Much to my shame and embarrassment, I have to confess that, despite passing many of them over the years (I must have), I simply never noticed these signs marking the Clyde Walkway, a path of almost 40 miles which begins in Glasgow’s Partick, and ends in New Lanark.
I’ve noted a number of writers refer to the paths that lead into the section designated as the Clyde Walkway, presumably not realising or noticing their error.
Completed in 2005, and created as a joint enterprise by the councils of Glasgow City, South Lanarkshire, and North Lanarkshire, it is notable for remaining close to urban centres and has easy access to public transport. However, that doesn’t mean you’re not in danger of ending up to your neck in mud, silt or water, or going to have to climb in places.
That said, having known spots like that, I think most (maybe all) such sections have been abandoned, and easy sections substituted. That said, I only know the section that gets as far as Strathclyde Park, things could get tough on the way to New Lanark.
The sign
For some reason, I’ve never really noticed the signs marking the walkway, apparently cast metal, and painted to give them a colourful appearance. I think part of the problem with my noticing them is their random siting on various poles, at various heights, and possibly not all too obvious.
I might also be guilty of becoming too familiar with them too, and ceasing to notice them.
This one jumped out at me as I was heading home from shopping in Cambuslang.
It was dark (it nearly always is when I’m shopping), with little ambient light, so I decided this would have to be one of my rare flash shots, even though the distance was fairly far due to the sign being mounted high on a pole.
This was the intended pic, which came out reasonably given it was dark, at night, using flash, and a long zoom for the small sign mounted up on a pole.
I only found one other pic online (there MUST be more), from 2012, showing a bright and clean sign. This one looks a bit worse for wear, as do some others I’ve noticed since then.
Note the edge of a road traffic sign at the top, where the retroreflectors have caught the flash.
I should add these have been corrected for perspective (looking up at the sign) – the resulting wide ellipses instead of round/circular signs was just too much to bear!
Bonus pic
This extra pic was unplanned, but a shame to waste it.
I’m not sure what happened – most likely is the flash wasn’t fully charged when I pressed the shutter release. I’m guessing the camera fell back onto its non-flash mode, and set things up for an available light shot.
This shows I probably could have done without the flash – as the pic almost turned out.
The main problem is the long shutter time it chose (I normally block these to avoid shake) which led to camera shake, which might have been OK had I been holding it steady. However, anticipating a flash to freeze things, I wasn’t holding the camera properly.
The colours came out weird too, so I had to process them into something better.
Interesting result though, and a handy (rare) comparison between flash/no flash of the same subject.