Sutherland: Balnakeil, Loch Assynt, Smoo Caves, Old Shoremore Beach, Durness: Highlands of Scotland
Chapter 1

Getting There Is Halfwit's Fun

As expected, the trip was once again humongously awful.

The usual cattle car plane, the usual delayed planes and trains, and -- this time -- also an irrecoverable and devastating theft while in JFK.  And it was even worse for David, who'd already done thousands of miles coming in from Hawai'i.

We'd had to take separate flights, David stopping over in PHL and I in JFK, but there he was bright and shiny in Manchester.  Mama, the seasoned world traveler, snatched a chunk of stirling money out of the ATM and we headed for the train.

Tired and disheveled as were were, and cursed with chest colds we'd come down with the day of departure, it was still so exciting to land and be on our way to my beloved heart place.  (And I was grateful there even were trains, on the tail of the UK fuel protests.)

We had set out on the 19th, and by the night of the 20th we finally arrived in Inverness, to stay the night in the Old Royal Guest House, just a step out of the rail station.

We were too tired for any sightseeing, so we had burgers at Smokey Joe's cybercafé, wrote a log note, dosed ourselves with Nyquil, and called it a night.

The Real Hamish Country

Those of you who read my interview with M.C. Beaton, author of the Hamish MacBeth mysteries, know that she was scornful of Plockton as a choice for Lochdubh, with its yachts and palm trees and happy people.  What she'd had in mind was the Sutherland region of the far northwest.

Bright and early, we set out for that very northwest with our wonderful guide, a true Highlander, Nicola Fraser of Highland Journeys.  What a great decision that turned out to be.

We saw so many wonders:  Corrieshalloc Gorge, Misead Falls, Ardvreck Castle, Loch Assynt.  And it was as Ms. Beaton had described -- monolithic, powerful, often stark and grim.

But so beautiful.  A very wild, sparsely populated place, where you're very close not just to nature but to the very elements.  It's a completely different world, even commercially.  Everywhere we saw sheep, peat trenches, fish farms and mussel farms.  Waterfalls everywhere, often running gold with peat.  And of course the now-loved trio of heather, gorse and bracken.  As in Cromarty last trip, many of the beaches had rose coloured sand.

Here, there are suddenly no fences, and the sheep straggle into the roads.

Looking across a vast strath it's almost another planet's landscape - endless rolling stretches of bracken, gargantuan boulders set down in nowhere as if hurled from the moon, distant cloud-scraping mountains.

Nicola is a wonderful guide and a delightful person, very knowledgable about the region, and the travels were so much richer with the benefit of her company.

Old Shoremore Beach and the Smoo Caves:

One of my favorite stops was Old Shoremore Beach, a wild and windy but golden (and empty) beach near the Smoo Caves.

Looking down, we could see writing all over the grassy hillside done with the native white stones -- an exotic form of teen graffiti.

After enjoying the beach, we checked out the caves.  The Smoo Caves are very ancient, and you can feel that when you're there.  Ferns, moss, crashing water, and the glow of the view back toward the beach.

At Bal na Keil we wandered a beautiful graveyard and the church ruins, and admired the beautiful beaches, then came in for a landing in the village of Durness.

Fiddling Around in Durness

While wandering Durness, we noticed that there was an exhibition of Scottish fiddling scheduled that night, as the competing groups prepared for a coming major competition.  So after dinner at Sango Sands we went to the town hall and joined what looked like most of the village for a night to remember.

The ensemble began against a tartan backdrop and within minutes every toe was tapping.  There were fiddles, accordians, bass, concertinas, horn pipes and drums, and all the old loved tunes.  The residents of the Old Northwest photos mounted all the way to the wooden rafters seemed to smile.

The songs ranged from melancholy to foot stompin', Twilight Years to Marchin' through Georgia.   Some of the songs were in Gaelic.  The three highest points were:

• Watching accordionist Donny, who looked at all times sound asleep, yet belted out some real rollickers
• A tune of wrenching sweetness by John and Teddy on accordian and violin
• And the discovery that, if I leaned back, I could hear every word of the old tunes, being sung by an elderly woman who was enjoying the night to the utmost.

Our B&B, Glengolly, was immaculate and comfortable, run by the friendly MacKay family.  I snuggled in to read the big find of the trip:  the one Ian Rankin book that is simply not available in the U.S.

Cape Wrath & Sutherland Photo Gallery