Blogs from Angus, Scotland, United Kingdom, Europe - page 4

Sunday 19th July A Benvie family reunion The day has dawned with more misty light rain and it seems like that at least the first part of our driving day will be wet. We are heading today for Montrose on the east coast north of Dundee to stay with my cousin Aileen and husband John.Aileen has arranged a Benvie family reunion giving us an opportunity to meet more of the clan that we haven’t met before. We have planned a bit of a circuitous route across the country to get to Montrose as we haven’t yet been to Scotland’s most famous place names,Loch Lomond. From Ballachulish we took the A82 heading up the Glencoe valley climbing over a spectacular pass.At the top the light rain stopped enabling us to take photos of the grand scenery of ... read more

As I write this, I'm in the air to Tenerife but let's start with last week. We went to Scotland, Dundee in particular to the HCIED 2009 conference. This is the same conference I went to last year in Rome, and is comprised of the educators of HCI so its a very interesting conference with a lot of people who are passionate about pushing HCI forward and exploring how it can be taught. Dzl and I were going to teach a workshop. It was our first conference workshop and hopefully, the first of many. We had five workshop participants, all of whom were familiar with computers, software, programming, and more geeky stuff so it was a very different workshop than our typical new-to-computer-programming crowd. We didn't expect this and so it was a really interesting experience, ... read more

I got lucky today. Iona was uncharacteristically sunny, and though the wind was strong and cool, it was a beautiful day. I had spent the night in my car, and that was a bit cool but OK. Got my ticket as soon as they opened, and then went shopping a bit, almost missing the ferry! It's a 45 minute ride to Mull, a large island in the Hebrides chain. Then we had a tour bus take us to the ferry port for Iona, and he was great - very knowledgeable and also quite a comedian! The second ferry ride, to Iona, is quite short. We arrived on schedule at 12:30, and its a short walk to the old abbey, passing other parts of the old community including a nunnery and gardens, as well as the cemetery ... read more

Tag 71: Carnoustie - Auchtermuchty, 58.36 km, Fahrzeit 3:51, Durhschn.15.14 km/h, Höhenmeter: 496, Gesamtstrecke 3750 km Die Strecke führt schön flach von Carnoustie bis nach Dundee. Hier kämpfe ich mich durch den Großstadtverkehr zur Touristinfo in der Hoffnung, noch weitere Karten zu bekommen. Leider gibt es dort nichts. Nach kurzer Pause geht es über die Tay-Brücke, genauer gesagt über die Tay Road Bridge, nach Fife (oft auch Kingdom of Fife genannt). Wenige Kilometer weiter westlich verläuft die alte Tay Railway Brigde aus dem 19. Jahrhundert. Diese Brücke wurde gebaut nach dem Einsturz der Tay Bridge im Jahre ???, bei dem in einer stürmischen Nacht ein Zug mit 70 Personen versank. Dieses Unglück wurde u.a. von Theodor Fontane in seiner Ballade "Die Brück' am Tay" beschrieben: "und jetzt, als ob Feuer vom Himmel fiel, erglüht es in ... read more

Welcome back to my blog. As you may know I'm now just about to hit the road on a cycle epic to Norway lasting 2 months or thereabouts. I'm starting tomorrow from Dundee with a quick 50-miler down to Rosyth where I'm boarding the 17:00 ferry to Zeebrugge, yes Zeebrugge - probably further away from Norway than Rosyth! But the plan is to then cycle around the north sea coast, via my Belgian friend in Ghent for a few days :), and then up across Denmark to Copenhagen maybe in time for my birthday on the 27th (last years birthday was spent on the Inca Trail in Peru!). This part of the trip should be 'the gentle introduction' since I've been reliably informed that Belgium, Holland, northern Germany, and Denmark are all as flat as the ... read more