Polouriscaig revisited

Last Friday was the ranger walk to Polouriscaig, the abandoned post-clearance village in the hills behind Armadale. I went there last summer and hadn't been back since, so I awarded myself the afternoon off, taking just my short telephoto kit lens with me. (You can see what's coming, can't you...?)

It was an absolutely gorgeous afternoon for a walk:



The heather was in bloom, turning the hills purple, and mushrooms were sprouting up left, right and centre:



It had rained heavily in the past two days and frogs were making the most of the streams of water running down the track:



Polouriscaig itself is just four houses set in a valley, this being the most complete:



After a good look around the village, we sat on the hill behind to catch our breath and a merlin flew past, so engrossed in her pursuit of a meadow pippit that she flew within 15 feet of us and we were treated to a spectacular aerial display as the pippit tried to escape. The ranger said that it was incredibly rare for them to come that close to humans - and, of course, I didn't have my big lens! Still a privilege to see it. I don't know what happened to the pippit, they dropped out of sight.

On the far side of that hill and over a small moor there's another house which I didn't know about. It's not as well built as the others and it's almost gone, but the view from it was spectacular:



The mound you can see in the bottom right of that picture is a huge red granite rock which must look amazing at sunset. Next summer I may just take a tent up and photograph it at sunset (I'm not even going to attempt the trip back in the dark, it's a 2-hour walk and I'd be lost in about two seconds flat!)

It was at this point that the rain clouds caught up with us and we all got soaked. It blew over pretty fast and made for an amazing view towards Strathy Point lighthouse on the way back (that's Hoy, one of the Orkney Islands, in the background):



The ranger says that in October and November deer gather in the first valley over the hill - I shall go and have a look.

Seawatching

The ranger had organised a seawatch off Strathy Point last night and we were in luck - two minke whales feeding, a pod of 15-30 common dolphins (too far away to count accurately) and a small pod of five or six Risso's dolphins which swam right up to the east side of the point where we were sitting:

Whirlwind week

Mum flew into Inverness last Monday and was greeted by the best weather Scotland could offer - bright blue skies with little fluffy white clouds. But as we travelled north, the storms from the south started to catch up with us and overtook us at Golspie:





On Tuesday we went to Lybster for lunch and then on up the coast to John O'Groats to book our ferry tickets. There's a big clump of pampas grass near the pottery there and it was covered in sparrows, all munching on the seeds:



Wednesday was Orkney, a whistle-stop coach tour of the sightseeing highlights. I was hoping we'd see some sealife on the ferry, but apart from a brief glimpse of a common seal's head, nothing breached the surface.

Orkney was fabulous - I think I'll have to go back when I'm not tied to a coach tour schedule and don't have 40 other people traipsing round the same place at the same time. We went to the Ring of Brodgar:



and St Magnus Cathedral in Kirkwall:



We spent Thursday recovering and didn't go too far, but we did go to Strathy:



and to Castlehill:



(infrared filter used on that, I like the way it makes the grass go soft).

On Friday we went west, past Torrisdale Bay:



and on to Talmine:



Today we went down Strath Halladale and saw grouse, buzzards, deer and, best of all, a golden eagle - shame that none of them stopped long enough to be photographed!

It's all about the light

Apologies for the lack of updates, it's been a busy week. However, the good news is that my Mum's visiting for a week, starting tomorrow, so we'll be out and about with the cameras every day.

I've finished reading the first Joe Cornish book and one of the points he made that struck me was that there's no such thing as bad light, there's just the wrong light for the kind of picture you're trying to take.

So when I was sea-watching on Strathy Point yesterday afternoon (saw bugger all!) and the sky was overcast, I remembered what I'd read and instead of grand coastal vistas, tried thinking in more pastel tones:





Then the clouds came in and I got something a bit more dramatic:



Food for thought, anyway.

Melvich and Strathy

A couple of shots of Melvich beach from Monday afternoon - nothing special, but they do show the amazing weather we've been having up here:





Yesterday I finally went on my first ranger walk - I had about 10 marked that I wanted to do, but work, lack of car and weather have all conspired against me up until now. It was too overcast for photos, but I went up to Strathy Point and walked round it with a group led by the North Sutherland ranger, Paul Castle. Very, very interesting - I now know what a primula Scotia looks like (small and purple), can tell the difference between a cormorant and a shag (the shag flies low over the water - the black birds in my last Strathy Point post are actually shags) and can identify black-backed gulls, great skuas and kittiwakes (I think...). They're nearly all over for the year, but there's an all day walk on 13th September to go up Ben Hutig looking for golden eagles and mountain hare, and then another one in October in Strath Halladale to watch the red deer rut, so I'm definitely going to try and get to both those.

Strathy Point

Sorry, no lovely sunset pictures - the sky was flat last night. But today has been absolutely gorgeous, clear skies, sun and not too much wind, so I awarded myself the afternoon off and went to see if I could spot anything in the sea off Strathy Point.

Of course, British weather being what it is, a grey cloud turned up just as I got there. Which is why these cormorants were all hanging around on a rock rather than fishing:



Nothing in the sea, so I decided to walk slowly along the fence by the cliffs to the lighthouse and then back up the road, hoping that something would show up. And it did:



He was swimming around by some rocks and just at that point there was a stile over the cliff fence and a path. So since there was very little wind, I decided to be intrepid and hopped over it. The path led down to a wide ledge where I could sit and watch the seal in comfort:





But there were boot prints leading further down the path. I had a look and saw that the rocks below the ledge could be easily climbed down, almost like a ladder. Ten minutes later and I was seated on the pyramid-shaped rock at the centre top of this picture:



I'd spent a good quarter of an hour watching it to make sure the waves weren't getting anywhere near it first :o) I unpacked my camera again, sat there and waited. The seal popped up about 10 feet away, saw me, boggled, dived and wasn't seen again! This was the only shot I got - bear in mind the ones above are all heavily cropped in. This one isn't cropped at all:



Fabulous view from that rock though:



And this is what's at the end of the point - the lighthouse. It's a private house now and was up for sale at about the same time we found our house. Quite glad we didn't buy it, it must be a nightmare out there in winter: