Cloudy Road Trip Drive With Music To Visit Strontian Lochaber Highlands Of Scotland

Tour Scotland travel video, with Scottish bagpipes and drums music, of a cloudy road trip drive on a single track road with passing places, on ancestry, genealogy, history visit to Strontian, Scottish Gaelic: Sròn an t-Sìthein, the main village in Sunart, an area in Western Lochaber Highlands. It lies on the north shore of Loch Sunart, close to the head of the loch. In the 1830s, residents from Strontian and the surrounding area were among the first to use the Bounty Scheme to emigrate to Australia. The Brilliant, a Canadian-built ship, sailed from Tobermory to New South Wales in 1837 with 322 passengers, 105 of whom were from Ardnamurchan and Strontian. The Bounty Scheme, which ran from 1835 to 1841, was proposed by Edward Gibbon Wakefield as a way for Australian settlers to subsidise the emigration of skilled tradespeople from Britain. In the 1850s more emigrants left from the Strontian and Anaheilt area. The Allison sailed from Liverpool in 1851 for Melbourne with a number of Highlanders from the area aboard. In the hills to the north of Strontian lead was mined in the 18th century and in these mines the mineral strontianite was discovered, from which the element strontium was first isolated. The history of mining in the Strontian area dates to 1722, when Sir Alexander Murray discovered galena in the hills the region. A mine was opened in 1725, in partnership with Thomas Howard, 8th Duke of Norfolk and General Wade. Various materials have been mined here including lead, and strontianite, which contains the element named after the village, Strontium. While there have been inhabitants of the area for centuries, particularly in the woods north of the current village, the community as it exists now was established in 1724 to provide homes for the local mining workers. Lead mined at Strontian was used in bullets manufactured for the Napoleonic Wars. In the early part of the 19th century, part of the workforce was made up of captured forces from Napoleon's imperial army. This road is only wide enough for one vehicle. It has special passing places. If you see a vehicle coming towards you, or the driver behind wants to overtake, try to pull into a passing place on your left, or wait opposite a passing place on your right. Give way to vehicles coming uphill whenever you can. If necessary, reverse until you reach a passing place to let the other vehicle pass. When driving in Scotland, slow down and enjoy the trip All photographs are copyright of Sandy Stevenson, Tour Scotland, and may not be used without permission.

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