SS2:EB, Isle of Mull

After leaving the Mull of Kintyre, I ventured up to Oban, a seaside resort town that has frequent ferry crossings to the Isle of Mull. As I discussed with a few other people in my travels, Oban is one of my least favorite stops in Scotland. It is to Scotland what Blackpool is to England, or Branson, MO is to the US. It's kitschy and tourist-y and a pain in the ass to navigate.

Fortunately for me, I spent all of three hours there before hitching my ferry to Mull. Of course, some of my frustration with Oban could have something to do with the fact that I spent a good portion of those three hours looking for any place with internet access so I could email my final paper for my pathogenic microbiology course. I managed to find a small library near the harbour and sent my horrid screed on the minutiae of necrotizing fasciitis etiologies just in time to drive aboard the underbelly of this behemoth:


Eww, my windscreen looks foul. My poor little Hamish took quite the beating in the two weeks I had him. No telling what the cleaning though whe they got him back. (Honestly, it was just the driver's side that was all mucked up, thanks to my hiking boots and the perpetually wet terrain.)

Steaming ahead toward Mull, I went to the upper deck of the ferry to bid farewell to the mainland for the second time in my trip. The skies were overcast, and there was a light drizzle, but the Munros (mountains over 3,000ft) of Argyll could be seen in the distance.



On my first trip to Scotland, I had half-heartedly planned a trip to Mull, mainly to make my way to the holy island of Iona, the birthplace of Christianity in Scotland. I never made it to Iona or Mull my first go round, opting to go to Orkney instead. Once I drove off the ferry, however, I felt a slight tinge of regret for putting off this trip for so long.

Mull is an absolutely striking island with high, rocky cliffs, sandy coastlines dotted with brightly colored villages such as Tobermory, and a wild interior that seems so vast and desolate that it belies the island's relatively small acreage.



Sadly, the dual carriageway that extends from Craignure, the major port of Mull, to my stop in Fionnphort (Finn-uh-fert) only lasts for a few kilometers before turning into single-track roads around the perimeter of the island. As much as I love driving on single-track roads (it's fun, and people are so polite), it gave me very few opportunities to get out of my car and snap photos. Don't get me wrong, I took a couple hundred, but I'm quite selective when it comes to which photos I post on this corner of the blogophere. Can't have people thinking I'm an amateur.



The beach next to the teeny-tiny port at Fionnphort. This is also the view to which I was treated each morning, she says smugly.

On my second day in Mull, after arriving back from tours of Staffa and Iona (still to come), I managed to drive around the island a bit and get some fairly decent shots. In the next two, I loved watching the clouds pour down the mountainsides like a cascade, shrouding the peaks in mist. Regardless of where I go in Scotland, there is invariably something which will make me stop dead in my tracks, inhale sharply, and say, "Whoa." (I know, I'm a regular wordsmith. My poignancy knows no bounds.)



Later that evening, I was heading back to Fionnphort to sample some of the amazing seafood caught fresh off of Mull, racing the sunset.


The Ross of Mull (the large peninsula to the right) and the Sound of Mull as the sun began to set.


The Ross of Mull a few miles closer to Fionnphort.

Fionnphort is on the west of the island, and by the time I arrived to my guest house, the sun was dipping behind the isle of Iona, and the sky was blazing orange and gold. I sat out on one of the rocks on the shore, hugged my jacket tightly around me, and drank in the warm colors of the sky. I'm no poet, but sometimes I wish I were so I could do the scenery adequate justice when describing it to others.

While on Mull, I also had a few run-ins with the wildlife, both domestic and otherwise. It was here that experienced my first true Scottish traffic jam:


It's a good thing sheep are pretty cute, because they are maddeningly stupid animals. They are the pheasants of the ungulate family. And yet, you can't help but want to snuggle the bellies of each supine lamb, soaking in the Caledonian sun. I will have myself a pet sheep, homeowners' association be damned.

Another Scottish ungulate made several appearances in my travels around Mull. One lucky family had a small herd of red deer grazing in their lush pastures. Although red deer are not particularly shy (as compared to roe deer), I was surprised to see them grazing in the wide open. Usually, they are trampling up the sides of fells where we can't see them very well.


Finally, one of my favorite side trips on Mull was the Ardalanish Weaving Mill, a modern weaving mill using 19th-century technology and native Hebridean sheep to produce absolutely stunning handwoven woollens with as little impact on the environment as possible. I stopped in for a fantastic tour and spent waaaay too much money on a beautiful wool blanket. (Actually, it was a perfectly reasonable price, even a tad low, given the quality and the craftsmanship, but the flipping exchange rate screwed me over.) However, it was well worth the investment, as it's a souvenir that will remind of the wonderful time I spent in the Hebrides.

