1. To Torridon, BGC (before the “Great Confinement”)
Diary excerpt, Wednesday February 12th.
I watched the river plunging through our lower fields from the attic window. It was black and foam flecked; periodically wavelets slushed out across the field. …
It is late August and the morning is fierce with light. Westwards the Outer Isles are floating in a blue haze, their familiar shapes swollen yet indistinct. I am roaming the croft fields with a bag and a walking stick. The bag is for ragwort, the stick to seek out ankle-breaking old ditches that have all but vanished under the abundant summer growth. …
Southerly winds at this time of year often seem angry. To reach us here they must be funnelled through the narrows between Skye’s Cuillin mountains and the heights of Knoydart to then sweep past Applecross. Bursting from confinement at the mouth of the Inner Sound they release pent up energy, often bellowing like stags at the rut, and they ladle water across the landscape. …
July is a month of flickering, in and out, up and down. Heat and searing light give way to cooler silvery days filled with midges and mists, the latter gently spreading diamonds on leaves and flowers, in and out, up and down. …
Imagine, if you will, standing in front of a marble wall. It is smooth and cool to the touch and although the overall impression is pale and white, on closer inspection it appears flecked and veined with different colours. The more you look, the more detail you see: granular histories of formation and distant tales of its crafting. …
Our run of sassy, warm and sunny May weather ended in a flurry of sharp showers and midge mists. With the addition of moisture after weeks of dryness everywhere is sappy, buzzing and busy, especially in the croft fields. Even the surrounding hills that are bare of trees are greening now. …
The sunset sky of May Day Eve was a riot of unflinching, billowing gold and crimson. It promised heat and flames but when the night came it was cool and solid like grey marble.
May 1st 04.30: sunrise is an hour away and I look out of the window. …
The last of the unusually calm weather has passed. Normal service has been resumed with strong westerlies forging ahead of cloud banks smeared across the Outer Hebrides. Spring has retreated to the low hill behind me and dithers in patches of crisp sunshine. …
We have been languishing in benign, calm Spring brightness. The vernal equinox has prodded this place into wakefulness, shaking us all out of our winter wrappings. Music and song has erupted from every corner of the croft, from hedges and trees and fields, and from the river itself. …
A young blogger (https://youngfermanaghnaturalist.com/) asked whether spring had arrived on the croft. I wanted to answer yes, but in truth, though there are patches of spring here and there and although it is the spring equinox, we are mostly still in winter’s thrall. …
As the first page of March opened, tall thunder clouds passed over the Cuillin and Trotternish on Skye and glided across the Inner Sound. Soundless, austere and stately, the heights of their heads were impossible to estimate and yet I heard no thunder, saw no lightning. …
Buffeting breezes and grey rains have returned yet the signs of spring are manifold. There are snowdrops gasping in wide open surprise at the lack of snow and ice, crocuses vibrating in purple and orange and daffodil spears bursting through turf and soil. …
