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Seen here are Northern Ireland’s famous ‘Dark Hedges‘, a magnificent avenue of beech trees that were planted over 200 years ago by the Stuart family. According to locals, the road was intended as a compelling landscape feature to impress visitors as they approached the entrance to their home, Gracehill House. Two centuries later, the trees remain a magnificent sight.
Climbing the slopes of Mount Etna to about 1600 m. Initially through oak forest, then pine, then silvery beech. Pushing across big patches of soft snow wishing we had fatbikes!
The forest was divided up by sections of bare volcanic rock, an alien landscape to both of us but really enjoyable to ride through. The pictures show us crossing an old flow from 1981 - part of the six day long stromboli lateral eruption according to the signpost.
Bike through New Zealand. As good as it sounds.
From the tangled sheep paths of the tussock grasslands to purpose-built trails snaking through the sharp mountain peaks, New Zealand ’s varied topography makes for an awe-inspiring mountain bike playground. We traveled throughout the South Island testing the SB5.5c on the fast, ragged conditions in Queenstown and Mount Cook to the mud and gnarled roots of the beech forests of Craigieburn.
The last living Jacobites, or, when the English steal your hedge trimmer...
For half a kilometer along the busy Perth-to-Blairgowrie road, the light is blotted out by a dense screen of beech trees. At 30 m high, this is the tallest hedge in the world.
The Meikleour (MEEK-loor) beech hedge was planted in 1745, when tensions between England and Scotland were at their height. The unpopular Act of Union was barely 40 years old, and many Scots viewed the exiled heirs to the Stuart dynasty as rightful kings whose place had been usurped. These tensions came to a head in the Jacobite Rebellion of 1745 (‘the Forty-Five’), in which the Jacobite army advanced to within a few days of London before the commanders’ courage failed and they made the mistaken decision to retreat. Five months later the rising was crushed completely at Culloden.
It is widely believed that the trees of the hedge were planted by men who then left to fight in the rebellion. They never returned, and the hedge they had started was allowed to grow tall in their memory.
Today the hedge is trimmed every ten years, an operation that takes four men six weeks to complete. Its edible nuts provide food for small animals in winter, and as beech trees commonly retain some of their leaves it also offers shelter to birds.
Since beeches can live for hundreds of years, it is likely that the Jacobites’ memorial will be standing for some time yet to come.
Image credits: Sandy Stevenson https://flic.kr/p/aWkMQp
Sources: http://bit.ly/1U0aD3u http://bit.ly/1U8vIYa Beech trees: http://bit.ly/1R1evL4 Jacobite rebellion: http://www.nts.org.uk/Culloden/PPF/
Seen here are Northern Ireland’s famous ‘Dark Hedges‘, a magnificent avenue of beech trees that were planted over 200 years ago by the Stuart family. According to locals, the road was intended as a compelling landscape feature to impress visitors as they approached the entrance to their home, Gracehill House. Two centuries later, the trees remain a magnificent sight.
The trees can be found along a section of Bregagh Road, about 80 kilometres from Belfast off Antrim Coastal Road. You can see it on Google Maps street view here: (http://bit.ly/1LiK0jA). You may also recognize the Dark Hedges from a scene on Game of Thrones where it doubled as the King’s Road.
-Jean
Photo by Giuseppe Milo: https://www.facebook.com/giuseppemilophoto
