I am sure that anyone who has ever spent an evening at Buff Club in Glasgow will have either made a joke or thought about making a joke that relates to the name Buff being British slang for native. I can imagine hundreds of Facebook…Read More

I am sure that anyone who has ever spent an evening at Buff Club in Glasgow will have either made a joke or thought about making a joke that relates to the name Buff being British slang for native. I can imagine hundreds of Facebook updates that might read something like: 'Having fun in the Buff' or 'Can't believe Tom is in the Buff tonight'. As I almost always give in to peer pressure rather quickly and pitifully, I decided to do the same with the title for this article. However, terrible puns aside, my girlfriend and I had a great time at Buff.
To set the scene, we had been at my friend's wedding during the afternoon and early evening. As a consequence, we were very much in the party mood. So, we jumped on a bus from the wedding venue – the rather nice A House for an Art Lover – and headed onto Sauchiehall Street in the city centre. Buff is located on a rather dark backstreet that runs parallel to the large shopping street. If we had not been accompanied by a few locals, we may not have ventured down there, but I am glad that we did.
The first surprise in Buff was the prices. I ordered two bottles of cider and two pints of lager and was charged for 11GBP. Considering it was a Friday night in a night-club in a major British city was expecting to pay roughly double that. So, I was delighted – it put me in even more of a dancing mood! On top of this, the beer was good; it was crisp and cold.
Buff is separated into two floors. The bottom is more of a bar. It plays modern music – rock and indie music rather than techno or dance - at rather loud volumes. We settled in to enjoy our beers and chill out a little to the music. It was not bad at all and I could easily have spent a very nice evening like that. However, our desire to dance and the fact that it was rather crowded downstairs pushed us upstairs to the dance-floor.
When we got there, I was both delighted and astounded to find that not only was the dance-floor busy buzzing, but that the music was 1960s British music of the mod variety. I am a huge fan of such sounds – The Small faces and the Spencer Davis Group are a couple of major favourites – which meant my girlfriend and I were onto the dance-floor extremely quickly. There were a couple of factors that conspired to make the dancing fantastic. The first was that we had been at a traditionally Scottish Wedding and had been 'enjoying' Caley dancing. There had been no modern music at all, so we were very much ready for a change of pace. The second was that we were all dressed rather formally because of the wedding, so we fitted into the 1960s vibe very well.
We had an absolutely fantastic time at Buff and I would heartily recommend it to anyone who is visiting Glasgow and looking for a good evening out. It was free to enter and the drinks were cheap.   Close

Call me naive but I believed that Ben Nevis was nothing more than a glorified hill somewhere in the Highlands. Well, trust me, I’ve been eating humble pie ever since. This mountain is certainly do-able is you are reasonably fit but don’t underestimate it. The…Read More

Call me naive but I believed that Ben Nevis was nothing more than a glorified hill somewhere in the Highlands. Well, trust me, I’ve been eating humble pie ever since. This mountain is certainly do-able is you are reasonably fit but don’t underestimate it. The path is steep and it gets very, very cold and wet up there. Initially we speeded up the steep paths, jumped over rocks, even took a detour to a lake some one third of the way up. But then the mist started coming in, there was no view to keep us entertained anymore and our legs started to hurt a lot. Fast forward another two hours and we long passed the last greenery. All you have left now was rocks and a bunch of tired hikers. We were right in the clouds slowly crawling along the never ending zigzag lines, convinced that it could only be bare minutes until we finally reached the top. And the temptation grew to ask the grinning hikers descending how much longer this torture was going to go on for.

So here is a word of warning: regardless how tempting it is – do not ever ask people how much longer your ordeal is going to last! Obviously we made that mistake and we lived to regret it. In a fun way obviously and it gave us some good laughs when we finally made it down. But up there in the cold it was no fun whatsoever. So imagine this situation, you are tired, wet and ready to give up at any point. All those happy people around you skip past you on their way down. They look happy, they are grinning, clearly I can’t be too bad?! So we asked some random guy. His response was "Only like 30 minutes to go – you are nearly there". Thirty minutes later we were nowhere closer to the top so we asked again. The next answer we got was "About an hour, maybe ninety minutes". Hang on, really? Alright, let’s have another break and then get going.
Zigzag after zigzag passed and suddenly the sun broke though. And what we saw was absolutely soul destroying! The mountain ahead of us was still stupidly high with its zigzags filled with hikers crawling up like ants. Thank you Mr. 30 minutes that we passed over an hour ago. Thankfully the clouds started coming in again and we didn’t have to see just how much of the way was still ahead of us. So we walked on but we were decisively less cheerful than before. A couple of minutes later r random guy shouted that we were nearly there, maybe another ten minutes or so. Given what we had just seen we were very much aware that there was no way we could do this in 10 minutes but we really, really wanted to believe it!

After another half hour we were ready for another break. A lovely old lady on her way down stopped smiled and said "Don’t worry guys, just 45 more minutes and past two snowfields and you’ll be there". I am not kidding you, that woman said snowfields. We were absolutely convinced that she was having a laugh. Please, this is a hill in Scotland and it was late June. No way there would be snowfields up there.

Well, fast forward another 30 minutes and we are in the middle of a total white out. Snow was all around us, we could not see more than 5 meters ahead and it was bloody freezing. As fun as this might sound this is actually the most treasures part. There are no markings whatsoever and it is fairly easy to lose your sense of direction. At one point we came very close to the edge and nearly tumbled down a drop off. But we were too far gone to turn around now so we pushed on and finally made it – the top of Ben Nevis, the highest peak in the UK. The landscape is dreadfully eary and we were surrounded by clouds – but still, there was hardly any better feeling in the world than standing on top of this "tiny hill".

From there on it was only a short hike (well, 2 ½ hours) hike back down. But by this point the pain in our legs and the freezing cold did not matter anymore. We had made it to the top. And at some point we found ourselves saying "Yeah, you are nearly there, it’s not that hard" to the unfortunate hikers still on their way up. Clearly endorphin alters your pain reception and time awareness tremendously.

Climb this mountain and enjoy it – but for your own sanity do not ask anyone how much longer it is going to be until you reach the top! Once you are on your way down you’ll understand why anyone passing you has such a smug grin in their face too. And let me tell you one thing – it is well deserved!
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Scotland isn't exactly known for its tradition of sophisticated cuisine, but there's been more and more high-quality restaurants opening in the country all the time, and although day-to-day Scottish food tends towards stodge and fat, there are some products and dishes that you just have…Read More

Scotland isn't exactly known for its tradition of sophisticated cuisine, but there's been more and more high-quality restaurants opening in the country all the time, and although day-to-day Scottish food tends towards stodge and fat, there are some products and dishes that you just have to try.

Like many cultures from wet and cold places, Scots are good at grain products, and cakes and pastries are something of a national weakness. Try the Dundee Cake -- a ground-almond enriched fruit-cake covered with whole almonds, or the Black Bun, a dark almost flour-less Christmas concoction covered in plain pastry traditionally associated with Hogmany (New Year).

Savoury pastries of note include butteries, the Scottish take on a croissant, salty, flaky and delightful if eaten hot, with extra butter (the ''buttery'' of the name is a misnomer, as the rolls are made with lard and yeasty dough). A quick lunch is often a Scotch Pie or a Bridie grabbed from a bakery -- both mince-meat filled pasties, the first one a somewhat plain one, usually round, the latter a flaky pocket with savoury filling. When bed, both can be atrocious, but when good, they are lovely if rather greasy.

A ''fish supper'' is what Scots call the fish and chips, and the best Scottish chippies serve fantastic versions of this British traditional take away indeed: with fat, crispy chips with fluffy insides and fresh fish in light batter. You will be always asked if you want salt and vinegar, and you should, to cut through the grease.

A chippie is a heaven for deep-fry fans and the nation that ostensibly invented a deep-fried Mars bar (though in all honesty I only ever saw Japanese tourists ordering those) deep-fries in batter everything else too, including sausages, chicken and haggis.

Speaking of which, haggis is indeed something that needs to be tried. Traditionally associated with the Burns Night celebrations on 25th January, haggis is an oatmeal and meat (mostly offal) concoction If you have it in a gastro-pub or a restaurant, it will often come as a top slice of a little tower constructed of mashed potato and mashed swede (rutabaga). Confusingly, swede is called a turnip in Scotland! Although ingredients of a haggis may seem off-putting, don't knock down this well-spiced dish before you try. Good haggis is very good indeed.

Meat - especially excellent beef, of which Aberdeen Angus and Highland Cattle are the best - can be very good in Scotland. A steak pie - a rich beef stew covered with flaky pastry - is traditionally eaten on New Year's day, and is another pub meal staple.

Venison, either farmed or wild, as well as game fowl, makes for popular restaurant choices, what with so much of the Highlands covered by shooting estates.

Seafood, shellfish on the west coast, white fish on the east and salmon, wild or farmed, all over, are also worth trying and very popular. Try to get a good Arbroath smokie - a smoked haddock done in a traditional way in or around the small East-coast fishing town. Nothing beats one freshly smoked, hot from the barrel, but they are available in restaurants and at fishmongers throughout the country.

Fruit and vegetables are not as non-existing in Scottish diet as it might seem, in fact Scotland grows a lot of soft fruit for the UK market, with strawberries and particularly raspberries happily growing on the acidic soils. June and July are the high season for those and you will see punnets of freshly picked ones sold from stalls at the roadside.

And finally, if you are staying in a B&B, choose one which serves a good cooked breakfast: you can get your fill of porridge, bacon, sausages, haggis, black pudding and, potato scones and toast, all washed down with strong tea, to last you the whole day!   Close

Although all of the UK enjoys a relatively mild climate considering its actual latitude, the Scottish weather, especially in the Highlands, and especially in the west, gets a fairly deserved bad press.This is less to do with the fact that the weather is incredibly harsh,…Read More

Although all of the UK enjoys a relatively mild climate considering its actual latitude, the Scottish weather, especially in the Highlands, and especially in the west, gets a fairly deserved bad press.

This is less to do with the fact that the weather is incredibly harsh, as the temperatures rarely drop into below zero and snow isn't that common on the sea level, and more with the amount of rain, the weather's fickle changeability and the fierce gales that combine with the damp to sometimes create a literally lethal wind chill factor.

To keep it in perspective, though, unless unlucky or careless on a mountain side or a deserted moor, you are extremely unlikely to die of exposure in Scotland on the sea level. The mountains are a different matter, and even in the summer you need to come prepared for quick changes of weather. Always carry a waterproof jacket, an extra layer of clothes and be ready for a sudden and unexpected drop of temperature, rain and wind picking up. It is said that you can see all seasons in one day in Scotland, and nowhere it is as true as it is in the hills of the Highlands.

There is quite a regional variation in weather patterns as well, with the west being noticeably wetter and more cloudy (though the very coast gets more sunshine that even a couple of miles inland).

North-western Highlands are cold and wet, with the average annual high temperatures in Kinlochewe around 12C, average low 5C, 57 days of frost, 217 days with some rain and less than an hour of sunshine per day in December and January, going up to about 5 hours a day in May (which tends to be the sunniest month here).

Braemar in the Cairngorms, where the coldest temperatures in the UK are frequently recorded, is colder but a bit sunnier, with May and June again the sunniest months with relatively least rain.

On the other hand, Leuchars in Fife near the east coast north of Edinburgh has similar annual average temperatures to Kinlochewe, but three times as much sunshine in January and December and a respectable 7 hours a day in May, with two-thirds of the days rain free all year round. Edinburgh has similar weather patterns.

All in all, May and June are probably some of the best months to come to Scotland. In June, the average highs in the south of the country are around 17C, the lows around 10C. In the Highlands, the temperatures are comparable in July & August, with June and especially May cooler at around 14-15C average high and 7C average low, but there is more sunshine and if you comein May, the midges are less likely to be out yet!
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If the Scottish weather, apart from being generally wetter (especially on the west coast) than many other places in the UK, tends to be at least a little bit better than its pretty universally held image, and the wildlife in Scotland is mostly as benign…Read More

If the Scottish weather, apart from being generally wetter (especially on the west coast) than many other places in the UK, tends to be at least a little bit better than its pretty universally held image, and the wildlife in Scotland is mostly as benign as everywhere else in the UK, there is one creature that keeps visitors away from large swathes of the best Scottish landscape for half of the year.

This creature is a small insect that flies slowly and can be easily squashed with two fingers: the Highland Midge.

Midges are a bane of the outdoors on the west coast of Scotland (although they appear in other areas as well, but in vastly smaller quantities) and anybody who is considering camping or even just hiking in those areas between late April and October (and certainly May to September) should really pay some heed to keeping midges at bay.

There are various theories as to how best you can avoid the pesky insects, but frankly, if you are in a midge-infested place, there is very little you can do.

They like damp, warm(ish) and windless. They don't like dry and hot, so won't be out in full summer sunshine (although that tends to be rare in the Highlands). They don't like windy, but then windy is not much for for people either. They are not very fast, so walking at a reasonable speed (easy on flat, not so easy when slogging up a hill) will keep them from biting, but stopping for any reason will bring them on in spats.


What CAN you do, then?

1) Stay indoors, especially when midges come out in droves, which tends to be at dusk and earlish in the morning. Unlike mosquito, midges don't invade buildings much, though if you leave an open window and a light on at night, you will need a vacuum cleaner to get rid of them, and you will miss some.

2) Use a repellent. Various ones have their own fans, in my personal experience the best OVERALL is a new one called The Smidge, expensive but effective and not too horrible. DEET-containing tropical-strength repellents also work, but in addition to repelling midges, they dissolve your electronic equipment (or at least plastic parts thereof) and make the food taste foul. Some people swear by Avon's Skin-So-Soft jojoba skin oil (the original green/blue bottle), and it's commonly sold in shops in the Highlands. I find that it works reasonably, but needs to be reapplied very frequently and smells worse than Smidge (but better than DEET).

3) Cover up. Wear long-sleeved tops, long trousers and some form of hat. If you do a lot of hiking, or are likely to be outdoors a lot and unable to hide from midges, seriously consider getting a midge net for your head. Sometimes you will need it simply not to choke on the swarm of midges even if the repellent keeps them from biting you! Some people buy full-body midge suits, and you know, it's not as a ridiculous idea as it seems.

4) Check midge forecast at ww.midgeforecast.co.uk and try to choose areas where the midge levels are lower.
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Broadford, the first bigger place on the Isle of Skye after driving off the bridge, is a long, sprawling settlement stretching for about a mile along A87. It's not a particularly lovely village, but it is the main service centre for the south of the…Read More

Broadford, the first bigger place on the Isle of Skye after driving off the bridge, is a long, sprawling settlement stretching for about a mile along A87. It's not a particularly lovely village, but it is the main service centre for the south of the island and it has been recently chosen by the Sunday Times as a one of the top places in Scotland to live in.

The views towards the mainland and up-island are lovely indeed, and the presence of the large Co-op supermarket, open seven days a week and till late, means that Broadford is indeed the place to stop for any provisions.

In addition to the Co-op, Broadford has a laundrette (at the back of the supermarket, on the petrol station side) as well as a hospital, several hostels (including rather nice Broadford Backpackers, on the same turnoff as the hospital), two garages for servicing and fixing your car; hotels, restaurants and a few gift shops. If you are after wool or knitwear, unique but on an expensive side, check out the Handspinner Having Fun at the old pier (well signposted).

Up the road, past the bridge,near the post office and the bank, is the Woodrising gallery of photography, where very pretty prints of lovely Skye landscapes can be bought (and there is free coffee, even for browsers).

If you are looking for a quick bite to eat, the Waterfront chippie is passable, but if the fast food van is open on the ''market square'' behind the co-op, have something from there, the burgers come from Strahtcarron butchers and are really good, and coffee is OK too.

Broadford is also a location for one of the few Skye rainy-weather attractions, namely the Serpentarium, a small but reasonably diverting for a short visit, reptile rescue centre which has snakes, lizards, frogs, tortoises, iguanas and the like, in addition to a case exhibiting illegally traded goods of reptilian origin. Snake handling sessions are on offer, and you can settle your nerves with a beverage in the next-door Watermill cafe. Serpentarium is closed on weekdays November to March.    Close

Kyleakin is a small village that used to receive the ferries that departed from Kyle of Lochalsh to Skye before the Skye Bridge took over the task. About 200 years ago, Lord Macdonald planned developing Kyleakin as a model new town of "New Liverpool",…Read More

Kyleakin is a small village that used to receive the ferries that departed from Kyle of Lochalsh to Skye before the Skye Bridge took over the task.

About 200 years ago, Lord Macdonald planned developing Kyleakin as a model new town of "New Liverpool", but not much of that came to fruition.

The loss of the ferry traffic put the hamlet more off the beaten track somehow, with the main A87 road that goes north bypassing the village. However, it has reinvented itself somewhat as a location for backpackers' hostels and gets actually fairly busy in the summer, while at other times it's a sleepy place.

I wouldn't make a big point of going to Kyelakin on purpose, however if you have an hour or two to spare in the area, it's worth the little detour or a 2-mile walk from the Skye Bridge roundabout.

