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Tuesday 6 June 2023

How many great white sharks is that?



Scotland's lochs deeper than some of the world's tallest landmarks

VisitScotland has released images ahead of Water Safety Week (18-25 June) in a bid to educate swimmers and all those participating in watersports over the summer.

Loch Morar in the Highlands is Scotland's deepest loch at 1,020ft...

It is about the same depth as the height of the UK's tallest building, The Shard in London (1,016ft), or 69 great white sharks stacked from nose to tail.

We were out walking along canal towpaths today. Flat walking of course, with no hills. Over the whole walk we probably only completed a total ascent of about 6 great white sharks.

9 comments:

dearieme said...

Once children are out of their depth it probably doesn't matter whether the loch is ten foot deep or a thousand. (Well, doesn't matter to them; to Nessie it may matter.)

Doonhamef said...

The killer is the cold water shock. And swimming in fresh water will mean less buoyancy than when in sea water. On a hot sunny day the shallow water at shore can be warm but out a bit the water a foot down will be very cold.
Never ever dive in.

Sam Vega said...

What's that in okapis?

Alan said...

How long has it been since we had lengths in football pitches, heights in double-decker busses, liquid volumes in Olympic swimming pools etc?
I prefer proper units such as the Imperial Smidgeon, which is slightly more than the infamous ba' hair.

James Higham said...

A useful measure, the Great White Shark. I just happened to have posted today on him, in connection with Nick Faldo.

A K Haart said...

dearieme - that's it, if they go out of their depth they can drown.

Doonhamer - being far more familiar with swimming in the sea, I found the oddest thing about swimming in fresh water was the taste of the water. Scottish lochs look too cold to even think about swimming though.

Sam - there must be a multiplication factor somewhere, but it depends how the okapis are joined together - the connection factor.

Alan - I think we still have liquid volumes in Olympic swimming pools, but I had to look up the ba' hair. I'm more familiar with the Imperial Smidgeon because I don't think it ever went metric.

James - had to look that up, it's a blank in my sporting history.

dearieme said...

"Scottish lochs look too cold to even think about swimming though." When I was being prepared for kayaking on Loch Tay then I had to show the instructor that if my little craft overturned I could right it. That was close enough to swimming for me. Brrrrr! The next day I went sailing.

A K Haart said...

dearieme - I sometimes regret never having tried sailing. Part of it is always having lived well inland and part because sailing on a reservoir seemed like an alternative I'd eventually find unsatisfactory.

dearieme said...

Sailing is good fun but I've hardly done any since boyhood. What I've done only once but enjoyed enormously was pony trecking - on a Norwegian mountain pony on the hills above Loch Tay. Marvellous. We even came to a patch of level ground and enjoyed a gallop.

The pony could carry me down a slope so steep that if I'd been on my own I'd probably have come down it on my bum. Hugely impressive creature!