Compo

The Cape Wrath peninsula viewed from the Faraid Head peninsula:

I love rummaging around old graveyards. I remember the old Priory church graveyard across the way from the White Hart, Lenton. There were some really good slate stones with interesting inscriptions about the Crimean war and other mid-Victorian episodes. Here are a few photos of old stones taken in Durness, Sutherland last week: 1623: Memento Mori: 1619AD. Can anyone decode this stone's message, please? Finally, the chapel - who would not want to be buried in such surroundings?!

From "bithdayscan.com": 1st November 1950., your age is Sixty-Seven years and Two Hundred and Seventy-Nine days. 24751 days passed since day of Your birth (or 3535.9 weeks). But you are not alone with this! In world 309000 babies was born on that day. You were born on Wednesday , and your zodiac sign is Scorpio. You haven't had birthday in this year yet., next birthday will be in 86 days. Your previous birthday was 279 days ago. The "big bum" was on ≈8th February 1950. (if you were born on time), but for details, ask your parents, they may have some interesting stor

So, are you well again? How are you these days?

Anyone have any Elly Griffiths books to sell?

Just seen some photos on a faceache site depicting RAF Newton in a very sorry state. I was at Newton in 1970 and 1971 when it was 9S 0f TT and lived in one of the married quarters for a time. It was saddening to see the dereliction of this once thriving old camp. Does anyone have any recent photos of RAF Newton to share on here, please?

We had planned to stop and take a photo of Ben More Assynt from Elphin in which case I could have helped but we had just overtaken a lorry bound for Wick and so would have been stuck behind it for a further 25 miles had we stopped.

A swarm of something that has flown over from North Africa in the current southerly windstream, perhaps?

This year I am growing some spuds in heavy duty black bin liner type bags. As I was watering them the other day a cloud of angry wasps suddenly appeared - the little beggars have built a nest inside one of the tater bags! Good job they are not early spuds; at least they will be gone by the time I need to empty the bag.

Riding my motorbike over Clifton Bridge in the mid-70s a wasp managed to get down the back of my neck - Bogger stung me several times before I managed to stop the bike...mind you I was travelling at 60mph at the time

The loch is quite low at present PP; the bogs that surround it are unusually quite dry.

Thanks for the compliments, gang!

A couple more shots from Ben an Eoin and Sgor Tuath: Sgor Tuath west top from the flank of Ben an Eoin. This was an interestign scramble: The only people spotted last Thursday during an 8hr walk. These people were on The Fiddler, a mountain across the glen. Taken witih a telephoto lens: The Fiddler from Ben an Eoin. Same mountain as previous photo: How many of these stones would you need to build Hadrian's drystone wall, I wonder? That's my rucksack and extended walking poles on the side of the stone....

Just finished Zig-Zag Girl by Elly Griffiths. A whodunnit set just afterWWII. The novel is built around a wartime group of "Magic men" who were a team of military deceptionists working from Inverness. After the war the members are being killed in ways relating to their deception tricks - so who is doing the killing and why? Enjoyed the book which took me less than 48hours to read. Now it's back to my Anthology of Railways - a book full of factual snippets of information and anecdotes from almost 200yrs of railways in Britain.

Here's another snifter for you....A triad of hills in Assynt, as seen from the summit of Sgor Tuath: Right to left 1. Cul Beag; 2. Cul Mor; 3. Suilven.

Thanks Siddha. There will be more to come - I still have to get them out of the camera and uploaded to the internet. Found this John Ruskin quote and thought you might like it - have to say that I agree with it: "Summer is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces up, snow is exhilarating; there is no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather." I tis especially true in places like the far north.

Another walk in the Coigach mountains, Assynt, noth west Scotland. When uploaded, I will post a few photos of my walk yesterday 26th July 2018 in what turned out to be the hottest day in the area since records began - still 28°C at 5.30pm....too hot for mountain walking, thus a four hour walk took me over eight hours to complete! Most of the mountain streams had dried up but luckily I found two from which I could replenish my water bottle. This one is a shot of "The Sentinel" (Lower left of photo). It is in a high gully on the north face of Sgor Tuath [note the road beyond the loch]. The sma

My oil fired boiler is now 23yrs old, maintained by myself and still working perfectly. I get phone calls from the eco nutters saying buy a new boiler but why the heck should I when the one I have works so well?! I can buy spares for the burner for a mere fraction of the cost of a new boiler and the boiler plates/flues clean easily enough.

Exactly what I did, LL.

One rarely sees cookers being refurbished these days. Most are tipped and replaced with new ones. I was pricing up a new range cooker and comparing the price to the possiblility of refurbishing our own. In the end I opted for a refurb and although it took me a couple of weeks (I am retired so no cost there), I managed a refurb for just under £200 as opposed to a new cooker at £2,300. Part of the front panel before: After: Mummified mouse found inside the front panel: The finished product:

An elderly lady in Wick was taken for all her savings and her disabled son's too. Despite both police and social work trying to convince her that she was being scammed by someone telling her that she had won half a million but had to send money to them to release the funds, etc., she continued sending the cash until there was nothing left. I get very angry at these scumbags and believe that current punishment is nowhere near severe enough for those caught.

'ere's summat as yer don't see anymore....A nice Meccano set:

My dad was a big fan of Fiery Fred. He was born and brought up in Sheffield. After returning from WWII lived the remainder of his life in Nottingham. Anyone remember Brian Close? Always stood so close to the bat when fielding that he frequently became a casualty.

Not sure which photo you mean, PP. this one is a view looking south west from Loch Broom into the Minches and the islands are the Summer Isles: This one is looking into Loch Broom froom the same viewpoint. You can see two small pointy promontories towards the centre of the photo. The lower is Ardmair Point and the upper is Ullapool: