No not some fantasy story but two towns on opposite sides of the River Forth.
Since it was another stellar day I decided to walk across the River Forth. Not having the skills to walk on the water, I chose the Forth River Bridge as the Queensbury Crossing is not yet open and the Rail Bridge is for, well, trains. Opened in 1964, it is in need of repair and was even closed to all traffic in early 2105 and heavy goods vehicles (HGV) for a year. Once the new Queensferry Bridge opens, this one, as I understand, will be limited to buses, bikes and pedestrians and then will further structural repairs be made.
So I took the train to North Queensferry and walked over.
The views from the bridge, including those of the new bridge and Forth Rail Bridge are as good as I had hoped. The Queensferry Crossing is a cable-stayed bridge and will have a total length of 2700m/8858′ with the longest span being 650m/2137′. Boston’s cabled-stayed bridge, the Zakim Bridge in comparison is 1432′ in length with it’s longest span is 745′
I believe that is the UK’s newest aircraft carrier, Queen Elizabeth and at 65,000 tonnes, 918′ long and 230′ from waterline to top of mast, the largest ship Britain has ever launched.
The Rail Bridge was opened in 1890 and for years it’s two 521m spans were the longest in the world. 110m over the water it has 200 train movements per day. It went through a 10 year restoration that was completed in 2012 required 4,500,000 man-hours and used 240,000 sites of paint.
After walking under the bridge I was now in the very pretty town of South Queensferry.
I went close to the river to get some more photos and spoke to an OAP who lived in the Senior center. He was puttering in the garden building raised beds with chickenwire to keep the deer out, and the residents enjoy the fresh eggs.
Inchgarvie is the island that can be seen by the rail bridge and has served as a prison and place for syphilis victims.
And Nessie is lost
And because one can never get enough uphill slogs, these are the stairs leading to the Dalmeny Rail station looking back down whilst catching my breath.
Being too tired to do much more walking I got a day bus pass and road around Edinburgh all afternoon getting on and off as things caught my eye.
And the harbor of Leith.
I had visited The Conan Doyle many years ago so no need to do so again.
But I can’t recall seeing this guy.
And I was startled to suddenly come across a view I had seen the first time I visited Edinburgh in 2003 in a post titled A Little Perspective
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