Just a few quick snaps of our fabulous stall at the Belladrum Tartan Heart Festival two weeks ago.

The SAMS undergrad students did a fabulous job entertaining the crowds with the roving science trolley – can you guess how many badges are on the lab-coat? Hundreds of I (heart) UHI badges must have been given out!

Our stand was colourful, and busy! The backdrop are panels made for the Oban Festival of the Sea by local schoolchildren. Jim’s got the noise tank ready to go, with a soundtrack of underwater recordings of a tidal channel environment, marine animals (porpoise, seals, whales, etc), and man-made sounds (ships, a tidal turbine). Helen kept the smaller ones busy making ocean-themed festival headbands and bracelets. Mine had sparkly jellyfish on!

Helen and I both perfomed in the UHI Verb Garden. Helen did a fabulous job with her clarsach and storytelling. The audience wasn’t quite as young as it could have been, but she encouraged the tired teenagers up to the front, telling them to ‘act their shoe-size’. I performed the next day, giving a ‘TED’ style talk likening the music festival to the increasingly noisy ocean-sounscape. Of course, after a day of hard work, we had time to see some of the headline acts – the Kaiser Chiefs were brilliant!

We’ve got lots of food for thought for next year’s activities – hopefully UHI and the Belladrum Festival will invite us back!