Drained (Glendevon Reservoir)

A friend of mine has a habit of finding cool places to visit. So much so that in the last few days I asked her to share her secrets, rather than have me ask where she was when I see her photos/videos on social media (Atlas Obscura was her answer, if you’re interested).

She posted a video, just a few seconds long, of a dilapidated house in a misty valley. When I enquired about the location, she explained that a drained reservoir had exposed some buildings that had previously been submerged.

I knew immediately that I had to visit. I had no idea how long the reservoir would be empty. Google didn't provide any enlightenment on that front so i figured that it would be best to go sooner rather than later. It would hardly be the first time that I'd gone off to photograph something, only to find that the circumstances had changes entirely and that I had missed the boat.

* The reason the reservoir was empty was a simple one. It had run out of water. I had assumed it was for maintenance but apparently we just had a particularly dry summer and we had used it all up. This reservoir is one of 5 in the area so we're not about to run out just yet.

It was Friday and I had the weekend mornings free. Saturday would be foggy and overcast, Sunday would be rain. Foggy and overcast is some of my favourite weather to photograph. By contrast, rain is down there with my least favourites. It was an easy choice to make. For the first time in a while, I was heading out early to photograph something entirely new. It was exciting.

The weather on the drive up was promising. Foggy enough to provide atmosphere, but clear for a hundred yards or so before things started fading into the white.

Roughly a mile before reaching my destination, things went wrong. The fog vanished and the sun appeared. While I'm sure the majority of the population would see this as a good thing, for me, this was disastrous. I was looking for atmosphere and isolation. Now it looked like a summer's day. Blue skies all round. Eurgh.

I'm not going to lie, I was furious! How dare the weather do this to me, in Scotland no less. This was a betrayal. And it's what I get for showing enthusiasm. Knowing full well that the images in my head were now impossible, I continued on to get a look at the site. You never know what might present itself.

What presented itself might not have been what I was looking for but it was certainly worth exploring. Hulking concrete structures that carved through the landscape. Some of them could be mistaken for WWII bunkers. The photo above looks like it could have been taken in France in 1945.

I was still angry about the lovely weather, though. I wasn't going home empty handed but I would be leaving without the photos I came for, which is always frustrating. The good thing was that the sunshine was doing a good job of drying out the reservoir bed, which meant I could wander about without sinking to my knees in silt. Good thing too, as I realised later on that I had left my phone in the car. Had I fallen and got stuck in the mud, I would have been there for a while.

My favourite shot of the day came as I had decided that I was finished with the reservoir floor. The dam wall is an impressive chunk of concrete. It's hardly the Hoover Dam but when it's entirely exposed like this, it's imposing.

Looking over the edge, I could see that the patterns on the ground looked cosmic. It was like looking at the surface of Jupiter. The above shot, is looking straight down from the dam wall.

I headed back to the car, annoyed that I hadn't got what I'd come for but glad to be going back with a few interesting photos. And I'd been able to enjoy the morning walk.

It occurred that this was one of the benefits of shooting for your own sake. Had I been on a paid job to get a specific thing, the option to simply change tack and go for something else wouldn't have been an option. So it's good to freestyle it sometimes and see what happens. It also means that when conditions aren’t favourable, it’s not the end of the world.

I did photograph the resurfaced house and the dam wall in its entirety but the light was all wrong for them so they aren't photographs that I would share. I'll treat them as location scouting and hope that by the time I get back up there, the water hasn't been replenished.

The last photo here is an alternative take. I don’t normally share my alternates as I prefer to curate the best ones and leave it at that but I liked the optical illusion with this. Like the above image off the edge of the dam, this is a top down view from the top to the ground. Except this shot includes my feet. The gray line down the middle of the photo is the sheer dam wall. Everything to the right of that line is 50 feet lower than everything to the left of it.

Dunmore

The Pineapple. Upon hearing this, most of the world would think of the fruit. However for those of us who live within a certain radius of Dunmore, a rather different image springs to mind.

I remember as a child, people would refer to it matter of factly. As if it was normal to talk about “The Pineapple” as being something to visit. It was all very confusing for my tiny brain. The reassuring thing is that the Pineapple continues to confuse people, even after they see it in person. You might even be confused as you read this.

So what am I wittering on about?

Built in the mid 18th Century, it was a summer house with an extravagant decoration on the top. At the time, pineapples were seen as fancy food in Scotland (and still in in many places) and as was so often the case with wealthy landowners of the time, the Earl of Dunmore was keen to demonstrate how rich and cultured he was. So we now have this interesting building that is hidden away in the woods. It’s not hard to get to but the turnoff is easy to miss and the road there is poorly maintained.

In all honesty, there’s not much to it, other than the outer design. There are some rooms on the inside that you can stay in for a long weekend. I’m not sure if it was unfinished or refurbished because there’s a serious style clash between the workmanship of the entrance and pineapple itself (which is amazing) and the surrounding building, which looks like post war social housing.

There is clearly some maintenance of the grounds but it’s not like some of the walled gardens that you can see around Scotland. The upkeep here is mainly to make sure you can get through the gates and walk about safely once inside.

The estate is extensive, though. And there are a few interesting sites to visit. The order that you find them depends on the direction you go when you leave the Pineapple. It loops round though so you shouldn’t miss anything when you walk round.

The first of the sites that I’ll talk about here is the smallest. The Mausoleum.

You can actually go inside the structure as the door lies open. I believe that it was a crypt. There are certainly spaces that would accommodate a number of coffins. As best as I could see, there’s not a lot more on the inside. I guess the idea was that it wasn’t for spending any more time in than was necessary.

Further round the ground lies the stables. At first sight, at least from the front, it could be mistaken for a medieval church. It was clearly designed with giving that impression. Once you get exploring, you can see that it’s in a sorry state. There are signs that some work has been done to secure certain stairwells but it’s a long way from being structurally sound.

And then there is Dunmore House. It was clearly the heart of the Dunmore empire back in the day but these days is mostly a forgotten ruin. The Pineapple is locally famous. My guess is that most of the visitors to the Pineapple are completely unaware of the mansion that once was.

There are several reasons for that, I suppose. You need to go to find it, for one. And as some friends found out recently, the paths there can be messy to traverse if you’re not wearing the appropriate footwear. Also, much like the stables, it’s not the safest of buildings to visit. There is a cellar level that is periodically accessible by a careless step. A fact that I nearly found out myself once when I stepped backwards while photographing an archway only to find that I had been inches away from plunging down into the darkness of a 19th century manor cellar.

I’ve been a lot more careful about where I put my feet since then.

It’s an interesting place for a few reasons. It was only abandoned in 1961, yet it’s getting to the point where it’s almost completely reclaimed by nature. Some places are inaccessible because they’ve collapsed or are blocked by trees and plants.

It also must have been impressive when it was in its heyday. There are dozens of rooms and many more dozens of fireplaces. I guess heating was a high priority of the Dunmore crew.

Anyone familiar with 80s fever dream ‘Labyrinth’ will get a familiar feeling. While I’m sure it felt more conventional when it was a functioning home, the remaining skeleton has all these stairways and doorways that lead to nowhere. I defy anyone to spend any amount of time there and not half expect to see David Bowie’s bulge to appear, soon to be followed by David Bowie himself.

Lastly, it made a brief appearance as a hospital in time travelling show, Outlander. They picked an apt location, as there would have been no shortage of spare needles.