High days and Holidays

Over the last 6 weeks, we seem to have been away from home an awful lot. First we went to France for a week, then after we got home, we went to Scotland for around three weeks. As always, Scotland was amazing! The holiday was split in two by a dental appointment. As these are so hard to get, we decided to come home for it, rather than try to change it, which meant the first part of the holiday ran from Wednesday to Sunday.

We drove straight up to Poolewe, as there is a ceilidh on there on Wednesday nights. We had booked to stay as a campsite just 5 minutes' walk from the hall, so we put the tent up

then went straight to the dance. It was a group called Jigginaboot' who werent bad. Loads of tourists and locals piled into the hall (all the proceeds go to local charities) and there was very little space for actual dancing. The Orcadian Strip the Willow was out the door!

Lovely sunset over the loch too:

 

Now Poolewe is on the west of Scotland and anyone in the know, knows that that means midges! Consequently we got up early, had breakfast and set off for the east asap, before the midges got up to torment us. But not before getting a picture of a heron on the edge of the loch - and having to deal with some unexpected work issues that arose overnight!

When we got to the east, we went straight to the Black Isle show. Oddly enough and much to OH's amusement, I found the sheep shearing competition the most exciting! In fact, I was so excited that I forgot to get the camera out; or was that because it poured all day? I did get a few pics of the cattle on show:


Thursday is Nairn - we always go there on a Thursday, as there is another ceilidh at the British legion hall. It is the only place we go that ends with Auld Lang Syne, followed by the Queen. What the foreign tourists must think is anyone's guess! But it works and it was good to meet up again with some old friends that we have made over the years. We are so accepted as part of the furniture there that they dont even introduce us as visitors any more! It is a differnt sort of ceilidh; they dont just have dancing, though therre is plenty of that. They also have recitations of Scots dialect poetry (very funny)

singers

and Highland dancing

Sometimes that also have the Gallic Choir, but they werent about this year, though a couple of them were there and entertained us with some singing. Which reminds me, I'd like to find the song they did, 'Follow the Heron Home'.



Friday was the ceilidh at Fort Augustus.

The guy on the left is Hubby! [Blurr is deliberate, showing movement].
By now you might have gathered that we go for the 'season' - ceildh after ceilidh! We also go for the walking (didnt really do any this year) and the wild life - buzzards, herons, red kites and dolphins.


Saturday morning dawned bright enough and so we went to the Strathpeffer Highland Games. Warm and sunny all day; lovely show, with pipers, pipe bands, caber tossing, hammer throwing, highland dancing and cycle racing (on grass). It was a really good day.

The weather however was not to last. We had planned to go to church on the Sunday morning, but the forecast was really bad. Many people who dont unsderstand that Scotland and rain are synonymous terms, had already packed up and moved on. We always go prepared for rain, as it wouldnt be Scotland without it. However, Saturday night is absolutely threw it down all night (remember we were in a tent!) Anyweay, the forecast was weather warnings for flash floods etc, so instead of church, we packed up a dripping wet tent and drove home. Of course we chose the 'sensible' route (not) - the A82 down the side of Loch Ness, over Glencoe and Rannoch Moor. There was water everywhere - pouring onto the roads, but we didnt get flooded anywhere thankfully. It only took us 10 hours to get home!
Water pouring onto the A82 on the side of Loch Ness:

After the dental appointment we stayed home until the Wednesday then again drove to Poolewe. This time it was Alastair McCulloch with a small band. Now he was fantastic. He's a fiddle player and he's brilliant. The dancing was good as always too.

The next morning, I got a load of pics of a heron in flight, but although they looked fine on the camera, once on the computer they were clearly all blurred!

Before leaving Poolewe on the Thursday morning, we went to a small farmers' market in the church hall. There we met a woman from the Scoraig peninsula - no electricity, no mains water, no road - she had to get to the market by boat, with her eggs and veggies to sell! She told us about a man who also lives there who has built his own wind and solar energy sources. He is on a website which I still need to check out.

During the rest of the two weeks, we saw dolphins (kind of). We had spent a nice sunny day at Kessock, watching the firth for about 4 hours. I commented that I reckoned all the dolphins were playing down at Channonry Point, as we saw one swim past on the far side and that was it. Apparently there had been 9 at Channonry, including three calves and they had put on quite a show! Just our luck! The following day, we went to Channonry. It was like November - cold, windy, wet, grey. The sea was really choppy and although the dolphins came, they didnt do much, so all I photographed was a few fins. There were about 5 altogether. If you look carefully, this one has a calf swimming next to it:

The one walk we managed was with some friends from Fort Augustus. They regularly walk on a Monday morning, so we were invited to join them. Again it rained, but the rain was interspersed with sunny moments. Walked through some forest tracks and some woodland and down a really quiet country lane. After wondering why it was soooo quiet, we finally saw a sign that said traffic was prohibited down there at that time as there were road works! So that explained it really!

We visited Ullapool and saw a red deer by the side of the road. It wasnt scared at all, so I got my big lens and walked so I was level with it but on the other side of the road. It stayed for ages, so I have a few decent-ish shots.

We also went to Fort George. They were doing a re-enactment day, of Fort George through the ages. It was rather disconcerting to see a Roman soldier having a conversation with a WW1 soldier!

They did a re-enactment of a battle in WW1 with gas masks and all sorts. Of course, they were a Highland regiment and so they were all in kilts. At one point the announcer mentioned that now we could be sure that there were some 'real Highlanders' amongst the soldiers. You will have to guess what I mean, but the incident caused much hilarity amongst some of the crowd and served to show some of the more unexpected perils of wearing a kilt in battle!

In the middle of the afternoon, they did a re-enactment of a dog fight between a messerschmit and a spitfire. It was on for about 20 minutes and was really spectacular. Well done those pilots; their skill was amazing.

All in all, we managed 12 ceilidhs in 18 nights (three weeks minus the going home for the dentist): three times at Nairn (plus dancing one Thursday afternoon, also at Nairn); three at Fort Augustus, one at Invermoriston, one at Beauly, one at Lhanbryde, three at Poolewe. By the time I got home, I was in need of a rest!