A Scenic Coastal Journey - Sepia Saturday

 This week's prompt photograph  from Sepia Saturday features a rather bleak image of a  lone figure staring out to sea from a rocky beach with a stone wall and a dilapidated house in the background. 

 I have hardly any vintage  beach scenes,  so instead I am taking you (and my camera)  on a coastal journey across Scotland and the north of England, with ancient castles, lone figures, rocks and seascapes - many with a touch of history and also amily connections.  

 

 A ruined coastal castle in the Scottish  town of St. Andrew's. Its university was founded in the 15th century,  is Scotland's first university and the third oldest in the English speaking world.  Before the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century, the  castle served as the ecclesiastical centre for Scotland and witnessed several scenes of violence. 

Further down the east coast  of Scotland is Canty Bay, near North Berwick, 20 miles south of Edinburgh.  where we enjoyed some  self-catering holidays. 

 

On the far right of the photograph is the prominent Bass Rock with its lighthouse and seabird colonies, but in the 1600s it was a remote prison.  We had a clear view of it from our kitchen window and the bay was a favourite walk every day, with our dog enjoying clambering over the rocks.  

      The Bass Rock, off North Berwick in the Firth of Forth 

 

The impressive rocky coast line  at the fishing village of St. Abbs, Berwickshire  in the Scottish Borders.

Sandyhills Bay on the Solway coast, near Dumfries in south  west Scotland was our destination for a short break on the trail of my husband's ancestors,  whom I had traced back quite easily  to Samuel Donaldson of South Leith, near Edinburgh.  

It was only much later when writing the narrative that it struck me I had  no evidence whatsoever that the Samuel Donaldson born in 1728 in nearby Kirkbean, Dumfriesshire,  was the same Samuel Donaldson who married  in South Leith, in 1759.  So I abandoned this line of research - but we enjoyed discovering a new part of Scotland!

 

Across the border into northern England

I am a Blackpudlian,   born in the  seaside resort of Blackpool on the north west coast of England.  Blackpool  Tower, built in 1894, was modelled on the Eiffel Tower and rises to 520 feet - facts drummed into us at school. My parents met at the famous Tower Ballroom.  

Until the 19th century, Blackpool was just a small hamlet.  It rose to prominence with the building of the railway linking  it to the mill towns of industrial Lancashire and Yorkshire and soon became England's  most popular  holiday resort, with its miles of golden sands. The unique Blackpool Illuminations were first switched on in 1879 to extend  the season well into the autumn.

 

A surprisingly empty Blackpool beach with the Central Pier and the famous Tower in the background.

 We move across country to South Shields on the north east coast of England, where my husband was born.  Here is the beach at Marsden Rock where he enjoyed playing as a boy. 

 

My daughter with her cousin, walking their dogs om Marsden beach. 

 Marsden Rock is a 100 foot sea stack which lies 100 yards off the cliff face.  Believed to be once  a smugglers' haunt,  it is now the home of seabird colonies.   In 1803 a flight of steps was constructed up the side of the rock. In 1903 several choirs climbed onto the rock to perform a choral service.  

 

In a way these are historic photographs, as in 1996 the arch collapsed, splitting the rock into two stacks. The smaller stack was decreed unsafe and demolished.

 

Here is Bamburgh beach in Northumberland (a favourite day trip away), dominated by the impressive Bamburgh Castle which can be seen for miles around. as it stasnds 150 feet above the North sea.  Its history goes form Anglo Saxon Citadel to impenetrable  Norman stronghold; home ome to a succession of kings from Henry VI to James 1 and the first castle in the world to fall to gunpowder in the War of the Roses. Latterly home to the local Armstrong famiy. 

As a child I remember having a book on heroines in history with an illustration of Grace Darling  (1815-1842), the lighthouse keeper's daughter at Bamburgh,   who in 1838 risked storms and icy seas to rescue sailors from the shipwrecked "Forfarshire.   She died of consumption just four years later and is buried in Bamburgh, with a museum dedicated to her life.  

 And lastly - one of my  most favourite  places  - the Isle of Iona off the west coast of Scotland - a tiny island only 1-5 miles wide by 3 miles long,  with a population of 120 permanent  residents, famous as the home of St. Columba and the cradle of Scottish Christianity.  It is a wonderful, magical  place that is high on my "bucket list" to return.  

 

My daughter a lone figure on the beach  with the Isle of Mull in the background.

If you think it always rains in Scotland, think again when you see the skies and seas in these photographs, though I admit we were very lucky with the weather.  We enjoyed exploring the island, walking south to north and across to the west coast, looking onto the Atlantic - next stop North America!

Peace!

                                           And our dog enjoyed the beaches too,  In the background is the Cal Mac (Calendonian Macbrayne)  Ferry)  which plies between the islands. 

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And to end this seascape journey, the sign at Land's End,  in Cornwall, which marks the most south-westerly point of mainland Britain.

 

Copyright © 2025 · Susan Donaldson.  All Rights Reserved

 

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