The views down Lochalsh are pretty good, and the Kyleakin harbour is rather picturesque. You can climb the hill above the village, or for a less taxing little walk, go along the shingle beach opposite the harbour, past some decoratively dilapidated fishing vessels and to the ancient ruin of Castle Moil, a 15th century castle that used to guard the narrows and from which the legendary princess called Saucy Mary (after whom a popular hostel in the village is named) extracted a toll from vessels passing through.

The ruin is small, but the views from the top of the little hillock on which it stands are excellent, especially towards the bridge, and on a not-too-midgey day it's a nice place to have a picnic lunch.

Kyleakin is also the location for Bright Water Visitor Centre, where you can discover the biodiversity of the local area and book the tour of the islet of Eilen Ban. It supports the Skye Bridge now, but it's known for its Stephenson lighthouse and the cottage of Gavin Maxwell, of the ''Ring of Bright Water'' otter novel fame.

Kyleakin hall hosts many local performances, and when the mobile cinema Screen Machine comes to the area, it parks at the Kyleakin village car park.    Close

As everywhere else in the UK, Scotland is and old place with an long-standing culture full of subtle (as well as not so subtle) complications and fault lines. Certain sensitivities are common to all parts of the UK, but others are quite specific to Scotland,…Read More

As everywhere else in the UK, Scotland is and old place with an long-standing culture full of subtle (as well as not so subtle) complications and fault lines.

Certain sensitivities are common to all parts of the UK, but others are quite specific to Scotland, or even its particular parts or regions.

I am not attempting to write an anthropological guide here, just point out certain aspects of the culture that a traveller or a visitor might want to be aware of, either to avoid an unpleasant moment or just to enhance the understanding of the place.

Nationality. Never, ever call a Scott ''English'' and never refer to Scotland as ''England''. Although it is understood that people from outside the UK will use ''England'' as a metonymy for the whole of Great Britain, and often for the whole of the United Kingdom, it's a very bad form to do it in Scotland. The Union of both countries is still an extremely controversial thing, and in fact the Edinburgh government is (at the time of writing in 2012) in the hands of SNP, a nationalist party whose main (and some say, the only honestly held and real) objective is to achieve full independence for Scotland. The history of Scottish-English wars is long and illustrious and the memory of some battles, particularly the massacre at Culloden (although that was fought actually, along dynastic and religious fault-lines more than national ones) is still alive. Just. Remember. Scots. Are. Not. A. Subset. Of. The. English.

The attitudes to the UK project are more complex and although majority of the Scots support some form of independence, many do not. Historically, many Scots played an important part in the imperial expansion of the UK, and Scottish thinkers, writers and philosophers are an integral part of the mainstream UK intellectual life.

Religion. Overall, more of a fault line in Scotland than in England but less than in Ireland. If you talk to people from Glasgow, you are likely to hear about ''sectarianism'' which will inevitably refer to the tribal rivalry between the Protestants (specifically Church of Scotland) and Catholics, and will be often connected to the conflict between the supporters of the city's two main football clubs, Rangers (the Prod one) and Celtic (the Catholic one). Historically, many a big social upheaval in Scotland had a religious element, including both of the Jacobite rebellions of the 18th century. Nowadays outside Glasgow the Catholic-Protestant differences are significantly less pronounced, in line with the increasingly secular character of the culture in all of the UK.

In the Highlands, and particularly in the Western Isles, the Wee Frees, an extreme protestant church that split off the main Scottish Kirk, still has a powerful influence in many areas, where hanging out washing on a Sunday is frowned upon, playgrounds are chained closed and ferries don't run on a Sabbath.

Region. The rivalry between Edinburgh and Glasgow is legendary, each of those fascinating cities quite particular about its respective image Edinburgh's is one of a refined, cultured and decidedly upper-middle class snobbishness with an undercurrent of decadent darkness dating maybe as far as it medieval days. Glasgow considers itself a down-to-earth, working-class, genuine, friendly and non-snobby, with an undercurrent of violence and a gangland mythology to rival that of London's East End (not for nothing a head-butt is known as a Glasgow Kiss).

There are minor reflections of that archetypal fault-line, for example the antipathy between Perth (a snobby market town that considers itself a refined city) and Dundee (''Scumdee'' in the words of many a less refined Perth inhabitant).

