I’d been wanting to visit the National Museum of Flight at East Fortune airfield, East Lothian, Scotland for ages. Last year we finally made it.

It has all the appearance of a Second World War airfield so familiar from films.

Control tower:-

However, the airfield was first commissioned as a Royal Naval Air Station. This was the gate:-

The airfield’s complement was tasked with protecting shipping in the Firth of Forth and preventing airship attacks on Edinburgh or the navy and its base at Rosyth :-

Hangar:-

Hangar Annexe, a Nissen Hut:-

HMS Queen Elizabeth is the Royal Navy’s latest aircraft carrier. (That’s the one there’s not enough money to fit out with any aircraft.)

She sailed out from her fitting out at Rosyth in the Firth of Forth for her sea trials in June 2017. We happened to be in Cellardyke, Fife that day and caught a glimpse of her near the Isle of May.

HMS Queen Elizabeth (yacht in front) and the Isle of May from Cellardyke Harbour:-

HMS Queen Elizabeth and Isle of May closer view:-

HMS Queen Elizabeth closer view:-

Isle of May:-

HMS Queen Elizabeth and another ship:-

Below is a photograph of the new Royal Navy aircraft carrier as viewed from Rosyth. This is the one that apparently won’t have any aircraft once it’s fitted out as we can’t afford them. Trident yes, it seems; warplanes no.

On Friday I realised that T Ronald Dump’s hair reminded me of this:-

The reason we were at Rosyth was to go on a cruise. On the Fred.Olsen Lines ship SS Black Watch. This was the ship’s (mascot?) Not figurehead. It was facing to the rear.

Sunset over the Forth:

On the corner of Queensferry and Admiralty Roads, Rosyth stands the Ex-Servicemen’s Club, which has some deco features.

Stitch of two photos from Admiralty Road:-

From Queensferry Road. Note memorial wreath on wall:-

Detail, Queensferry Road:-

Wreath and Plaque, Ex-Servicemen’s Club, Rosyth:-

Plaque to Users, Ex-Servicemen’s Club, Rosyth:-

We got fairly well acquainted with Rosyth, a Fife town on the Firth of Forth west of but very close to the Forth Bridges, when we were house-hunting. We opted for elsewhere in the end.

Rosyth is most famous for its Naval Dockyard but is home to some deco.

The Clydesdale Bank building, on Queensferry Road, has an Art Deco frontage, at least in its older aspect, built 1932:-

This modern addition (to the left of photo above) isn’t though:-

The former Palace Cinema, also on Queensferry Road, from left.

Palace Cinema from right:-

Shop with slightly edged flat roof on Admiralty Road. Windows replaced.

We took a stroll around North Queensferry last week. It wasn’t much of a stroll because it’s not very big. It must be the best location in the world for viewing iconic bridges, though. It lies slap bang between the two famous ones over the River Forth.

The following two pictures were taken from the same spot. The angle between the photos is about 60⁰.

They’re doing some repair work on the Road Bridge which, thankfully, you can’t see from the road.

The next time I drive over it will be more scary than usual now I know all that is going on below.

Pictures of the northern cable anchor point and a support pillar are on my flickr site.

Looking west we could see the trans-North Sea ferry berthed at Rosyth.

There was an aircraft carrier at the Royal Navy base too. I had thought we no longer had any of those, or was it just the new ones the Coalition Government planned to scrap? My camera isn’t quite good enough for the distance involved but it was definitely an aircraft carrier. It had that upward sweep at the bow.