Scotland

Light of life

/ Ineke Knot

While I was visiting Glasgow a while back, I walked through Kelvingrove Park on my way to Glasgow Vineyard Church. Because of a silly mistake I was rushing to get there in time. Sometimes, though, while I walk, I feel like there’s something I need to pay attention to. Something that’s more important than the meeting or thing that’s preoccupying my mind. 

That’s when I noticed a fir tree. It looked incredibly beautiful and green, with some sort of green berries at the tips of it’s leaves. So full and lush, at first sight. It drew me closer. But then, as I got closer, I noticed that it was only the outside that was green. The inside was leaflessy brown. No sunlight could penetrate the thick layer of leafs shielding its inside. 

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Stagnant water

/ Ineke Knot

Do you like waterfalls? If so, how do you like them? Do you like to look at them? Or do you like to jump off them? When we think of waterfalls, we think of powerful displays of nature. Litres of water tumbling down meters of substrate. But we risk forgetting that the waterfall is part of a river. And only a short part in that. Some parts of the exact same river might be slow-streaming, maybe even stagnant.

Have you ever noticed that these stagnant parts are even part of the waterfall itself? Rock formations give shelter to the fast pacing water. Small or big pools turn around in the same circles, over and over again. However, the slightest change in position of the water could completely change its state. It would result in the water being violently pulled back into the river, flowing along with its course.

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Persistence

/ Ineke Knot

Recently my boyfriend and I were in Scotland, where we camped next to Loch Achray. From our tent we had a beautiful view of Ben A’an, a 454 metres (1,491 ft) high mountain. Yes, I’m aware of the fact that in the UK a mountain is officially defined as a peak of 600 metres (1,969 ft) or higher. However, given that the highest point in the Netherlands is 322 metres (1,058 ft), I personally classify Ben A’an to be a mountain.

We woke up to a clear day and the tantalising view across the lake seemed to draw us towards Ben A’an. Described by my ‘Wild’ guidebook as ‘giving perhaps the best views-to-effort ratio of any Scottish mountain’, we knew we had to make the ascent. So up we went, my boyfriend sometimes slowing me down when my enthusiasm would make me speed up to an unsustainable pace. We saw a beautiful mansion disguised as a castle, heard a stream rumble, passed a bridge and walked along a big sad stretch of cleared trees. And then the steep part came. The part about which I questionably asked: ‘Ehm, do you think it’s that peak?’. Until we caught the glimpse of a bright red jacket and realised that, indeed, the last part of the climb would be that steep.

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