Here is an update on travelling through London Heathrow to Edinburgh (current as of Februrary 11, 2022 and at time of publication. Travel guidelines and restrictions are subject to change; be sure to check with existing national and local government agencies as well as your airline for the most up-to-date information for your travels)

Scottish Blue Badge guide Susan Brown [Eyes on Scotland and Eyes on Bermuda] spends her winters in sunny Bermuda (lucky lady!), and this year, she’s giving us a photographic tour of the the island’s town of St. George all decked out in holiday lights.

For my third installment on the theme of artists and artisans, I’m introducing some of  my favourite artists whom I have been following on social media for a few years now. They range across a variety of media, but perhaps unsurprisingly for a Scottish Blue Badge guide, all of these artists are Scottish. Indeed they are all based on the west coast of Scotland—two in the county of Argyll and two on the Isle of Harris in the Outer Hebrides. 

Sam McDonald is fascinated by the beams of light that penetrate the water and illuminate aspects of the fish who seem to be oblivious to his presence. It is this regular interaction with the marine environment which has given Sam the insight to create such beautiful pieces by mixing resin and traditional metal working techniques, patination, and pewter, gold leaf, brass, and other metals. 

Living on an island means that local raw materials are finite, and part of wood craftsman Alex’s ethos is to reuse and repurpose discarded wood, whether it be windfall, landscaping waste, ocean flotsam and jetsam or off-cut wood. Chris, a designer of rope art, believes in sustainability wherever possible and repurposes discarded ropes that he finds in the ocean, as well as working with new ropes.

Until last week, I understood over-tourism to be an urban problem, limited to cities like Edinburgh, Rome, Paris, New York, Sydney, or Barcelona. I was forced to re-evaluate in the most unlikely of locations—a beautiful beach on the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, about as far away from the likes of a global metropolis as you could possibly imagine.

Scotland is home to a pilgrimage route that is up there in terms of importance with the better known routes to the popular disciple destinations of Rome (St Peter) and Santiago de Compostela (St James the Great). Why ? Well, the town of Kilrymont, or St Andrews as it was renamed, was home to some of the relics (bones) of St Andrew, one of the twelve apostles of Jesus and brother of St Peter.

So many of the stories we hear about travel in Africa are focussed on the Eastern and Southern parts of the continent, including Kenya,Tanzania, Namibia, and South Africa. I was based in West Africa for just over two years in the early 2000’s and had some great experiences, both with work and for leisure.

Do you live on the East Coast of the United States of America and are desperate to get away for a beach vacation? There is a gem of a country only a couple of hours from the East coast that is waiting to wow you! That gem is the British island territory of Bermuda, and it is easy to fly to only a couple of hours by plane from Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Atlanta and Miami.

Europe Day is a bittersweet day for me. I am of the generation that had the opportunity to study and work in Europe. I had the freedom to go where I pleased for as long as I pleased, which—unless they already live there and have applied for settled status—UK citizens will no longer have. 

Human beings are social characters that need interaction to stimulate emotions, to energize thought processes, to bring experiences to life; and boy, have I loved the various communities I have been part of across the world!

I don’t know about you, but for me, the last 12 months has been a rollercoaster of highs, lows and just jogging along on life’s journey. It has been exhausting, exhilarating and exceptional, but not necessarily in equal doses.

Louisa Jordan’s working career was mainly in care and nursing on the East and West of Scotland. She later enlisted with the Scottish Women’s Hospitals for Foreign Service in December 1914, after the start of the First World War.  She joined the first Serbian unit and looked after war wounded soldiers until the outbreak of a typhus epidemic in 1915, when she took charge of a typhus ward in Serbia.