My Skyfall Location Hunt Begins
So I got obsessed with finding those James Bond spots after rewatching Skyfall for the ninth time. Saw some fan forums guessing locations but nothing solid. Grabbed my laptop one Sunday morning thinking “How hard could it be?”
First I scrubbed through every explosion scene with my face glued to the screen. Noticed those fancy cliffs looked super familiar – remembered hiking near Glencoe years ago. Rewound the Scotland train scene frame by frame till my eyes crossed. Finally spotted that one bent pine tree I’d taken a selfie with! Got so excited I knocked over my coffee mug.
- Spent 3 hours matching Istanbul rooftop shots to Google Street View
- Zoomed in on background signs during the casino scenes
- Wasted an afternoon on Reddit arguments about Shanghai buildings
Putting the Map Together
Wrestled with this mapping software that kept freezing whenever I added more than five pins. Every time it crashed I had to restart from scratch – three attempts down the drain. Finally gave up and started handwriting coordinates on sticky notes all over my desk like a madman.
The final breakthrough came when I randomly remembered that cabin scene with Javier Bardem. Googled “abandoned islands with weird church spires” and boom – Nagasaki’s Hashima Island popped up. Nearly fell off my chair because I’d vacationed there back in 2015!
Spent all night transferring scribbles to the map software between coffee refuels. When the sunrise hit my window, I had 27 exact pins dropped from Turkey to Scotland. Couldn’t stop grinning like an idiot – my girlfriend thought I’d lost it completely.
Truth is, half these locations turned out to be totally inaccessible. That dramatic finale spot? Private property with angry “TRESPASSERS SHOT” signs. My map’s basically a “look but don’t touch” guide unless you’ve got MI6 clearance. Still chuffed I pieced this puzzle together though!
