Sunday 23 May 2010

My run

Hey there bloggers, as i was in snap happy mode this wknd i thought i'd take my camera out with me and share something a little bit special with you...........my run route! i'm pretty proud of my run route, i'm so lucky to have it, and i'll treasure it for as long as we live here, since i started running i appreciate Tarbert so much more, because of the amazing run route it provides me!

so alarm went off at 7am this morning, and after much grumbles from Mr Neen about obscene hours for an alarm, i got up and hit the road for 7.30am - such a great time for a run, specially on a sunday when i'm a feeling a little bit heroic coz i know all my friends are either still in slumberland or have mega hangovers! and heres little me pounding the streets!

so with no further ado, heres my run route for y'all!

as you walk out my front door, you walk about 50yards then your met with this:


and this:


a little bit further along and heres the start of the fishing boats.


we're going through the main street of the village now.




see, the water on my left, and the shops are over the road on my right - rewind a year and the only time i saw this sight at this time on a sunday was on the way home from parties! not no more, no sireee!




now i've made it through the main street, and am coming out the other side, this is one long road with water on my left and HUGE houses all the way down to the end on my right.


this is the harbour mouth, leading out the gulf stream




and a quick look across the harbour mouth at the other side of the village. the whole village is in a valley and built round a horse shoe shaped harbour.



again the harbour mouth, so pretty in this light







a little slip where they do kids kayaking and sailing lessons from. behind it is another slip where one of the many ferries comes in, lots of ferries come in to different slips all around here, its a bit of a gateway to the islands.



now we're past the ferry port and another quick look over the water.



the first big building on my right, is a big old hotel, its a really beautiful building, its out the way of the village centre, it looks at the view pictured above. the food here was amazing, it would take about 15mins slow stroll to toddle along here on an evening to have a barmeal, then a another 25min slow stroll home heh heh, we used to love it.


then the owner refurbished it, but he stripped the walls inside back to the bear stone and took it too far, he struggled on for the best part of the year, with the hotel closed, and trying to patch it back together, then he found a burn (for those that dont know - its a small trickle off a river) running under the foundations of the hotel so it was pretty much game over for him as there was no way he could afford to fix the damage he'd caused along with the problems of the burn running under the hotel. that was about 4 years ago! and its been in this situation ever since, its ruined inside and still so pretty outside! very sad!




now we're nearing the end of the line




the tip of the land that you see here is the end of the road, they call it "the concrete" no idea why, its just called that, but if your going down this way you would say i'm going for a run down the concrete! funny huh!

once you get to the end theres a little tiny walkway out into the water and that it it just ends!

you can climb over the rocks to the shell beach, which is tightly packed with clam shells, because hundreds of years ago its where the fishing boats used to land thier clam catches and the wifes would sit on this beach shelling the clams, so its very very deep and tightly packed with clam shells - i dont have a pic, but i took the two below from a local website to show you, its pretty amazing, some of them are still whole but most are broken into pieces, we dont go over very often these days as its no good for the furry friends, the shells are a bit too sharp for thier tootsies!






and this is me reached the end now! lets go home!


i took some piccies on the way home too - i hope i'm not boring you, the light was completely different facing the other way it looked so good i couldnt resist.





one of the piers, there are 3, it smells a bit fishy at this bit, thats the down side, the up side is you can go to the fish wholesaler (he has a factory/warehouse on one of the back streets and buy almost any type of fish from him fresh its been landed that morning, so thats a pretty good plus side! its not a shop he supplies all the restaurants and shops and ships to spain and france alot and when your in a resaurant and see "loch fyne oysters" or "loch fyne lobster" etc its come from here and come from him! heh heh!







look at the huge houses on the left hand side, i cant imagine what one of these this size with this view is worth now! scary money i would think!



further along into the village now, this is the main pier where the big trawling fishing boats land.







this the view of whats left of the castle i showed you in my earlier post, from the road.




some pretty ones of the harbour.







and we're home, thats casa del neen there on the bottom right , the two windows there are our living room. not a big ole house like the ones down "the conrete" but its our "home" nonetheless, we own it and its just 50yards from the harbour, cant complain really!





so there you have it peeps, i hope you enjoyed your tour of Tarbert, i like it and i'm glad i could share it with you!!

4 comments:

  1. Wow, what an amazing place! I'm so jealous of your run route, its beautiful! It makes me think about driving off somewhere and doing my run some place a little more scenic. I bet you find it much easier to motivate yourself to go out when you know you have that to come! x

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  2. thanks - yup it makes getting out pretty easy! dont know how much i'll be saying that in the winter right enough, when the wind and rain is howling in the harbour mouth and its icy cold heh heh but i'll enjoy it till then, then maybe i'll find a more sheltered route for the winter! x

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  3. Oh wow! That is beautiful - especially like the piccies on your way back, loads of good light behind you. :) I will have to give you a running tour of Gateshead in comparison!! LOL. x

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  4. I love your town! Its funny but I suppose I've only ever really seen the part that I drive through on my way to Glasgow! I do quite often stop to use the loo or get some food though :)

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