Tag Archives: Greyfriars Kirk

View From The Museum

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The roof terrace garden atop the National Museum of Scotland on Chamabers Street, is one of my favourite places to take in views across my city. The modern extension of the Museum, which sits right across the road from historic Greyfriars Kirk, has a roof terrace which, like the Museum itself, is free for anyone to access, visitor or native alike.

View From The Museum 01

(looking south to Bristo Square, where you can see some modern University of Edinburgh buildings on the left, the Hogwarts-like Teviot student union in the centre, and the domed rotunda of McEwan Hall on the right – where I had my graduation ceremony, a lifetime ago…

View From The Museum 02

It’s not all historic, old, handsome buildings – there are also rather uglier intrusions onto the nearby skyline, such as these 1970s Brutalist towers Edinburgh University dumped on the city, after demolishing parts of the old George Square. They look rather better in a B&W photo than they do in reality!

View From The Museum 03

View From The Museum 04

Looking west to the old Greyfriars Kirk.

View From The Museum 05

The roof terrace, being right in the heart of the Old Town, also offers fine views to Edinburgh Castle, atop its huge, volcanic rock.

View From The Museum 06

View From The Museum 07

Above – looking over the rooftops to nearby George IV Bridge. Below, looking northwards, the “crown” spire of Saint Giles Cathedral on the Royal Mile clearly visible on the skyline.

View From The Museum 08

View From The Museum 09

Normally you have to look up to admire the handsome dome of the Old College Building (which is adjacent to the original, Victorian-era part of the Museum, but from the roof terrace you get a different perspective.

View From The Museum 010

Looking along the roof terrace garden of the National Museum of Scotland

Vid - View From The Museum

A brief video panorma of the view from the roof terrace, starting off looking towards Edinburgh Castle, standing sentinel above the city as it has for centuries, then panning north and east, across the Old Town skyline, then zooming out into the Firth of Forth beyond, where huge ships are carrying enormous, yellow structures for new offshore windfarms out to sea from the Port of Leith.

Tombstone shadows

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Walking through historic Greyfriars kirkyard recently, the winter sun now very, very low in the sky. Clear but freezing day, low angle of sun creating a lovely, soft, golden light quality and casting long, long shadows, such as here where it stretched long shadows from the old tombstones out across the kirkyard.

low sun and long shadows in the old boneyard

Normally it’s not good practise to point the camera lens towards the sun, but I needed an angle looking in that direction to get these shadow strips into frame as I wanted, so I simply moved around a little until from my perspective the sun was blocked by a tree trunk just enough that I could get the shot without flaring out the image. Some days you get lucky…

Hello, little, furry chap!

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Walking through historic Greyfriar’s kirkyard at the weekend (walking off a delicious Semla – a Swedish cream cake made only for a few weeks as part of an old Lent tradition), spotted little squirrel sprinting across the grass between the old tombstones, pausing to pick up little twigs and leaves. Couldn’t get a photo as he was too darned fast, zipping along then onto a tree, up and around to the other side. I followed him around but there was no sign of him. Then I saw movement, and noticed a small hole in a knot of of the tree trunk. And sure enough it turned out to be his little hidey-hole, and as I watched patiently he stuck his cute wee head out for a look down at me (you can see him right in the centre of the pic):

A few moments later he darted out, grabbed more of his little collection of twigs and leaves and dragged them back into his little tree home, front paws fiddling around inside while his bum and bushy tail hung out the entrance. Either that or I had just been mooned by a squirrel…

Autumn in Edinburgh

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Scotland in autumn, my favourite season here, not just because of the riot of colours as the leaves change, but because of the quality of light we get here at this time of year.

Greyfriars, autumn 01

Because our little kingdom lies so far north, as the world tilts on its journey around the sun Scotland is at such an angle that we have the sun much lower in the sky, casting long shadows and meaning the sunlight is stretched out to a redder part of the spectrum, meaning we get this glorious, golden quality. It’s like warm honey slowly dripped across the land, beautiful copper-amber colour that splashes over the landscape and the man-made structures alike, giving an amazing glow to everything from trees to the old buildings hewn from native stone. Gorgeous.

Greyfriars, autumn 02
(Greyfriars kirk as the evening autumnal sunlight splashes across the western end)

Greyfriars, autumn 03

And right now we’re in that perfect time when much of the foliage is still the deep green of spring and summer (doubtless helped by all that rain we get!) but parts have started to turn now, mixing russet, gold, vermillion and more colours, especially as the sunlight shines through them.

Greyfriars, autumn 05