This is a picture of Kinnaird Head Lighthouse, which sits just behind the Wine Tower.
It started life as a castle, as you can probably make out from the style of the architecture ! A few of the town roads bear this out also, being called "Castle Street" and "Castle Terrace", both of which are very close
to the lighthouse. There is also a pub (which just so happens to be our local!), named - aptly enough - The Castle Bar.
|
The castle was later converted into a lighthouse - the first official lighthouse in Great Britain. Although it was decommissioned a few years ago and replaced with a much smaller, automated lighthouse, it now houses
"The Lighthouse Museum", which has many exhibits and artefacts from numerous lighthouses all over Britain. Tours of the actual lighthouse can also be arranged. There is a small gift shop and a lovely cafe with glorious views
of the open sea. It's well worth a visit.
Here is our main shopping street. There really isn't a great variety of good shops in Fraserburgh,
but this street is always very busy. A One-Way System was introduced about two years ago, which included our very first sets of traffic lights!!
All in all, the weather here is quite good, the only constant being the wind. Be it a gentle breeze
or a howling gale, the wind is ever-present. In fact, up until a few years ago, Fraserburgh held the record for the strongest gust of wind ever recorded at sea-level in the U.K. - over 120 MPH !! The wind actually blew a huge hole
out of our steading roof! However, with Fraserburgh being open on two sides to the sea, we don't get too much problems with snow during the winter - the salty air must have something to do with that !
Occasionally, we get dramatic views of the Aurora Borealis - or Northern Lights. Usually, we only get to see
streaks of light in the sky to the north, mostly orange, sometimes green and they seem to shimmer and wave, like sheer chiffon blowing in a soft breeze. A few years back, however, we had two consecutive nights of incredible, breathtaking displays.
The lights were orange on both nights. On the first night, the entire sky was covered in what looked like the roof of a huge circus tent, with the streaks of light seeming to radiate from a central point right above us. I've since learned (thanks
to "Focus" magazine )that you see this type of display when you are directly underneath an electrical storm. On the second night, the whole sky was still filled with lights, but the display was more random, with patches of the sky appearing
to throb and pulsate as the lights came and went. The display lasted for hours and was absolutely mind-blowing - like something out of a Sci-Fi film. I have never seen anything quite so beautiful and I live in hope that I get to see another one
before I die. I wish I had photos to show you, but the ones I took on those nights didn't come out well at all.
If you haven't done so already on any of my other pages, could you please take just a couple of minutes to sign my
guestbook ? I really appreciate all your messages ! It's directly under the list of links below. Thank you so much.
|
View My Guestbook
