February 25, 2018

Coasting the East

A collection of pictures I took while touring the Scottish east coast.

In contrast to the west's shores lined with rugged mountains, the east Scottish seafront merges with relatively flat agricultural land. Still, it has plenty of exciting spots to explore. Here are a few that I saw so far, going from the north to the south.

Here are the covered places. The post includes links to more photos of some of the locations if you are interested.

Aberdeen (1), Scotland's third-largest city.

It is likely the greyest city I've ever seen. They used a grey stone for every construction in the past; which earned Aberdeen the "Granite City" nickname. But the new structures follow the trend, as most are either made of bare concrete or painted with faded colours.

Hues fitting the black and white theme are everywhere: the most common colours of cars at the time of my visit were silver, followed by black, white, and grey. Add loads of offshore drilling related industrial and the Scottish sky..

...and it is like entering a heavily colour-graded movie. A surreal experience.

About 16 miles south is Stonehaven (2), a town with the best ice cream I had in Scotland.

Just below is Dunnottar with one of the most remarkable castles I have seen in Scotland.

There are also neat cliffs...

...that follow the shore all the way to Arbroath (3)...

..and offer plenty of scenic spots to explore.

Arbroath itself is notable for its cathedral ruins from the 12th century...

..and a very pretty fishing harbor.

Following the course gets us on a few pretty sandy beaches.

It might not be a selling point for many, but sea-swimming in Scotland is cool! (pun or not).

Behind them is the Firth of Tay (4):

On its north bank is Dundee, a city where I'm currently based.

On the south bank is the Tayport's lighthouse and the Tensmuir Forest (5):

The forest then ends at another nice beach.

Further south is St Andrews (6), another town with impressive cathedral ruins..

And also a castle.

Then there's Kircaldy (7)


Keeping south, we reach the Firth of Forth (8), notable for the bridges spanning across. Each from a different century, each an engineering marvel. Pictured is freshly finished Queensferry Crossing.


But when you don't cross it and follow the water instead, you'll get to the Falkirk area (9), a place with the highest heavy-industrial concentration in Scotland. Besides an oil refinery, powerplants and such, they also have some beautiful public areas and a set of water canals coined with a massive set of sculptures: the Kelpies.


One of the canals leads to the famous Falkirk Wheel, the world's first and only lift for boats.

Going back east brings us to Edinburgh (10), the Scottish capital.


If you liked this collection, you might also like my other posts from Scotland. Alternatively, visit my blog archives for more categories and topics. Thanks for visiting!

Published by: Jakub Stepanovic in Collections

 

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