Anteros

I got back from a lovely break in the Western Isles last weekend and promptly came down with the cold from hell. It's ages since I've had a bad cold and I'd forgotten just how much they can flatten you. I had hoped to post some pics and other bits and pieces but my head is full of cotton wool, so in the meantime here's one picture of a nice view and the island poet Derick Thomson describing summer on Lewis better than I ever could.

Lewis in Summer The atmosphere clear and transparent as though the veil had been rent and the Creator were sitting in full view of His people eating potatoes and herring, with no man to whom He can say grace. Probably there’s no other sky in the world that makes it so easy for people to look in on eternity; you don’t need philosophy where you can make do with binoculars.

Leodhas as t-Samhradh An iarmailt cho soilleir tana mar gum biodh am brat-sgàile air a reubadh ‘s an Cruthadhear ‘na shuidhe am fianuis a shluaigh aig a’bhuntat ‘s a sgadan, gun duine ris an dean E altachadh. ‘S iongantach gu bheil iarmailt air an t-saoghal tha cur cho beag a bhacadh air daoine sealltainn a-steach dha’n an t-sìorruidheachd; chan eil feum air feallsanachd far an dean thu chùis le do phrosbaig.

~ Derick Thomson

PS katriona_s Thank you so much for my beautiful gift which was waiting for me when I got back. It's perfect! I love it :) Pics to follow.

We've been having a bit of weather up here, which has resulted in some rather hysterical news reports, however amongst the hyperbole I came across this masterpiece of Hebridean understatement on the BBC news website, from the Barra Lifeboat coxswain...

Speaking from Barra in the Outer Hebrides, Donald MacLeod, coxswain of the island's lifeboat, said there was rain, hail and "plenty of wind".

He said the storm had "grown through the night", adding: "The swell conditions are pretty bad to the west - it's showing about 14m (45ft)."

Mr Macleod said this was "a lot deeper than we normally see" and was "definitely something to be wary of".

And here's what a 45 ft swell looks like in the Hebrides. These pictures of the Butt of Ness lighthouse at the northern tip of Lewis were taken earlier today. To give you some idea of the scale, that lighthouse is about 120 feet high and in the middle picture the waves are breaking right over it.



By Dell-icious-ness



By Chris Murray



By Angus Maclean

I mentioned to aletheiafelinea that I'd been trying, rather unsuccessfully, to take more pictures of flower meadows while I was on holiday and promised to post them, so here they are! This is the machair, a unique coastal land form found only in the north west of Scotland, and most commonly in the Outer Hebrides. The machair is a low lying fertile grassland between coastal sand dunes and inland moor formed by windblown shell sand overlain by thin soils*. In the summer months the machair is awash with wild flowers and it used to be said that sailors approaching the Hebrides from the west could smell the machair long before the islands came into view. Early in the season the white and yellow flowers dominate (daisy, bedstraw, yellow vetches), followed by pinks and purples (wild thyme, clover, orchids) and finally the glorious blues (harebell, scabious, self heal, blue vetch). These pictures are of the machair behind Traigh na Berie. I've been coming here since I was a kid and have been trying to photograph it for over thirty years, but not a single picture I've ever taken does it justice. Of course having a proper camera rather than a decrepit old iphone might help :}



( Lots and lots and lots of flowers! )

Many thanks for all the very kind birthday wishes! We've been away camping by the beach for a few days so I've been out of range of t'internet. We had several days of glorious weather but our luck ran out yesterday and it started pouring, so I spent most of my birthday packing up wet camping gear and washing sandy clothes :} We're now holed up at my sister's house and hoping for some more good weather next week. Hope all is good with you guys!



Coll beach, Lewis

Well we weathered the gale and finally made landfall last night. Can't say it was much fun though. I survived relatively unscathed but poor daughter and partner were miserable :( Just as we were putting to sea, the captain cheerfully announced that there as a "fully westerly gale blowing and the seas high". Lovely!

Just so you can share the experience, I risked life and limb (well I stood up and staggered to the window, which kinda amounts to the same thing) to bring you this exclusive footage of a force 9 gale in the Minch. This is filmed from the observation lounge in the bows of the ship, at first you don't really get a good impression of the height of the waves because you're looking down from above. You get a better idea once the wave breaks right over the top of the ship!

I've often thought that if I could have any super power, it would be sea legs. I could have done with them last night I tell you ;)

Just back from a flying visit to the Hebrides. Had a lovely wee break hanging out with family, playing with two outrageously spoilt Lhasa Apsos and cooing over a very sweet baby. Hope to catch up soon, in the meantime, here's a few pics.

Flying over the West Highlands	Inner Harbour
Porter's Lodge	Into the woods

I'm off on holiday tomorrow for a fortnight. We're going up to the Outer Hebrides again but this time we'll be spending the first week camping and for the second week we'll be staying here.


This house was bult by my great-grandfather, my grandparents lived here and so did my father. The house should eventually have gone to my sister but my father's second wife tried to sell it after he died (long story). Luckily two of my cousins were able to buy it and renovate it and they now let it out. In the kitchen they've hung pictures of the whole family going right back to my great-great-grandparents so that vistors to the house can see the family that belonged here. My sister and I and our two daughters are there too. I spent a lot of mychildhood here, and although I've visited the house several times since my cousins bought it, this will be the first time I've stayed here for almost 30 years. I'm really looking forward to staying but it'll be strange too. Lots of ghosts here.

I'm off up to the Hebrides for a week tomorrow to see my sister so I'll be a little scarce for a bit. Should have t'internet access on my phone but the signal is always a bit dodgy up there. Not as dodgy as the weather though. This is what we are going home to. Wildfires. Yep, wildfires, on the West Coast of Scotland in April. Two hundred of them in the last week. There's been no rain on Lewis for sixteen days and the moor is burning. Meanwhile it's snowing in London. It's ridiculous. The picture below was taken a couple of days ago about five miles from where my sister lives.



In other news, tonight we went to the theatre to see Black Watch, the award winning National Theatre of Scotland play about the Scottish Black Watch Regiment and their deployment in Iraq. It's absolutely devastating and deserves every single one of its many awards, particularly for the music, which was arranged by a friend of ours. Additional entertainment was provided by a group of teenage girls (probably too young to remember the first Iraq war), sitting beside me who giggled every time one of the cast took off their trousers (which happened every 10 minutes) or made a cock joke (every 5 minutes), while the biddy with the blue rinse sitting in front of us tutted every time they said fuck (every two minutes) and mutterred about "foul language" every time they said cunt (every two seconds). They were all silenced by the time the piper played the Flowers of the Forest by the end though. The production has already toured the US several times and this time round it's going to Seattle and San Francisco. If anyone happens to be in the vicinity, I can highly recommend it.

Take care while I'm gone, and don't let the ship go over the side. A x