Videos of the day -- Ruth Aisling

On my post about travel last week, a couple of people expressed an interest in Scotland.  As it happens, one of the YouTubers I most frequently watch is Ruth Aisling (pronounced ASH-ling), who specializes in travel around Scotland and makes spectacular videos showcasing the country.  She has some experience with travel, having lived in Mexico and Japan (and can speak Spanish and Japanese), but eventually returned to her own country for some in-depth exploration.  She's been traveling around Scotland by herself for three years and has covered some very remote places as well as major ones.  She uses a camera drone, which explains the numerous aerial views (and how she can include herself in moving shots from a distance without a camera crew).

Her videos are on the longer side, generally twenty to thirty minutes -- much longer than I will generally watch, but I always find them so absorbing that I almost end up wishing they were longer.

This one is about Stirling, the "smallest city in Scotland" at thirty-five thousand people ("city" in the UK has an exact legal definition which isn't entirely based on size).  While small enough to get around easily, it's crammed with interesting relics of centuries past.  The visit to Stirling Castle starts at 14:50, but the whole thing is well worth watching if you're interested in the country -- use fullscreen of course.


An example of a remote place, which tourists usually overlook, is the small island of Gigha on the west coast.  With fewer than two hundred inhabitants, the island used to be the property of a big landowner, but was bought by its people in 2002 and is now community-owned.


Aisling's video channel is here, and she has a general website here.