Todays archive post is of a shot that had lain forgotten on my hard drive until today.  This lone, dead tree has been photographed many, many times before.  If you catch it in the right light the results can be very pleasing.

Todays post was taken a couple of days ago.  Due to the weather being nice for a change we had a trip up north.  This picture is of Butterbridge, part of an old military road in Glen Kinglas.  This  road was built by English Redcoats not long after the Jacobite rebellion of 1745 and was part of the route from Dumbarton to Inverary.  This bridge across the Kinglas Water was completed around the same time.  Every summer, cattle and goats were brought here to graze on high summer pasture or ‘airigh’.  While most of the men remained below on the crofts, women and children spent their time herding the cattle and making butter and cheese.  They stayed on the sheiling in small groups of stone huts.  The tradition died out in the late 18th century but it is remembered in names such as Beinn Ime (gaelic for ‘butter mountain’), which towers over the Glen, and in Butterbridge itself.

This shot was an ideal opportunity to use my new HiTech 10 stop ND filter.  This filter has loads of problems with casts and flare and results can be a bit hit and miss.  When it does work,  the images can be great with blurred water and moving clouds in the sky.  This view is of the bridge itself with Beinn Ime behind.

This next shot is taken from the other side of the water.  I decided to convert this one to mono to really emphasise the cloud formation and the silky water.

Todays archive post is a bit special for me.  It was taken a couple of years ago on my 40th birthday.  This is the old pier at Loch Long, not far from Arrochar. We had been away out for the day and were starting to head back home when I saw the shaft of light hit the pier.  I stopped the car in a layby and ran about 100 yards along the road and climbed down a wall to get lochside.  I just managed to get a couple of shots off before the sunlight disappeared as quickly as it had arrived.

Todays image is of Castle Stalker, near Oban.

Castle Stalker (Scottish Gaelic: Caisteal an Stalcaire) is a four story tower house or keep picturesquely set on a tidal islet on Loch Laich, an inlet off Loch Linnhe. It is located about 1.5 miles (2.5 km) north east of Port Appin, Argyll, Scotland and visible from the A828 main road about mid-way between Oban and Glen Coe. The islet is accessible (with difficulty) from the shore at low tide. The name ‘Stalker’ comes from the Gaelic Stalcaire, meaning ‘hunter’ or ‘falconer’, and should therefore be pronounced ’stal-ker’, with the ‘l’ sounded, not as in the pronunciation of the English word ’stalker’. In recent times the castle was brought to fame by the Monty Python team, appearing in their film Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It also appeared in the films Highlander and Highlander: Endgame. The Castle’s implausibly picturesque appearance, with its bewitching island setting against a dramatic backdrop of mountains, has made it a favourite subject for postcards and calendars, and something of a cliché image of Scottish Highland scenery. It should be noted, however, that Stalker is entirely authentic; it is one of the best-preserved medieval tower-houses surviving in western Scotland.