Scotland

North Coast 500 | Scotland Road Trip

In-camera pano shot on the X100V with the camera in the portrait orientation.

PHOTOGRAPHY AND TEXT BY DEREK CLARK

The road trip. It fires up a romantic notion in most of us; fuelled by everything from car commercials, old films of Route 66, and even childhood holidays from a time before every trip had to begin with a plane ticket. I started to get the urge for a road trip when I bought my fourth Land Rover, just a couple of months before COVID 19 appeared on the scene. This was obviously put on hold for the past 18 months, but with a reluctance to sit on a plane for multiple hours, the road trip became the best option. Not only that, after the various lockdowns during the pandemic, the urge to just hit the road and be free was pretty overwhelming.

The North Coast 500 is one of the worlds most beautiful and epic road trips. Starting and ending in Scotland’s most northerly city of Inverness. The choice of going clockwise or anti-clockwise is up to the driver, but we opted for the latter, travelling up the east coast fairly quickly, then slowing down to take in the epic rugged landscape along the extreme north coast and then back down the west coast. We camped, we stayed in hotels and we stayed in hostels. Wild camping is legal in Scotland and usually better than any campsite when it comes to pitching the tent in a great spot.

For a full week, I had no urge to pick up my phone and look at any of the garbage it’s connected to. The battery went flat and I couldn’t have cared less. I took an iPad and didn’t use it once. I took my kindle but didn’t read a single page. There was nothing but driving, photography, setting up camp, cooking and sleeping. It was just what I needed and just what I’ve been craving ever since.

The highlight of the North Coast 500 is the road leading to a remote village called Applecross. The road is called Bealach Na Ba and as far as I know is the highest road in the UK. A sign at the start of the road alerts drivers that it’s not suitable for large vehicles, caravans, motorhomes, or learner drivers. It has gradients of 1 in 5 and has hairpin bends. It doesn’t mention the vertical drops if you veer off the road, but you soon find that out.

We clocked up over a thousand miles on our 500-mile road trip, including the drive to Inverness and back. But we’re already planning our next road trip, but first, we need to get a roof rack to give us more space inside.

SHOT WITH FUJIFILM X100V, WCX100, X-PRO2, 18mm F2, LENSBABY COMPOSER PRO & EDGE 50 OPTIC

Death By 74 Cuts

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PHOTOGRAPHY AND TEXT BY DEREK CLARK

I chose this picture by Patrick La Roque from his essay Puddles Are Windows and Fissures are Roads to use as my theme. I almost chose dogs, as I can see two dogs in the top left corner, but in the end I chose differently. The converging lines in that same corner reminded me of roads, and the top of the picture feels like decay. Possibly converging lines cutting through the underdogs?

Death By 74 CUTS

The city of Glasgow, like a lot of highly populated places, is going through constant change. The always present cranes across the city skyscrape erect building after building, rubbing out the old and redrawing the new. But this only makes the places that are being left behind stand out; a slow painful demise. Tradeston is one such place, an industrial area that has been neglected for years. Decades of decay joined with decades of graffiti and vandalism.

In 2011, the M74 motorway was completed. Although construction started in 1966, the M74 didn’t reach its intended destination until 2011. This monster of a road rises up on stilts as it cuts a path straight through Tradeston, barely revealing what lies beneath to the unsuspecting drivers. But still, I’m drawn to this place, and I will probably return to document it more before it gets torn-down in favour of luxury flats or offices.

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Constant Renewal

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Photography & Text by Derek Clark

Constant

ADJECTIVE

Occurring over a period of time.

Remaining the same over a period of time.

(of a person) Unchangingly faithful and dependable.

NOUN

A situation that does not change.

Glasgow, like most cities, is changing rapidly. But you may have noticed that the older something gets, the better the chance of survival. The Provan's Lordship is the oldest house in Glasgow. It's a stones-throw away from Glasgow Cathedral and was built by Bishop Andrew Muirhead for the chaplain of nearby St Nicholas Hospital in 1471. I was lucky to have the place to myself when I visited recently and I have to say that it was more than a little eerie. You can practically feel the history in each room as you make your way through the house.

Nearby graves at Glasgow Cathedral have alphabet gardens growing in the engravings of the tombstones. Nature takes back everything eventually and here the soil has blown into the channels, followed be seed. constant growth; Constant renewal. Nothing ever stands completely still.

A short walk towards the city centre reveals the latest area for architectural renewal. Glasgow College and the surrounding area has seen a massive change in the past few years with building after building being erected at great speed (at least for someone who lives outside the city). But if I had to put my money on which of these buildings would still be standing in 100 years, The old Provan's Lordship would win hands down.

An old London bus passes by the modern architecture, the rattle of the Diesel engine cutting through the quiet like a chainsaw. It heads toward the Provan's Lordship. A link between new and old.

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The Hidden Lane

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PHOTOGRAPHY AND TEXT BY DEREK CLARK

DECEMBER 20th, 2018

Back in March this year, I shot some pictures of The Hidden Lane. This post has been sitting as a draft since then as it didn’t tie in with whatever we were doing around that time on Kage. Although it’s a bit out of season, I thought it would be a good idea to put this out as my last Kage post of the year. Sort of clearing out the cupboard so to speak.

When I revisited this post I was struck by how bright and colourful it was. I’m not sure if it was denial or a sense of false hope, but it surprised me that 2017 was not all doom and gloom (even though most of it actually was).

MARCH 20th, 2017

Like the wardrobe leading to Narnia, a typical close on a Glasgow street leads to the Hidden Lane. To be honest, there is actually a sign telling passersby it's there (businesses gotta survive), but it's still a bit of a surprise when you go through the close and arrive inside the Lane.

Brightly coloured doors and even a large building painted in the brightest yellow paint let you know you have arrived somewhere a little different. Different for Glasgow at least as we're not known for bright colours on buildings (although some of the islands off the west coast do embrace that sort of thing). There is actually a slightly odd feeling of stepping into another country, no doubt helped by the sudden appearance of sunshine on the day I visited.

I stepped into the tea shop and ordered a cup of tea and a piece of walnut cake. Sipping my tea from an old China cup that reminds me of visiting my granny as a child, I chat with the waitress about the lane. She tells me that one of the offices belonged to an MP from the Green Party and another was used for restoring antique furniture. I ask if it's ok to take a few pictures inside the tea room and with permission, grab my X-Pro2 and X100F and shoot a few photographs. The waitress comments on my cameras and asks if they are old film cameras. I wish I had brought the Hasselblad as I had intended, but wanted to travel light as I would probably be doing a lot of walking today.

I step out of the tea room and into the cold air, I turn right and enter an alley with brightly coloured doors. The second door is open and I look inside to see a young woman restoring an antique bench. Stepping inside, and with her permission, I shoot a few pictures and chat to her while she works. The bench is around one hundred years old and when she has finished it will hopefully be in use for another hundred or so. Isn’t that what we all wish for? That our work will live on after we’ve gone?

September 3, 2018 at 21:40 pm (Motherwell, Scotland)

By Derek Clark

My friend Steven needed to go to Glasgow today to film some B-roll for a project he's working on. So I tagged along and shot some street while he grabbed some footage. It wasn't intentional, but when I started to look at the photos in Lightroom tonight, There was more than a few people lost in their phones.

The world is a beautiful place!
Life is far too short!
These things are worse than the crack pipe!

JULY 26, 2018 at 3:30 PM (MOTHERWELL, SCOTLAND)

By Derek Clark

My sister lost her fight with cancer at 4:47 am on Tuesday 17th July 2018. She was 55 years old. Joyce was diagnosed with a brain tumour back in November 2016 and despite 6 months of radiotherapy, 14 months of chemotherapy, cannabis oil and honey imported from Israel, one tumour became two and it was clear treatment was not going to work.

Joyce kept her sense of humour right to the end, she never complained or showed any sign of self-pity, but a stroke changed her permanently and made communication more difficult and then finally almost impossible. At the end it was although everything but her lungs shut down, each breath a fight for survival. In the last few minutes of her life, she managed to open her eyes. She was surrounded by family, each of us holding on to her, making sure she knew we were there. Finally, her breath slowed, a few more breaths with longer gaps in between and then silence. She was gone forever.

July 24th, 2018. The funeral was today, exactly one week after she died. We couldn’t believe how many people showed up to pay their respects. It was a sea of faces, some I knew some I didn’t and some I should have known, but didn’t recognise. As requested by my brother in law, Joyce’s coffin was carried by her three brothers and three sons as her favourite singer Andrea Bocelli played in the background.

I've been asked so many times in the past week how I and the rest of my family were. I say that we’re ok, we're getting there. But the real truth is that we are all hanging by a thread right now. My brother in law, their three sons, my two brothers and our other halves, we’re all hanging by a thread. But my parents just buried their only daughter and that's just not right. It's not the way it's supposed to happen. I don't know how they're supposed to move on from this.

So we are all hanging by a thread. But we’re a close family, and if you twist and intertwine thread it becomes rope, and rope anchors the ship, it holds down the tents in a storm. As I write these words I look down at my wrist at the piece of climbing rope that’s been there for almost a year. I realise that it's the stuff that keeps us from falling.

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Arthur's Seat

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PHOTOGRAPHY & TEXT BY DEREK CLARK

If you’ve watched the movie Trainspotting 2, you might have been wondering about the hill that characters Renton (Ewan McGregor) and Spud (Ewan Bremner) ran up. You know, the one with the spectacular view.

Arthur’s Seat overlooks Edinburgh but the view stretches out far and wide. It’s steep but doesn’t take that long to walk up and the rewards are plenty. The road and rail bridges crossing the River Forth, and beyond that the mountains surrounding Loch Lomond. Turn to the right and you can see the east coast of Scotland. Keep on turning and you will be looking out over the North Sea in the direction of Norway and Denmark (Not that you can see them).

So if you happen to visit Edinburgh in the near future, take a walk up Arthur’s seat. You will find it near the Scottish parliament building and although it might take a bit of effort, you won’t be disappointed.