The Highlanders (aka ''tchuchters'', although this word can also be applied to any person from the countryside even if not from the Highlands) are often regarded with reciprocal suspicion by the people from the Central Belt, while in the Highlands themselves the inhabitants of the East Coast are considered dour and repressed by those from the West, supposedly possessed of more of a free spirit and Celtic ''craik''.    Close

A phenomenon that, although appearing occasionally in the most remote parts or on the least significant roads in England and Wales, a single track road with passing places is very much a Scottish thing. In the Highlands, many roads – even fairly major roads, and…Read More

A phenomenon that, although appearing occasionally in the most remote parts or on the least significant roads in England and Wales, a single track road with passing places is very much a Scottish thing.

In the Highlands, many roads – even fairly major roads, and in the most remote North, even the main trunk A-Roads – are single track.

A single track road is a road that has only enough room for one vehicle. Usually a vehicle means a lorry, which means that in SOME places two smallish cars may be able to pass slowly, but in the vast majority of cases it's the passing places that must be used for that purpose.

Passing places are wider areas of the road sort of bulging out on one side, usually enough for a lorry or two-three normal cars to fit in.

There isn't really much mystery or difficulty in using single track roads, although they can be tiring because they require constantly paying attention even if there is very little traffic.

The basic principle is simple: the cars need to pass in the passing places, and if you don't notice the car approaching soon enough, one of you would need to reverse. Always stop at the correct side of the road – ie when the actual widening in the road is on the left, you should still stop on the right and the car approaching will pass around you using the space. Usually people tend to wait in the passing spaces that are on their side of the road, as it feels more natural than stopping in what feels like the middle of the lane.

Passing spaces are also used to allow overtaking. Please, please, please do that if driving in Scotland. On country roads, especially the wilder ones, the very local locals who know each bend and pothole drive much faster than the visitors, and even the less-local locals going about their daily business tend to drive faster than those who look at landscape and amble about. If you see somebody catching up behind you, pull in into a passing space and let them overtake.

Most single-track roads have plenty of passing spaces, but on a winding or a very hilly road, it isn't always possible to see to the next passing place and thus some degree of planning is required.

Essentially, though, just being watchful and taking your time is all you need.

And remember, never, ever use a passing place to park! Stopping to check a map or something similar is OK (use the indicator to encourage overtaking) but leaving your car is a real no-no.    Close

The street sculptures outside St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh are some of the weirdest I have encountered. The first time I saw them was just before I entered the cathedral. My husband didn’t want to enter the church so he stayed behind trying to figure…Read More

The street sculptures outside St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh are some of the weirdest I have encountered. The first time I saw them was just before I entered the cathedral. My husband didn’t want to enter the church so he stayed behind trying to figure out what they symbolised. I hadn’t a clue and from the steps of the cathedral, they just looked like giant sized lumps of black, shiny metal.

After I had finished my tour of the cathedral I went out to look at these three statues that were designed by Scottish artist and sculptor, Eduardo Paolozzi. They were placed in this position in 1991 on the pavement opposite the church and at the top of Leith Walk. The piece of work is called, The Manuscript of Monte Casino, this is where the artist’s Italian family came from.

In the Second World War German troops invaded the town and took over the famous abbey, British and American Forces were unable to defend the town, Polish soldiers stepped in, many, many lives were lost but in the end the Poles were victorious. I know this from the inscriptions on a beautiful monument situated in Warsaw commemorating the bravery of the Polish 2nd Corps.

Paolozzi’s set sculpture isn’t as beautiful as the one in Warsaw but it is certainly interesting.The three pieces consist of a hand holding a spherical object, a foot with split dimensions and a large object with a metal bar running through the centre. The three piece sculpture symbolises a journey or pilgrimage. The hand is outstretched, ready to give or receive hospitality.The foot represents travel and if you look closely at the hand you will see two locusts, one on top of the other. This may be a biblical reference to the swarm of locusts in the Bible.

The statues do have a surreal quality about them but at the same time I can see the classical outlines. They are very large in size and I should imagine extremely heavy. I believe they were cast in a foundry in Germany.

Paolozzi was born in Leith, and perhaps he wanted the sculptures placed near where he used to live at Crown Place, near to the old station. In 1943 he was a student at Edinburgh College of Art and called up for army service the next year. Later on he went to Slade School of Fine Art in London and then worked in Paris for three years from 1947 to 1949.

In 2005, Paolozzi was awarded an Honorary Degree by Edinburgh University and was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1988. He was 81 years of age when he died in 2005.

If you would like to know more about this fascinating sculptor then pop into the Dean Gallery in Edinburgh where you will find a recreation of his art studio. Don't miss out on viewing this three piece sculptur either, it is fascinating.

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