07 January 2012

Beautiful Winter's Day

It's funny how people always say it rains a lot in Scotland (see the little YouTube video in my last post for a classic example). It's true it does rain quite often, but what often surprises people is that it tends to rain more in the summer than it does in the winter. Often in winter we have cold, bright and sunny days....the sort of days where you know you need to drag yourself outdoors into the cold to stare up at the bright blue sky and to soak up some much needed sun. 

Today was one of those days. So instead of staying indoors and stripping paint, I went out to for a walk to the beach with a friend. We were walking along the shore and the tide was high  so there wasn't a lot of beach to be seen but it was still lovely to be out. 

As we reached the point and turned south, I noticed 2 large birds of prey flying overhead. At first I thought buzzards, but then I realised that they were huge! Amazingly, it was a pair of sea (white-tailed) eagles. These are the 4th largest eagles in the world and used to live happily all over Scotland, but the were hunted to extinction in 1918. Since 1975 there has been a planned reintroduction project in Scotland, starting on the west coast, but since 2007 they have been reintroducing the birds to the east coast too. After some research, I think that these birds were released in 2009.

I have never seen one before so today was special! We stood and watched for around 20 minutes as they circled overhead and stood on the pine trees watching the horizon.




I was in awe of their majestic grace - just look at those wing tips!

7 comments:

Thimbleanna said...

Wow -- what a wonderful experience Di! How lucky you were to have stumbled across the Eagles. I'm not sure I've ever really seen Eagles in the wild, but I can imagine how much fun it must be to watch them. Your pictures are beautiful!

Karen S, Lykkefanten said...

Eagles in free flight is the best view in the sky! You were lucky and I can understand your fascination.

jane said...

wow! they are pretty amazing. lucky for us you were looking up. :)
x

Unknown said...

Love those winter days, sunny and cold. Here we haven´t have much yet...just grey and rainy. But will come and then I adore to go outside, and beach is perfect.
Photos of eagles are incredible.
And yeah it rain quite lot in summer...I suffered... ;)

Bethany said...

You were able to catch wonderful photos of them! It's hard to go out when it's so cold, but once outside, I'm always happy I did.

heather said...

how cool is that?! I love birds so much and certainly love seeing a new one, or one that's so rare!

patagonia was like that too. the winters were so calm and blue. bitter cold, but not as cold as they could be with all that summer wind.

wishing you a lovely super duper new year full of lots of new birdlife!

Hausfrau said...

How wonderful!

By the way, I keep meaning to thank you for all of your tips on Edinburgh--I really appreciate your taking the time to give me some ideas! We had a great time and would love to go back again--and to see other parts of Scotland, as well.