Island in the sun

The Clisham without boots

A trip to the Western Isles gave LotH a chance to recharge her Gaelic batteries and me a chance to climb the Clisham, the largest peak in the long island acting as a barrier between the moors of Lewis and the hills of Harris.  At 2,621 feet, it is a wee bit short of Munro status but still a good climb.

The impertinent calls of the cuckoos and the wheet of their erstwhile foster parents, the meadow pipits, echoed up Glen Scaradale as I parked the car near the start of the old post track now designated the North Harris Walkway.  It was then I discovered that I’d left my boots back at base. Oh, the trials of age and memory!

  From Gormul Maraig

Nothing for it, having come this far, I set off up the track in a pair of slip-on driving shoes…well, the track looked fairly dry…well, sort of.

The Clisham

Skirting the wettest bits, I made my way up the old path to a stony outcrop, Gormul Maraig, and climbed up over this to the shoulder of Tomnabhal where the Clisham came into view, then came a long slog up the boulder-strewn slopes to the break in the rocky summit ridge.

 The summit approach 

 The views were great down to Harris and up to Lewis but the feet were beginning to feel the strain and there was still the descent to come.  The trek was livened up by sights of greenshanks, the sudden burst from heathery hiding places of red grouse and the wary stares of red deer. 

 View to Harris

 Glacier grooved

As I scrambled back over the large boulders with their glacier grooved surfaces, I pondered on what a pensioner with hypertension and a tin hip was doing stravaging about alone on a mountain.   At that point, a bird flew over and, clear and concise, came the call “coo-coo, coo-coo”.  All the way from Africa to voice an opinion and maybe not far wrong either.  
 It took a day or two for the muscles to recover, the shoes never will. 

 Boating for Eagles

The trip to the Flannans was off, so I settled for a trip round Loch Roag in a RIB, hoping to catch sight of a sea-eagle, it being a bit too early for basking sharks to be seen.

Approaching a sea cave

 Spectacular interiors

Exploring the natural lagoons of Pabaigh Mor and Bhacasaigh with their turquoise waters and white sands was pleasant enough and the arches Pabaigh Beag and the sea caves of Fuaighh Mor were spectacular but no sign of the erne, even as we passed below Creag- na- Iolaire – the crag of the eagle - on Fuaigh Mor.  Not a glimpse.

Venturing out into darker water was a bit stimulating, the bouncy RIB and the spray making it a bit of fun and shaking up the old bones.  The island of Fuaigh Beag is now considered as the source of the uprights for the famed Callanish stones.  Apparently at a very low tide, workings were discovered where the stones may have been cut.  It would only have been a short trip for the slabs through by Bernera where the “bridge over the Atlantic” spans the narrow strait, to their destination at Callanais.

The Bridge over the Atlantic

As we made our way back to our starting point, I glanced up into the cloudless sky and there was a circling dot.   Could it be a sea eagle?   I swept up the binoculars and found that the dot didn’t get any bigger. 
 A floater in the vitreous humour… another penalty of age.

Home, to relax and watch the wonderful sunsets.  We had been hoping to see the fabled “green flash”. Apparently, this occurs just as the sun sets below the horizon – a momentary green flash in the sky. 

 Needless to say, no green flash was seen.

So, no sea eagle, no green flash but a great day out and a wonderful end with a sunset like a Rothko painting.