Last August I noted floods at Balbirnie Golf Course. The bridge featured in that post was sunsequently removed probably because its supports had been undermined.

In April this year I photographed the foundations of a replacement bridge.

The golf course itself was looking fine.

18^th fairway and green:-

The 10^th tee had some striking shadows:-

10^th tee and 18^th fairway:-

This clock was on a building at the entrance to the dock where our ship was berthed. The tower in white and the flagpole are also deco features:-

While wandering Bergen city centre I was delighted to see this building looming. Lots of deco hallmarks; curvature, rule of three, horizontals, verticals:-

These closer views also show up the building’s balconies:-

This bridge nearby certainly has a deco feel, albeit in a Scandinavian way:-

This one shows the ship we were travelling on (extreme right):-

Close up on lake with fountain:-

A road bridge in central Bergen from Mount Fløyen:-

Part of Bergen with sea inlets beyond:-

A distant suspension bridge (photo is fuzzy due to zoom function.) Due to its sovereign wealth fund – a legacy of the oil boom – Norway is festooned with infrastructure like this:-

The reason we visited Ceres in September last year was to take a look at the Fife Folk Museum.

Entrance as seen from bridge over the Ceres Burn:-

Inside the museum there is a small section devoted to crime and punishment, including an old prison cell:-

Beside this are two notices relating to trials and punishment:-

This second one mentions jougs, a kind of stocks:-

On the outside wall at the other side of the building to the entrance is an old doorway beside which is an example of a joug:-

The carved motto above the door reads, “God bless the just.”:-

Bridge over the Ceres Burn from grounds of Fife Folk Museum:-

Reverse angle:-

This bridge carries the main road (B939) through the village over the Ceres Burn:-

Castlegate Street, Ceres:-

See my Falkland Palace post here.

The gardens are very well kept. I believe they try to make them as much like they were back in the days of the Stuarts as they can. You can easily imagine Mary, Queen of Scots wandering about under the trees.

Trees in garden:-

Palace from garden:-

Steps in Falkland Palace gardens:-

View from steps to gallery and tower:-

Gate to orchard:-

Bridge in orchard:-

Last August there was severe flooding in Balbirnie Park. The Back Burn even overflowed by Balbirnie Golf Club’s eighteenth green, probably due to that tree trunk stuck at the bridge. Part of the revetments had been washed away:-

Between Golf Club’s clubhouse and Balbirnie House Hotel the road was flooded:-

The area just at Balbirnie House (and Hotel) which had flooded in February 2020 did so again:-

During that brief time when lockdown was lifted last year we were able to go to Edinburgh and visit the Royal Botanic Garden there, using a pre-booked and timed ticket.

As she’s keen on gardening and gardens it’s one of the good lady’s favourite places.

Planting by hothouses:-

Monkey puzzle trees (araucaria):-

Path with acer:-

“New Zealand ” section:-

Path in Botanic Garden:-

Bridge over burn:-

Waterfall from bridge:-

Waterfall video:-

Burn from bridge:-

The gardens are worth a visit at any time of year.

Abut a year ago we decided to take a walk to try to find the Barrel Brig, an old bridge over the River Ore in Fife. It had been featured in a calendar we had of local scenes but we’d never seen it.

It’s not on the beaten track and we had to walk quite a distance from where we parked in Coaltown of Balgonie. The start of the path has a view over to Balgonie Castle (on the left of this photo):-

It turned out to be a longer walk than we had expected along muddy roads/paths and over a disused railway line before finally seeing the River:-

It was still a couple of hundred metres or so before we saw the brig itself:-

The path curves round to the brig:-

You can see it’s not a modern thoroughfare:-

Before taking that shot I did scout down to the bank to grab this photo:-

We then strolled across the (unparapeted) bridge to get the opposite angle:-

On the way back to the car I took this shot over the fields to Largo Law in the distance:-

It’s mostly the Queensferry Crossing, not the two older bridges, you can see in this photo. (The white sail-shaped objects in the distance are the bridge’s cable stays.)

Looking the other way from the garden area there is a view of and Dunfermline Abbey and, to the left, the remains of Dunfermline Palace:-

Dunfermline Palace:-