water-proof, for water and mud seeped through and my legs got soaked, and then chilled by the cold, cold wind. Tree planting with Trees for Life is certainly a rewarding task, but generally involves mountainous hikes and inclement weather, followed by hard work, so is something for adventurous and outdoorsy types. As well as the day trips like the ones I attend, they also run conservation weeks, with accommodation, for those who would rather do something useful when they take time out of their regular lives. I've been volunteering with Trees for Life since last autumn/winter, and while my trips are always an adventure, and every time I go out I go "I'm never getting that cold and wet EVER again!" and then every time I get the chance to go again, I'm rushing to sign myself up.

✥⚜✥

I would like to clarify to readers that despite certain rumours, I am not a Pictsie, am very much alive, and am decidedly Franglais. 

Sunshine, Summer And The Outdoors

❀ I got a bit distracted... ❀

I was supposed to be taking pictures in the cemetery on Friday; I took the bus to the city, arranged to meet up outside the gates with my friend Suzy, got there and found it was locked up. This was not that late in the afternoon, and I'd been looking forwards to getting some nice pictures of the run-down mausoleum at the back (which I have featured before on this blog) with the nice Canon camera (rather than my point-and-shoot Ricoh). I was not hugely amused. I went to the graveyard in Church St. instead but my heart wasn't in it and I didn't take any good photos. In the end Suzy and I took the bus and went to my place.

It was far too warm to stay indoors, so I went to go play in the meadow outside my apartment building. Suzy likes the meadow as it is always full of various creepy crawlies and wildflowers. Suzy is a wildlife photographer focusing  (pardon the pun) mainly on bugs and has blog ::Up Close and Personal:: and Flickr stream: ::Suzy Bugs::. I like the meadow because it is a nice green open space where I get a stunning view down across the valley and to the mountains. Suzy took some pictures of me mucking around in the meadow. I took the picture of the clouds and the meadow and suchlike. It was actually really sunny all afternoon - a rarity in grey and rainy Scotland! 

This is the meadow by my flat, and the little wood with the burn.
This really was taken in Scotland, I don't live in Canada or somewhere.

I much prefer being outdoors to being indoors; being outdoors instantly lifts my mood. Sometimes I just sit in the meadow with a recorder or a flute and practice, or read a book, or sketch, or take photographs, other times I have no creative secondary purpose; the outdoors fulfils enough. The meadow isn't particularly large, but it is large enough to be enjoyable. I think it was too awkward a space with too much of a slope to be developed, especially as there is the rather steep slope down to the trees and the burn. (A burn, for those who do not know Scots terms, is a large stream to small river.)

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❝The poetry of the earth is never dead.❞

~John Keats

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A lot of my poetry (which is terrible and never being aired on the internet) is inspired by nature, as are a lot of my musical compositions (also terrible and never being aired on the internet) and my art (less terrible and frequently aired on the internet) is inspired by nature, and I live in such a beautiful place that I cannot ignore it. I feel really privileged to live in such a beautiful place. 

Enjoying my natural habitat. Photograph by ::Suzy::.

I mentioned that Suzy took some pictures of me. I guess these pictures are fairly representative of my summer style; somewhere between Romantic Goth and Trad-Goth, with a lot of lace in order to keep cool. As the odd spot on my face will attest, that pallor is not foundation; I am naturally really pale. In summer I tend to slather on the the sun-cream and leave off the foundation as it just gets greasy and horrid when I get hot. I was, however, wearing eye-makeup and lipstick (as is fairly obvious). As is again fairly obvious, this isn't my real hair (that's a sort of plum colour at the moment) but one of Raven's wigs.

Sunsets are pretty, and distracting. Very distracting.
Photograph by ::Suzy::. Thankyou!!

Anyway, this is not supposed to be an outfit post! This is about my love for the outdoors! And I do love it, regardless of weather. Recently the weather has been a mix of sunshine and showers, and yesterday evening it decided to rain rather heavily. I was out in a forest a short (well, short by my standards) walk away, scrambling down a ravine to get a good look at the waterfall where the burn (a different one, my area has several) went down some steep rocks, and also to scramble back across because there happened to be a good fording point at the bottom of this ravine. I got rather muddy indeed, and wet when I stepped in the burn instead of on a rock, and I didn't care that I was wet, cold and muddy because I was happy. It was a couple of hours in the outdoors, away from the human race, in the fresh air, burning off some extra energy. 

I love my little skull earrings. Photo by ::Suzy::.

I do conservation work with groups like Trees For Life and BTCV, and last autumn spent a lot of time helping at the nature reserve. In my own time I like going out for hikes (for which my attire is a lot more practical than it was on Friday!) and tend to get distracted by any rocks present. I used to live in Oxfordshire, which is not known for rocks and boulders and things to clamber on. I now live in the Scottish Highlands, known for being well, mountainous as the term "Highlands" indicates, and am a very happy outdoorsy lady.