New to Lincolnshire Roadcar in 2004, this East Lancs Volvo is seen at work carrying the Interconnect version of Stagecoach livery.

I quite like how this turned out actually...

The blind showed and it shows its horrible new livery, if i've not bragged about this new livery enough lmao.

Seen leaving Lincoln bus station is E300 27636 on a 53 to Market Rasen, then Grimsby.

Repainted in 'InterConnect' livery but without branding, Stagecoach East Midlands 15652 stands in March town centre on service 56 to Wisbech. It is a Scania N230UD with Alexander Dennis Enviro400 bodywork, new in 2010 and fitted with high-backed seats.

YJ05 JXD leaves Lincoln for Boston empty on 9.4.21

I don't know if the InterConnect routes are run commercially or if they are a Lincolnshire County Council contract fulfilled by Stagecoach and Brylaine, but Stagecoach get away with using 67 plate double deckers on the 100 and Brylaine always use lightweight Optares.

Optare Tempo YJ57 EGY makes its way around Lincoln bus station as it sets off on its journey to Boston on the InterConnect 5, complete with 'low floor bus every time' sticker to reassure passengers Brylaine aren't going to unexpectedly spring a 25 year old Volvo B10M on them one day.

26.4.21

Skegness InterConnect 56 comes face-to-face with Gainsborough InterConnect 100 at the entrance to Lincoln bus station on 13.7.21 - not that there really was any real facing-off to be done; the 100 went in and the 56 followed it.

Vehs 16939 & 10899

I believe this is one of Gainsborough's vehicles? One of the more modern types of vehicle you will see around Scunthorpe is this batch of E400 MMCs for the 100 route.

Seen heading out of Scunthorpe Bus Station is E400 Interconnect branded MMC 10901 on its final run from Scunthorpe to Gainsborough.

Gainsborough MMC 10896 in Lincoln bus station having arrived with a 100. Usually the blind has the intermediate destination and then "connecting for" the main destination but this time it was just 100 to Lincoln, suggesting this journey originated in Gainsborough (and not Scunthorpe like most 100s).

2.3.21

The bridge up Broadgate isn't really something I've 'played' with up until this occasion, with a few vehicles crossing the gently humped section of road. One such here is Brylaine Optare Tempo YJ06 YSP, now on its return run to Coningsby and diverting away from the works you can just see in the background, with Pelham Bridge closed for ten weeks. It will climb out of the city to the north east before using the Eastern bypass to cross back towards its usual route, rejoining it just south of the city.

I didn't really feel like going to explore this part of the diversions in the recent heat, but this warm yet cloudy day on 14.6.21 was a decent opportunity to get out and see a few buses in a slightly different location to usual. I was hoping a Brylaine bus would drop by, but the appearance of this 06 plate was unplanned! I haven't seen it since March and today I ended up with my two best pictures of it.

YN64AOZ Scania N230UD / ADL Enviro 400.

Stagecoach East Midlands (Grimsby) 15179 in Cleethorpes. Interconnect livery normally used on out of town services.

no. FX12 BBV

Stagecoach East Midlands 'InterConnect' ADL Enviro 400 19195 (NK57 DVY), is seen on Broadgate in Lincoln on 13th October 2021.

New to Stagecoach North East 2007.

Working the X62 to Jnc 32 Outlet for Leeds

Tempo YK57 FHM arrives at Lincoln bus station with an InterConnect 5 on 29.4.21

FX06AOF Volvo B7TL / Wright Eclipse Gemini .

Stagecoach East Midlands (Skegness) 16944 Interconnect livery .

Lincolnsire Roadcar E400 in Interconnect livery in Northampton on Silverstone shuttles...July 4 2015.

no. NK57 DWC

After the slight disappointment of my first sighting of 19181, where it took so long to come that the sun went in, I ended up running into it again - in the sunshine - without any planning. The Skegness machine parks up behind an ALX400 in Lincoln's bus station on 27.2.21

Interconnect Stagecoach Horncastle to Skegness bus on Lincoln Road Skegness.

Gemini 16944 gets a lick on as it departs Lincoln bus station for Skegness on 27.3.21 - annoyingly despite purple liveried Eclipse 21273 also being present I couldn't get a photo of them together as they were never next to each other!

It's almost that time of year again! With Hull Fair 2019 coming up thick and fast, let's head on back to last year's festivities... and bus loans.

Both loaned in from Stagecoach Lincolnshire, on the left, specially branded in the very nice InterConnect brand carried over from the late Lincolnshire Roadcar days, 10898, a 2018 Enviro 400 MMC, is seen parked up in Hull Interchange's bus park under the early October sun, parked up next to Scunthorpe-based 21212, a 2005 ex-RoadCar Wright Eclipse Urban, the sister of 21211 previously photographed on the Fastcat 350.

Vehicles typically come on loan from all of Stagecoach East Midlands' depots to cover Hull's fleet during its busiest day serving what is commonly touted as the biggest travelling fair in Europe, and though past fairs have been photographed with an interesting array of vehicles, multi-million pound investments across the East Midlands is starting to leave less room for interesting transfers. However, there is still room for interesting variety for these loan requirements, including last year's loan of 10975, a very colourful Pronto-liveried E400 MMC from Mansfield which, sadly, I didn't get a photo of. Who knows what we might get this year 'round? Hell, maybe Go North East may muscle in this time?

DK09GYJ Volvo B7RLE / Wright Eclipse Urban.

New to First Potteries 69498 and ex Stagecoach Chester & Wirral .

Stagecoach East Midlands (Grimsby) 21274.

Stagecoach East Midlands - InterConnect liveried - Scania N230UD / Alexander Enviro 400 - FX12 BBU seen in Skegness operating service 1 to Skegness Interchange on September 7th 2019

Could it be....? That .....

We are the eternal energy stream flowing through and interconnecting all things. We are the Universe experiencing all the possibilities of itself within itself as it expands into the spatial continuum of its undifferentiated self.

Can we entertain the esoteric romanticism that .....

Love is All and all is love, the inevitable conclusion of supple, empathic and compassionately open minds, who recognise themselves in the humanity of another. The unending all pervading cohesive elemental force of boundless energy, by which we are all equalised. Cloths us in understanding, as it Illumines our interconnected reality. Like the affect to the cause, or the ripened fruit of the tree of life, we are the many, that are one, seeking to comprehend our tree down to its root.

Or are we just alone and deluded aberrations of the light paling into insignificant obscurity in the cold unforgiving infinity of space and time.....?

We have the freedom to choose our perspective..

The picturesque large village of Nettleham is a distance of 4.7 miles and situated to the North East of Lincoln. This view shows a Volvo B7TL on a homeward bound journey from Market Rasen in the revised interconnect livery introduced in the autumn of 2014.

Stagecoach East Midlands' (Gainsborough based) brand new ADL Enviro 400 MMCs (10896 / YX67 VCJ & 10897 / YX67 VCK) sat at Scunthorpe Bus Station awaiting their checks and branding application before being transferred to Gainsborough. Delivered on 9th November, these are the first MMCs in the East Midlands to see the distinct InterConnect livery. Overall, six MMCs are due (carrying fleet numbers 10896-10901) in order to replace the current Scania N230UDs that have served InterConnect 100 for 8 years now.

Also, to the right of the shot, we see Stagecoach East Midlands' (Scunthorpe based) brand new ADL Enviro 200 MMC (26177 / YX67 UZA) sat at Scunthorpe Bus Depot after being delivered in the last day or so. Being the spare vehicle for the Humber FastCat, it has been painted in corporate livery as it will spend quite a bit of time working the routes around Scunthorpe itself.

InterConnect E400 10900 arrives at Lincoln bus station with a 100.

29.7.20

Well I put before that I liked to get photos of buses from different garages/towns together, and here I get no less than five buses from four different places!

On the left we have Skeg Gemini 16939 which has unfortunately broken down, with Grimsby's Eclipse 21263 a little way behind that, tucked in next to E200 MMC 37459 of Lincoln depot. Just departing is Scunthorpe E300 27197 and reversing out of a bay on the extreme right is the second Skegness vehicle, in the shape of 19208.

Not only is it a mix of depots, but a multitude of vehicle types and liveries. Both Skegness buses are in slightly different versions of InterConnect purple, though neither of them carry IC branding, while the two ADL single deckers have Simplibus branding, but again in different styles with one being the North Lincolnshire version. The Eclipse is in conventional Beachball, not that it makes it any more normal than the others being an ex-First bus. As you can see, Stagecoach East Midlands can be far from boring at times with all the variety!

Gainsborough depot clearly didn't get the memo so they forgot to send one of their buses to this party.

Lincoln bus station, 28.5.21

Sometimes you are just in the right place at the right time...this is one of those situations! Having legged it across from Victoria Bus Station, this photo sees Gainsborough 'Interconnect' based E400MMC 10898 leaving Nottingham on a Sherwood Arrow bound for Retford. It is assumed either a breakdown or last minute vehicle change of sorts resulted in this

Painted in Lincolnshire InterConnect livery.

Stagecoach East Midlands

ADL Enviro400

NK57DVX (19194)

Skegness Interchange

17 June 2021

Providing a welcome break from all the ADL stuff, here's Brylaine Optare Tempo YK57 FHM paired with Stagecoach Grimsby's ex-First Eclipse 21263 at Lincoln bus station. Of course in deep Stagecoach territory you can't stay too far away from the ADLs and to prove that there's an MMC lurking at the back, mostly obscured by the Tempo.

28.5.21

For a few days in a row there was a 'peak time' around 17:20 to 17:40 where several things would happen in a short space of time, with Stagecoach workings from other depots showing up (56, 100, 103, 107 and a NIS Gainsborough decker), the arrival of a Brylaine IC5, an Andrew's rail replacement, a JBT rail replacement, a couple of PC Coaches movements including one of their coaches over the flyover, two eastbound intermodal trains, an eastbound EMR unit plus all the variety that the standard Stagecoach Lincoln buses provided. I went out to get as much as I could each day, but with so much going on I never managed to get everything! Still, for the next couple of uploads I bring you what I caught amidst Lincoln's public transport 'rush hour'.

P1 JBT was back again but the light was worse than the previous day so it wasn't really worth getting the same photos again except slightly darker. An InterConnect 100 did show up though so here's Stagecoach E400 MMC 10901 passing Johnson Bros Omnidekka P1 JBT.

17.3.21

While seeing what the unusually placed InterConnect MMC was up to, the Centrebus 47 came by and I noticed it just in time to grab a photo. Enviro 200 556 is the bus of choice today, and is seen coming up Cross Street on 19.4.23

The River Helmsdale is one of the major east-flowing rivers of Sutherland in the Highlands of Scotland. It flows broadly southeastwards from Loch Badanloch down the Strath of Kildonan (otherwise known as Strath Ullie), gathering the waters of the Bannock Burn on its left and the Abhainn na Frithe on its right before discharging into the Moray Firth on the North Sea at the town of Helmsdale. Other significant tributaries of the Helmsdale include the left-bank Suisgill Burn and the right-bank Craggie Water. Loch Achnamoine which is just over 1 km in length, lies on the line of the river 1 mi / 1.5 km downstream of Loch Badanloch. Loch Badanloch is one of a complex of three interconnecting lochs - the other two being Loch nan Clàr and Loch Rimsdale which gather waters from the moors on the southern edge of the Flow Country via the Allt an Lòin Tharsuinn, Allt Lòn a' Chùil and Rimsdale Burn

The Highlands is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots language replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands. The term is also used for the area north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, although the exact boundaries are not clearly defined, particularly to the east. The Great Glen divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands. The Scottish Gaelic name of A' Ghàidhealtachd literally means "the place of the Gaels" and traditionally, from a Gaelic-speaking point of view, includes both the Western Isles and the Highlands.

The area is very sparsely populated, with many mountain ranges dominating the region, and includes the highest mountain in the British Isles, Ben Nevis. During the 18th and early 19th centuries the population of the Highlands rose to around 300,000, but from c. 1841 and for the next 160 years, the natural increase in population was exceeded by emigration (mostly to Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand, and migration to the industrial cities of Scotland and England.) and passim  The area is now one of the most sparsely populated in Europe. At 9.1/km2 (24/sq mi) in 2012, the population density in the Highlands and Islands is less than one seventh of Scotland's as a whole.

The Highland Council is the administrative body for much of the Highlands, with its administrative centre at Inverness. However, the Highlands also includes parts of the council areas of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Argyll and Bute, Moray, North Ayrshire, Perth and Kinross, Stirling and West Dunbartonshire.

The Scottish Highlands is the only area in the British Isles to have the taiga biome as it features concentrated populations of Scots pine forest: see Caledonian Forest. It is the most mountainous part of the United Kingdom.

Between the 15th century and the mid-20th century, the area differed from most of the Lowlands in terms of language. In Scottish Gaelic, the region is known as the Gàidhealtachd, because it was traditionally the Gaelic-speaking part of Scotland, although the language is now largely confined to The Hebrides. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably but have different meanings in their respective languages. Scottish English (in its Highland form) is the predominant language of the area today, though Highland English has been influenced by Gaelic speech to a significant extent. Historically, the "Highland line" distinguished the two Scottish cultures. While the Highland line broadly followed the geography of the Grampians in the south, it continued in the north, cutting off the north-eastern areas, that is Eastern Caithness, Orkney and Shetland, from the more Gaelic Highlands and Hebrides.

Historically, the major social unit of the Highlands was the clan. Scottish kings, particularly James VI, saw clans as a challenge to their authority; the Highlands was seen by many as a lawless region. The Scots of the Lowlands viewed the Highlanders as backward and more "Irish". The Highlands were seen as the overspill of Gaelic Ireland. They made this distinction by separating Germanic "Scots" English and the Gaelic by renaming it "Erse" a play on Eire. Following the Union of the Crowns, James VI had the military strength to back up any attempts to impose some control. The result was, in 1609, the Statutes of Iona which started the process of integrating clan leaders into Scottish society. The gradual changes continued into the 19th century, as clan chiefs thought of themselves less as patriarchal leaders of their people and more as commercial landlords. The first effect on the clansmen who were their tenants was the change to rents being payable in money rather than in kind. Later, rents were increased as Highland landowners sought to increase their income. This was followed, mostly in the period 1760–1850, by agricultural improvement that often (particularly in the Western Highlands) involved clearance of the population to make way for large scale sheep farms. Displaced tenants were set up in crofting communities in the process. The crofts were intended not to provide all the needs of their occupiers; they were expected to work in other industries such as kelping and fishing. Crofters came to rely substantially on seasonal migrant work, particularly in the Lowlands. This gave impetus to the learning of English, which was seen by many rural Gaelic speakers to be the essential "language of work".

Older historiography attributes the collapse of the clan system to the aftermath of the Jacobite risings. This is now thought less influential by historians. Following the Jacobite rising of 1745 the British government enacted a series of laws to try to suppress the clan system, including bans on the bearing of arms and the wearing of tartan, and limitations on the activities of the Scottish Episcopal Church. Most of this legislation was repealed by the end of the 18th century as the Jacobite threat subsided. There was soon a rehabilitation of Highland culture. Tartan was adopted for Highland regiments in the British Army, which poor Highlanders joined in large numbers in the era of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (1790–1815). Tartan had largely been abandoned by the ordinary people of the region, but in the 1820s, tartan and the kilt were adopted by members of the social elite, not just in Scotland, but across Europe. The international craze for tartan, and for idealising a romanticised Highlands, was set off by the Ossian cycle, and further popularised by the works of Walter Scott. His "staging" of the visit of King George IV to Scotland in 1822 and the king's wearing of tartan resulted in a massive upsurge in demand for kilts and tartans that could not be met by the Scottish woollen industry. Individual clan tartans were largely designated in this period and they became a major symbol of Scottish identity. This "Highlandism", by which all of Scotland was identified with the culture of the Highlands, was cemented by Queen Victoria's interest in the country, her adoption of Balmoral as a major royal retreat, and her interest in "tartenry".

Recurrent famine affected the Highlands for much of its history, with significant instances as late as 1817 in the Eastern Highlands and the early 1850s in the West.  Over the 18th century, the region had developed a trade of black cattle into Lowland markets, and this was balanced by imports of meal into the area. There was a critical reliance on this trade to provide sufficient food, and it is seen as an essential prerequisite for the population growth that started in the 18th century. Most of the Highlands, particularly in the North and West was short of the arable land that was essential for the mixed, run rig based, communal farming that existed before agricultural improvement was introduced into the region.[a] Between the 1760s and the 1830s there was a substantial trade in unlicensed whisky that had been distilled in the Highlands. Lowland distillers (who were not able to avoid the heavy taxation of this product) complained that Highland whisky made up more than half the market. The development of the cattle trade is taken as evidence that the pre-improvement Highlands was not an immutable system, but did exploit the economic opportunities that came its way.  The illicit whisky trade demonstrates the entrepreneurial ability of the peasant classes. 

Agricultural improvement reached the Highlands mostly over the period 1760 to 1850. Agricultural advisors, factors, land surveyors and others educated in the thinking of Adam Smith were keen to put into practice the new ideas taught in Scottish universities.  Highland landowners, many of whom were burdened with chronic debts, were generally receptive to the advice they offered and keen to increase the income from their land.  In the East and South the resulting change was similar to that in the Lowlands, with the creation of larger farms with single tenants, enclosure of the old run rig fields, introduction of new crops (such as turnips), land drainage and, as a consequence of all this, eviction, as part of the Highland clearances, of many tenants and cottars. Some of those cleared found employment on the new, larger farms, others moved to the accessible towns of the Lowlands.

In the West and North, evicted tenants were usually given tenancies in newly created crofting communities, while their former holdings were converted into large sheep farms. Sheep farmers could pay substantially higher rents than the run rig farmers and were much less prone to falling into arrears. Each croft was limited in size so that the tenants would have to find work elsewhere. The major alternatives were fishing and the kelp industry. Landlords took control of the kelp shores, deducting the wages earned by their tenants from the rent due and retaining the large profits that could be earned at the high prices paid for the processed product during the Napoleonic wars.

When the Napoleonic wars finished in 1815, the Highland industries were affected by the return to a peacetime economy. The price of black cattle fell, nearly halving between 1810 and the 1830s. Kelp prices had peaked in 1810, but reduced from £9 a ton in 1823 to £3 13s 4d a ton in 1828. Wool prices were also badly affected.  This worsened the financial problems of debt-encumbered landlords. Then, in 1846, potato blight arrived in the Highlands, wiping out the essential subsistence crop for the overcrowded crofting communities. As the famine struck, the government made clear to landlords that it was their responsibility to provide famine relief for their tenants. The result of the economic downturn had been that a large proportion of Highland estates were sold in the first half of the 19th century. T M Devine points out that in the region most affected by the potato famine, by 1846, 70 per cent of the landowners were new purchasers who had not owned Highland property before 1800. More landlords were obliged to sell due to the cost of famine relief. Those who were protected from the worst of the crisis were those with extensive rental income from sheep farms.  Government loans were made available for drainage works, road building and other improvements and many crofters became temporary migrants – taking work in the Lowlands. When the potato famine ceased in 1856, this established a pattern of more extensive working away from the Highlands.

The unequal concentration of land ownership remained an emotional and controversial subject, of enormous importance to the Highland economy, and eventually became a cornerstone of liberal radicalism. The poor crofters were politically powerless, and many of them turned to religion. They embraced the popularly oriented, fervently evangelical Presbyterian revival after 1800. Most joined the breakaway "Free Church" after 1843. This evangelical movement was led by lay preachers who themselves came from the lower strata, and whose preaching was implicitly critical of the established order. The religious change energised the crofters and separated them from the landlords; it helped prepare them for their successful and violent challenge to the landlords in the 1880s through the Highland Land League. Violence erupted, starting on the Isle of Skye, when Highland landlords cleared their lands for sheep and deer parks. It was quietened when the government stepped in, passing the Crofters' Holdings (Scotland) Act, 1886 to reduce rents, guarantee fixity of tenure, and break up large estates to provide crofts for the homeless. This contrasted with the Irish Land War underway at the same time, where the Irish were intensely politicised through roots in Irish nationalism, while political dimensions were limited. In 1885 three Independent Crofter candidates were elected to Parliament, which listened to their pleas. The results included explicit security for the Scottish smallholders in the "crofting counties"; the legal right to bequeath tenancies to descendants; and the creation of a Crofting Commission. The Crofters as a political movement faded away by 1892, and the Liberal Party gained their votes.

Today, the Highlands are the largest of Scotland's whisky producing regions; the relevant area runs from Orkney to the Isle of Arran in the south and includes the northern isles and much of Inner and Outer Hebrides, Argyll, Stirlingshire, Arran, as well as sections of Perthshire and Aberdeenshire. (Other sources treat The Islands, except Islay, as a separate whisky producing region.) This massive area has over 30 distilleries, or 47 when the Islands sub-region is included in the count. According to one source, the top five are The Macallan, Glenfiddich, Aberlour, Glenfarclas and Balvenie. While Speyside is geographically within the Highlands, that region is specified as distinct in terms of whisky productions. Speyside single malt whiskies are produced by about 50 distilleries.

According to Visit Scotland, Highlands whisky is "fruity, sweet, spicy, malty". Another review states that Northern Highlands single malt is "sweet and full-bodied", the Eastern Highlands and Southern Highlands whiskies tend to be "lighter in texture" while the distilleries in the Western Highlands produce single malts with a "much peatier influence".

The Scottish Reformation achieved partial success in the Highlands. Roman Catholicism remained strong in some areas, owing to remote locations and the efforts of Franciscan missionaries from Ireland, who regularly came to celebrate Mass. There remain significant Catholic strongholds within the Highlands and Islands such as Moidart and Morar on the mainland and South Uist and Barra in the southern Outer Hebrides. The remoteness of the region and the lack of a Gaelic-speaking clergy undermined the missionary efforts of the established church. The later 18th century saw somewhat greater success, owing to the efforts of the SSPCK missionaries and to the disruption of traditional society after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. In the 19th century, the evangelical Free Churches, which were more accepting of Gaelic language and culture, grew rapidly, appealing much more strongly than did the established church.

For the most part, however, the Highlands are considered predominantly Protestant, belonging to the Church of Scotland. In contrast to the Catholic southern islands, the northern Outer Hebrides islands (Lewis, Harris and North Uist) have an exceptionally high proportion of their population belonging to the Protestant Free Church of Scotland or the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The Outer Hebrides have been described as the last bastion of Calvinism in Britain and the Sabbath remains widely observed. Inverness and the surrounding area has a majority Protestant population, with most locals belonging to either The Kirk or the Free Church of Scotland. The church maintains a noticeable presence within the area, with church attendance notably higher than in other parts of Scotland. Religion continues to play an important role in Highland culture, with Sabbath observance still widely practised, particularly in the Hebrides.

In traditional Scottish geography, the Highlands refers to that part of Scotland north-west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which crosses mainland Scotland in a near-straight line from Helensburgh to Stonehaven. However the flat coastal lands that occupy parts of the counties of Nairnshire, Morayshire, Banffshire and Aberdeenshire are often excluded as they do not share the distinctive geographical and cultural features of the rest of the Highlands. The north-east of Caithness, as well as Orkney and Shetland, are also often excluded from the Highlands, although the Hebrides are usually included. The Highland area, as so defined, differed from the Lowlands in language and tradition, having preserved Gaelic speech and customs centuries after the anglicisation of the latter; this led to a growing perception of a divide, with the cultural distinction between Highlander and Lowlander first noted towards the end of the 14th century. In Aberdeenshire, the boundary between the Highlands and the Lowlands is not well defined. There is a stone beside the A93 road near the village of Dinnet on Royal Deeside which states 'You are now in the Highlands', although there are areas of Highland character to the east of this point.

A much wider definition of the Highlands is that used by the Scotch whisky industry. Highland single malts are produced at distilleries north of an imaginary line between Dundee and Greenock, thus including all of Aberdeenshire and Angus.

Inverness is regarded as the Capital of the Highlands, although less so in the Highland parts of Aberdeenshire, Angus, Perthshire and Stirlingshire which look more to Aberdeen, Dundee, Perth, and Stirling as their commercial centres.

The Highland Council area, created as one of the local government regions of Scotland, has been a unitary council area since 1996. The council area excludes a large area of the southern and eastern Highlands, and the Western Isles, but includes Caithness. Highlands is sometimes used, however, as a name for the council area, as in the former Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern is also used to refer to the area, as in the former Northern Constabulary. These former bodies both covered the Highland council area and the island council areas of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles.

Much of the Highlands area overlaps the Highlands and Islands area. An electoral region called Highlands and Islands is used in elections to the Scottish Parliament: this area includes Orkney and Shetland, as well as the Highland Council local government area, the Western Isles and most of the Argyll and Bute and Moray local government areas. Highlands and Islands has, however, different meanings in different contexts. It means Highland (the local government area), Orkney, Shetland, and the Western Isles in Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service. Northern, as in Northern Constabulary, refers to the same area as that covered by the fire and rescue service.

There have been trackways from the Lowlands to the Highlands since prehistoric times. Many traverse the Mounth, a spur of mountainous land that extends from the higher inland range to the North Sea slightly north of Stonehaven. The most well-known and historically important trackways are the Causey Mounth, Elsick Mounth, Cryne Corse Mounth and Cairnamounth.

Although most of the Highlands is geographically on the British mainland, it is somewhat less accessible than the rest of Britain; thus most UK couriers categorise it separately, alongside Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and other offshore islands. They thus charge additional fees for delivery to the Highlands, or exclude the area entirely. While the physical remoteness from the largest population centres inevitably leads to higher transit cost, there is confusion and consternation over the scale of the fees charged and the effectiveness of their communication, and the use of the word Mainland in their justification. Since the charges are often based on postcode areas, many far less remote areas, including some which are traditionally considered part of the lowlands, are also subject to these charges. Royal Mail is the only delivery network bound by a Universal Service Obligation to charge a uniform tariff across the UK. This, however, applies only to mail items and not larger packages which are dealt with by its Parcelforce division.

The Highlands lie to the north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which runs from Arran to Stonehaven. This part of Scotland is largely composed of ancient rocks from the Cambrian and Precambrian periods which were uplifted during the later Caledonian Orogeny. Smaller formations of Lewisian gneiss in the northwest are up to 3 billion years old. The overlying rocks of the Torridon Sandstone form mountains in the Torridon Hills such as Liathach and Beinn Eighe in Wester Ross.

These foundations are interspersed with many igneous intrusions of a more recent age, the remnants of which have formed mountain massifs such as the Cairngorms and the Cuillin of Skye. A significant exception to the above are the fossil-bearing beds of Old Red Sandstone found principally along the Moray Firth coast and partially down the Highland Boundary Fault. The Jurassic beds found in isolated locations on Skye and Applecross reflect the complex underlying geology. They are the original source of much North Sea oil. The Great Glen is formed along a transform fault which divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands.

The entire region was covered by ice sheets during the Pleistocene ice ages, save perhaps for a few nunataks. The complex geomorphology includes incised valleys and lochs carved by the action of mountain streams and ice, and a topography of irregularly distributed mountains whose summits have similar heights above sea-level, but whose bases depend upon the amount of denudation to which the plateau has been subjected in various places.

Climate

The region is much warmer than other areas at similar latitudes (such as Kamchatka in Russia, or Labrador in Canada) because of the Gulf Stream making it cool, damp and temperate. The Köppen climate classification is "Cfb" at low altitudes, then becoming "Cfc", "Dfc" and "ET" at higher altitudes.

Places of interest

An Teallach

Aonach Mòr (Nevis Range ski centre)

Arrochar Alps

Balmoral Castle

Balquhidder

Battlefield of Culloden

Beinn Alligin

Beinn Eighe

Ben Cruachan hydro-electric power station

Ben Lomond

Ben Macdui (second highest mountain in Scotland and UK)

Ben Nevis (highest mountain in Scotland and UK)

Cairngorms National Park

Cairngorm Ski centre near Aviemore

Cairngorm Mountains

Caledonian Canal

Cape Wrath

Carrick Castle

Castle Stalker

Castle Tioram

Chanonry Point

Conic Hill

Culloden Moor

Dunadd

Duart Castle

Durness

Eilean Donan

Fingal's Cave (Staffa)

Fort George

Glen Coe

Glen Etive

Glen Kinglas

Glen Lyon

Glen Orchy

Glenshee Ski Centre

Glen Shiel

Glen Spean

Glenfinnan (and its railway station and viaduct)

Grampian Mountains

Hebrides

Highland Folk Museum – The first open-air museum in the UK.

Highland Wildlife Park

Inveraray Castle

Inveraray Jail

Inverness Castle

Inverewe Garden

Iona Abbey

Isle of Staffa

Kilchurn Castle

Kilmartin Glen

Liathach

Lecht Ski Centre

Loch Alsh

Loch Ard

Loch Awe

Loch Assynt

Loch Earn

Loch Etive

Loch Fyne

Loch Goil

Loch Katrine

Loch Leven

Loch Linnhe

Loch Lochy

Loch Lomond

Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park

Loch Lubnaig

Loch Maree

Loch Morar

Loch Morlich

Loch Ness

Loch Nevis

Loch Rannoch

Loch Tay

Lochranza

Luss

Meall a' Bhuiridh (Glencoe Ski Centre)

Scottish Sea Life Sanctuary at Loch Creran

Rannoch Moor

Red Cuillin

Rest and Be Thankful stretch of A83

River Carron, Wester Ross

River Spey

River Tay

Ross and Cromarty

Smoo Cave

Stob Coire a' Chàirn

Stac Polly

Strathspey Railway

Sutherland

Tor Castle

Torridon Hills

Urquhart Castle

West Highland Line (scenic railway)

West Highland Way (Long-distance footpath)

Wester Ross

Painted in Lincolnshire InterConnect livery.

Stagecoach East Midlands

ADL Enviro400

NK57DVZ (19196)

Skegness Interchange

17 June 2021

This photo I unfortunately blurred a little, but shows 18335 working the 100 in place of a purple MMC on 18.2.23, here on St Mary's Street in Lincoln where it was tucked in behind its Gainsborough stablemate 18040.

Seen in Spalding bus station on service 57 to Skegness stagecoach east Midlands

E400 19194 NK57DVX in Lincolnshire InterConnect livery. Recently this service no longer serves Spalding and has cut back to Boston only.

For a few days in a row there was a 'peak time' around 17:20 to 17:40 where several things would happen in a short space of time, with Stagecoach workings from other depots showing up (56, 100, 103, 107 and a NIS Gainsborough decker), the arrival of a Brylaine IC5, an Andrew's rail replacement, a JBT rail replacement, a couple of PC Coaches movements including one of their coaches over the flyover, two eastbound intermodal trains, an eastbound EMR unit plus all the variety that the standard Stagecoach Lincoln buses provided. I went out to get as much as I could each day, but with so much going on I never managed to get everything! Still, for this upload I bring you what I caught amidst Lincoln's public transport 'rush hour'.

I've seen enough of these now that a purple liveried all-ADL Enviro 400 from Skeg can be called a mundane working, but in this case here it's a little more special since it's my first ever 'spot' of 19207, parked at the back of Lincoln bus station here on 20.3.21

STAGECOACH

Arriving at the bus station, on the InterConnect service from Gainsborough, is 10901 (YX67VCO), an ADL Enviro 400, new to Lincolnshire in November, 2017.

A combo that is unlikely not nevertheless happened at Lincoln bus station on 29.3.21, with the sole repainted Pointer so far plus Skegness Eclipse 21216 coming over for a brief visit of the 56, which is usually operated by deckers. The matching pair are seen here together with an E300 also painted in 'local' livery, showing how the colour scheme has been applied across the different bodywork styles.

A different sort of bus drawing now, with one of the InterConnect 100s done in a kind of pixel art style. This came about as I was trying to do something else at first, but that project morphed into making a pixelated Enviro 400 MMC for, I dunno, reasons.

I've never fully understood how pixel art works or how it should be made, as surely scaling down a photograph to a pitifully small resolution is the most accurate way to make a pixel image... but low res photos look absolutely crap while pixel art done by somebody that actually knows what they're doing looks good. So what's the deal?

Making this odd little image was, I suppose, me trying to figure out the above. I just tried giving every colour a hard edge with no 'feather' from one colour into the next, so everything that isn't on an exact horizontal or vertical line has a jagged edge, and used a brighter version of each colour in the few places where there were highlights.

Although I drew it with each square of colour being a single pixel, this is a bigger version so that it isn't just a postage stamp sized picture on your screen. Because Paint.net adds its own softening/feather to edges when you scale an image up or down, I had to put it into MS Paint to scale it up at the end, and then add back the window transparency because MS Paint turns any transparency in images white. Considering the whole process took forever, and the results are kind of meh, I don't think I'll be doing another one. It was enjoyable, though.

Another one of the purple Skegness E400s in Lincoln bus station on 3.7.20

Stagecoach East Midlands 15811 FX12BBV, Scania N230UD Alexander Enviro 400 in Interconnect 6 livery.

Leaving the Skegness depot.

You know something's gone to pot when two more Gainsborough MMCs show up three minutes after the last one; normally there's only ever one on Lincoln at a time. 40+ minutes of traffic delays mean as one 100 is leaving, the next one is arriving and somehow a third one has got thrown into the mix with 10897 here out of service and looking like it is heading in the direction of Lincoln depot. I don't think it was working the extra evening 107, but there's a chance that's what was going on.