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Above, view from McCaig's tower.
Day trip to Oban on Wednesday, 8th
April, 2015
I’m having a bit of a computer day today.
The plan is to download all my recent photos from the memory card to the
computer, maybe do a bit of editing on some of them, write and post a blog
about my recent trip to Oban and then….. Hopefully, post a garden blog. Plus
the obligatory peep into FB to see what’s happening over there.
The Oban trip was the first long day out of
the year. It was a fairly early start; we left the bus station at 8am and
arrived in Oban 12.10.
above, from the window of the bus.
It was a long but worthwhile drive through
some of Scotlands’
most spectacular scenery. We travelled from the east coast to the west coast passing
rivers, lochs, mountain ranges and a whole heap of towns and villages along the
way. We made a few local stops to pick up more passengers and then headed west
along the coast to Dundee where the river Tay empties its loads into the North Sea. The river Tay is the longest river in Scotland and deposits a greater volume of water
into the sea than any other river in the whole of the UK. From Dundee
we continued west to Perth where we crossed the
Tay on the Perth Bridge (also known locally as Smeaton's
Bridge). We drove through Perth
and headed out toward Crief. Some people got off the bus here and were picked
up later on the way back. Crief is a lovely little town that I’ve only visited
once a long time ago, maybe one day I too will get this bus as far as Crief and
spend the day there. After Crief the
landscape becomes more mountainous and wild looking. We pass St Fillians,
traveling along the northern edge of loch Earn and then passing right through
the top end of the Trossachs
National park.
As we
drove through Cranlarich Ben More was to the south of us. Then we began driving
along the Northern edge of Lock Awe looking north toward Ben Cruachain and past falls of Cruachan. We had breathtaking views of the Grampiam Mountains to the north and the Trossachs
to the south. The journey was so frustrating at times, here were all the views
and scenary I could ever want and I was trapped on a bus unable to get out and take
photographs. I took quite a lot of photos from the bus but a combination of
movement from the bus and strong overhead sunlight reflecting every where
rendered most of them useless. These few
photos are all I have of that wonderful journey. We arrived in Oban on time and
parked at the little harbour. From there we could look out over the sea and see
the Isle of Mull to the west of us. The
return bus left Oban at 3.30 which only gave us 3 hrs and 20 minutes but we
figured that was enough time to do what we had to do. We did the same bus trip
last year and explored the town and harbour, this time we wanted to achieve two
things. First we wanted to make enquiries about times, cost, frequency etc of the
boat trips out to the seal colony in preparation for our next visit, and
secondly, our main task of the day, was to climb to the top of McCaigs Tower and
take in the views.
above, from the window of the bus
There are 144 steps from the town up to the
top of the hill, and I felt the effect of every single one. These steep steps
are called Jacobs ladder, even the name has a sense of foreboding about it.
From inside the tower.
McCaig's Tower is a prominent ‘tower’ at
the top of what is called ‘Battery Hill’ in Oban. It overlooks the town of Oban, the harbour, and
the Isle of Mull which lies just offshore. It offers the best views available
of the many ferries and ships coming and going from the busy little harbour.
From inside the tower.
It
is built of Bonawe granite which came from the quarries across Airds Bay,
on Loch Etive. McCaigs tower has a circumference of about 200 metres with
two-tiers of 94 lancet arches (44 on the bottom and 50 on top) there is also a
single small open arch right at the bottom in an area where the land dips away
and the tower had to be extended downwards.
The entrance to the tower.
The structure was commissioned, at a cost of
£5,000 (which would be anything up to 10, 000 in todays economy) by an ultra wealthy, philanthropic banker,
John Stuart McCaig. Oh that bankers were still of the generous philanthropic
variety.
Spring flowers just outside the tower.
John Stuart McCaig was his own architect. The
tower was erected between 1897 and his death, aged 78 in 1902. McCaig's
intention was to provide a lasting monument to his family, AND ( and I think
more importantly) to provide work for
the local stonemasons during the winter months. Like I said, oh for a banker of that variety these days.
View from the tower.
McCaig
was an admirer of Roman and Greek architecture and had planned for an elaborate
structure based on the Colosseum in Rome.
He planned to build a museum and art gallery in a central tower inside the
present external structure.
View from the tower.
If he had
lived long enough to see his plans through to completion, there would be what
we have now, the circular external structure, plus an internal tower housing a
gallery, a museum and many statues of himself and his family. Sadly his death
brought an end to construction with only the outer walls complete.
view from the tower.
The climb to
the top was adventurous for me to say the least, but so very glad I persevered
and made it to the top. We had a good look around, took loads of photos,
marvelled at the views and fully appreciated the unique opportunity this
position offered to see ships manovering in and out of the small harbour area.
Fortunately the weather was great that day and we enjoyed our picnic sitting on
top of that hill.
Above, this is the little boat that will take us to the seal colony next time.
And then it was time to think about our
descent. We took the road back down. It was a narrow winding road with steep
incline and sharp curves and bends. Half way down we began to notice these brightly
coloured knitted covers made by hand and obviously sewn into place while
insitu.
We met an elderly gent climbing the hill with apparent ease
who viewed them with amusement and told us they just started ‘appearing’ about
a year ago and no one knew where they came from. We took photos and continued
on our way downhill.
Then came across an artists workshop/
studio. She had a notice outside which invited you
to go in and take a look which we did. Now I have to say much as I admired her
work, and I did, she lived up to he name.
She was indeed a little ‘strange’.
She
had a tiny but interesting workshop/ studio. I loved her unusual quirky work
and the fantastic mosaics all over her hillside garden, (she said they were
influenced by the famous mosaics in the Park Guell by Guadi at the Barcelona park) but, she
was odd!!.
above, banner on the side of her studio wall.
We felt as if we were intruding and she didn’t really want visitors
and so we left her to her work, quickly.
above, her mosaics, all very reminiscent of Gaudi
We reached the bottom of the hill with just
enough time for a quick refreshment stop and then headed back to the bus. And
on the way back, we checked through our photographs, admired the view and
planned our next trip to Oban and the boat trip to the seal colony.