Finally, at the tail end of my tour, the guide offered to let me see some of the other goodies he had out back, namely several orphaned Hebridean lambs.


I used to be a devotee of the white lambs with black faces, but after meeting these guys, I'm sold on the Hebrideans. I may as well be dead, I am practically catatonic as a result of the cute. Baaaaby animals!



Allow me to reenact the phone call I made to my mother later that evening:

"MomMomMom! I got to see some baby lambs and ohmigod I want some can we have some my landlord won't mind I promise he'll love them as much as I do, ohmigodohmigodohmigod" --DEEP BREATH-- "must have a Hebridean sheep you don't understand I got to pet one and they're so soft and I could name it Charlie or Seamus or Duncan or Dougal or something really Scottish, PLEASE?!"

You see this? One little black lamb has the power to turn an otherwise intelligent, articulate, self-sufficient 23-year-old woman into a blethering idiot. Baby animals, it seems, are my one downfall.

That, and smart boys with glasses.

SS2:EB, Mull of Kintyre

Upon leaving Arran, I took the ferry from Lochranza to Claonaig on the Mull of Kintyre. Kintyre is a narrow peninsula that extends from just below Knapdale and terminates in a bulbous tip. (Snerk.)

Okay, those last two words were carefully chosen, not (only) because I have a ribald sense of humor, but because purportedly there is a defunct broadcasting guideline that used the Mull of Kintyre's shape and orientation to determine whether images of a penis could be broadcast on the BBC. Apparently, if the penis in question was displayed at an angle greater than that shown by the peninsula of Kintyre on a map of Scotland, then said image was too graphic for television. According to the BBC, an actor's penis must never appear more than "slightly tumescent." When I first read this golden nugget of trivia in an issue of The Independent, I came perilously close to wetting myself. "Slightly tumescent." That is a phrase that I am going to incorporate into my vernacular posthaste. In fact, I plan on using it somewhere, somehow in my thesis. Below is a map of Kintyre--Mull and all--for you to make your own assessment of the next slightly tumescent penis that crosses your path.



Now that my mother and Nani will never read this blog again, let's move on to the real photos, shall we?

Kintyre, like much of Scotland, has a varied, patchwork geography. The granite beaches that line both coasts give way to lush oakwood forests before turning into hilly moorland in the interior. Driving through Kintyre is a character building experience: when you're not driving on the edge of steep cliffs, you're slowly climbing up a road with a 14% incline, or navigating hairpin turns in the hills. It's a beautiful, if distracting, journey.



The beaches along the motorway aren't sandy, but rather quite rocky. The water is a beautiful turquoise, clear to the bottom, where you can see the kelp swaying with the waves.

I spent most of my time in Kintyre in and around Lochgilphead and the Taynish peninsula. Much of Taynish is now a protected nature reserve, unique among many Scottish nature parks in that it was only lightly managed. Timber was collected only for use by the laird and the land was never clear cut for commercial planting. As a result, the area gives one a clearer idea of what a pristine Scottish landscape looks like.


On my way to Taynish, I had to take a very small, single track country road. En route, I stopped to chat up some of the locals.


This picture just barely captures the majesty of this slice of Scotland. In the five or so miles of trail that I followed, I was rarely under full sun. Instead, the sunlight filtered through the verdant canopy, flickering as the breeze came in from Loch Sween.

When left to my own devices, I tend to dawdle, picking through the undergrowth looking for bugs, flowers, and salamanders, among other things. Some days I get lucky and find a treasure trove of goodies--from bones and teeth to seed pods and nests--others I find one or two footprints. Either way, I leave happy. If only "naturalist" were still a legitimate scientific profession. Sigh.


This trip was a fruitful one. Shortly after setting out, I was collecting a sample of detritus under some moss. While setting my GPS coordinates, I glanced down and saw a flash of blue:


It was springtime, and all the babies were out in force, including the former resident of this egg (belonging to a robin, for those not so well versed in ornithology). Walking among the oaks, I could hear the urgent peeps from a chorus of hungry chicks all around me.


Digging a little further into the underbrush near a boggy plain in the reserve, I stumbled upon one of the 12 amphibian and reptile species native to the UK. (For comparison, Alabama has 156.) This little guy is a young Bufo bufo, or a common toad. I had hoped to find a Natterjack toad (Bufo calamita), but they are exceedingly rare. There are days that I really miss working with herps, wrangling the huge pythons or feeding the wee frogs. But fungi are cool, too.



Speaking of fungi, this is one of my collection sites. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for some good stuff to come out of these samples. These soils should be fertile and full of detritus without all of the bacteria from agriculture. Lots of detritus - bacteria = bumper crop of chytrids

After walking through the preserve, I took a trail to the top of Barr Mor, which is Gaelic for "bald hill". This site has been inhabited for the past 6,000 years. "Bald hill" is a bit of a misnomer. The hill itself is pretty densely wooded for the first 300 ft. or so, with the trees thinning into a bluebell glen for the last 100 ft. of the ascent.


Just the very top of the hill is cleared of trees, offering absolutely stunning views over the peninsula and the surrounding firths and lochs.



After spending part of the afternoon lounging among the bluebells on Barr Mor, lazily thumbing through a book and munching on macadamia nuts, I headed back to my car. On the way out of Taynish, I stumbled upon some of the most charming residents of Scotland: the heilan' coo'.


Is he not cute to the point of absurdity?! Lucky for me, a wee fold of these guys was milling about by a fence near the roadway. (Groups of highland cattle are called folds, not herds.) I stopped to take some photos when one started toward me--equally as curious about me as I was about him.



What. a. DOLL. This charming fellow--who surprisingly smelled of a sweet mix of oats and hay--let me scratch him behind the ears for a few minutes, and tousle the soft, thick locks on his darling bovine forehead. I sent these pictures to my sister later that afternoon, and she went absolutely batty. She vowed to pet one when she got to Scotland (an adventure yet to be posted, but in the queue), a quest that would take the whole of our time in Alba to achieve.

SS2:EB, Isle of Arran

I've been safely back in the States for nearly a week now, and it's been hard to find the motivation to continue posting. I'm having the same struggle with leaving that accompanied my first return from Scotland. Damn, I miss that country.

On this second trip, I managed to explore more of the islands than I did two years ago. One of my stops this go round was the Isle of Arran, a short ferry ride from the small beachside town of Ardrossan. The island has a whopping population of ~5,000, with small villages dotting the coastline. Most of the interior is uninhabited, largely due to the hilly terrain. On my first day in Arran, I set off from my B&B in the village of Blackwaterfoot and headed toward the opposite coast via a country route that bisected the island. On my way, I found some lovely places to go hiking, including this one:


This is representative of how I felt for a good part of the trip. Awww, look at my sad, lonely little car.


One of the burns that cut through the valley that dominates the center of the island.

One evening, I got the urge to go out for a walk along the beach. On my trekking map, I found a site called King's Cave and decided it would make a great place to look for black guillemots, a type of seabird related to the extinct Great Auk.


The trail leading to King's Cave and the beach. I love that you can see the different water currents meeting off the shore.


Heading north along the west coast of Arran, we come to a series of caves flanking King's Cave. These extend back into the rock nearly 100ft and are filled with smooth, rounded stones polished by years of tumbling in the sea.


After exploring the caves, I turned to the south and walked toward this rocky plateau. Along the way, I stopped to collect at the salty, boggy marshes and played in the tide pools.


View from the top of the plateau. The caves are about 3km in the distance.


I was wrapping up my walk at about 8:30 that evening so that I could get back to my guesthouse while there was still some daylight. The sun was slowly making its descent, casting a warm glow upon the beach. I stopped to sit on one of the rocky upheavals and snap photos, like I do.

As much as I was enjoying my trip, I missed my family and friends. I was having all of these incredible experiences, hiking through some of the most beautiful habitats I had ever set eyes upon, and I had no one to share it with. Luckily, later that evening I was adopted by a group of Englishmen at a pub; a group of mountain bikers were holidaying on the island and somehow I got roped into joining them for a few rounds. It was just the sort of awkward socialization I craved.

The next morning, I set out to explore the eastern coast of the island, and happened upon one of my mortal enemies: a mute swan. Now, I couldn't just let this jerkface swan swim around and eat waterweeds in peace. Oh, no. Anyone who knows me knows that I can't make a trip to Scotland without screwing with Her Majesty's massive, ill-tempered waterfowl.


Okay, so I didn't mess with this guy or his girlfriend all that much. In fact, I attempted to share my Nair's oatcakes with them. No dice. Word must have gotten out that I'm not to be trusted.

Finally, a slightly graphic image for the squeamish in the audience. Birds interest me to no end, mostly because they're like tiny, fluffy dinosaurs. One of the most common birds you'll find in Scotland is the common pheasant, which is native to China but was introduced to Europe for hunting. Now, believe me when I say this: pheasants are some of the dumbest birds on the planet. In fact, dumb is a profound understatement. These birds are functionally retarded. They are often found on the side of the road, squashed six ways from Sunday. They are to Scotland what the armadillo is to the Southeastern US. Well, in terms of roadkill anyway.

That's how I stumbled upon this unfortunate sight. Male pheasants usually have a harem of female peahens, but this poor guy seemed to be mourning his girlfriend's recent demise. Aww, bird-love and bird-loss is so heart-rending.


Stupid, stupid birds.

SS2:EB, The Solway Coast

[Apologies in advance: this will be a short entry as I have limited access to the interwebs and I still have a good bit of Scotland to sample.]

When most people think of Scotland, they imagine windswept moors covered in bracken and heather, or gently rolling green hills peppered with bleating sheep and fuzzy orange cows. Sure, Scotland has plenty of both, but it also has stretches of white sand beaches reminiscent of the tropics.

I planned a trip down to the Solway Coast to collect from its estuarine soils, as there are a number of halophilic chytrid species. I chose a wetland/shore bird reserve to collect from, because it had several miles of trails for me to explore. The reserve encompassed a large swath of brackish wetlands that resembled the peat bogs of the central region of the country.



Less than half a mile away, however, the path suddenly changed from high grass to dry, white sand.


I was still within the confines of the nature reserve, but had stumbled upon one of the coastal stretches. Crossing the sand dune, I was met with this:



Holy crap. I've mentioned in a previous entry that I prefer rocky, volcanic beaches to the sandy beaches of the islands, but I think I may have to retract that statement (or qualify it, at the very least). This small bit of coastline, at the end of an unmarked country route, was a wee slice of heaven. The air was thick with salt from the sea, and heavy with the perfume of the flowering gorse bushes that dotted the beach. The wind whipped around, a brisk 11 C (52 F), and the calls of the seabirds surrounded me. It. Was. Awesome.



The tide was out, leaving an enormous portion of the low-lying shelf exposed. I puttered around, looking for limpets, barnacles, and bivalves.


The sea creeping in, capped with foam from breaking waves.


In the few hours I spent walking around this site, I saw one other person, no less than 1km away. I took advantage of having the beach all to myself and took hundreds of photos, only a few of which I've uploaded here. I'm not really a photographer, I just play one on tv.


Easily my favorite image from this visit.


Finally, as I began my hike back to my car, I happened cross this illegally parked log.

(Get it? Because there's an orange boot next to it! You know, like a parking boot? I'm funny, damn it!)

SS2:EB, The Galloway Hills

I eagerly anticipated my time in the Galloway hills, a large, heavily forested region that is a favorite among hikers, mountain bikers, and wildlife enthusiasts. Over the past few months, I've been feverishly recording in my field notebook woodlands and nature reserves in Galloway that might offer a wealth of sampling sites. I'm happy to report that I wasn't disappointed.

A large swath of the Galloway hills are managed by the Forestry Commission in Scotland, meaning fells that were once carpeted in broadleaf trees, ferns, and bracken, are now planted with a mix of timber and native trees. Parts of the region have retained more of their wild, uncultivated charm, and it was these areas that I tried to sample most thoroughly.

The further one drives into the region, the more desolate the terrain becomes. This area reminds me of the Highlands, with its granite crags, heather, and grasses.


In the two weeks I had my car, I logged nearly 1,900 miles, many of which were from tooling around this staggeringly gorgeous area, which covers several hundred square miles of mostly uninhabited wildlands. In my explorations, I happened upon a wild goat park. Naturally, I took a crap-ton of photos.


How could you not love a bleating animal with horns and a beard?! It's like a trash-eating dog with antlers.

Not all of the Galloway hills are this stark. Cutting through one of the forests was a sizable burn, littered with the glacial till that is characteristic of the Scottish landscape.


I inherited a love of water from my mom. I see a river, a pond, or a puddle and I can't stay out of it. Unfortunately, the fifty degree temperatures prevented me from frolicking in the cool, clear waters. Instead, I wandered out to the middle of the stream, sampled algae, and snapped pictures.


Along the banks of the burn were some dense mixed conifer-broadleaf forests. In my experience, these types of habitats make for great collecting, with the range of microhabitats available. The mosses that carpet the forest floor are among some of the best site for chytrid sampling.

Scots pine, oak, and birch dominate these mixed forests, while the understory is covered with ferns, mosses, liverworts and other primitive plants.


A gorgeous, sprawling oak. I have a particular affinity for huge, expansive trees. They remind me of summer days spent crawling in the oak trees in New Orleans' City Park. Whenever we get the chance during my visits home, my sister and I traipse off to City Park to play like monkeys.

As much as I love ginormous trees, I'm also a fan of the smaller inhabitants of the forest. I'm that kid who crawls around the forest floor, digging in the dirt, catching bugs, etc. This trip, I found a great little collection of slime molds standing on a felled tree trunk.

After I finished up goofing off in the woods, I hiked up to a viewing point to take in the valley in its entirety. Two waterfalls flanked either side of the hollow between the fells, and a small burn cuts across the length of the corridor. Despite the clouds, the wind, and the rain, it was absolutely stunning.


Too bad I look like I'm abusing barbiturates. Damn that wonky eye.