Advertisement
The 'in-the-air' canal.A wonderful day. We ‘achieved’ all that we set out to do … negotiated the early morning traffic to hit the motorway to Falkirk to experience ‘the wheel’ first-hand. The Falkirk Wheel is a rotating boat lift the only one of its kind in the world and raises boats by 24 metres to connect the Forth and Clyde Canal with the Union Canal.
We were told by the very informative crew member as we were raised into the air that the caissons or gondolas always carry a combined weight of 500 tonnes of water and boats, with the gondolas themselves each weighing 50 tonnes. Care is taken to maintain the water levels on each side, thus balancing the weight on each arm. As you all know, Archimedes’ principle says that floating objects displace their own weight in water, so when the boat enters, the amount of water leaving the caisson weighs the same as the boat. This is achieved by maintaining the water levels on each side to within a difference of 37 mm using a site-wide computer control system comprising water level sensors, automated sluices and pumps. It takes 22.5 kilowatts to power ten hydraulic motors which consume ONLY
The 'in-the-air' canal ... top view.1.5 kilowatt-hours per half-turn, roughly the same as boiling eight kettles of water.
After 4 hours we departed for the Kelpies. The Kelpies, 30m high horse head sculptures weighing 300 tonnes each are built of structural steel with a stainless-steel cladding depicting kelpies (shape-shifting water spirits), representing the lineage of the heavy horses of Scottish industry and economy … pulling the wagons, ploughs, barges, and coal ships that shaped the geographical layout of the Falkirk area. The forms were inspired by the Clydesdale (draught) horses.
From here it was onto to visiting a friend that we had made whilst I was teaching in Vancouver in ’86. Even though we had kept in contact with Christmas cards over the years, we had no phone number, no email address but we did have a street address from long ago. We took a punt to see if Anne (and her husband, Jimmy … who we had never met) was still at that address.
We pulled into the driveway and immediately the owner came to suss out who was parking in his driveway. I referred to him by name which immediately took him aback but I quickly followed up with Anne
and her maiden name. Anne had just gone for a brief walk. We were invited inside, and it was like we were old friends. Anne arrived and all pandemonium broke loose. Joyful time indeed. Hours later we departed but not before agreeing to meet up in Edinburgh on the 8
th of June upon our return from the Shetlands.
Yep, great day.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.116s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 14; qc: 31; dbt: 0.0757s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
