Friday, June 27, 2008

Out there...


Rain clouds over Kiloran Bay
Originally uploaded by goforchris.
After uploading the last of my photos from last week's holiday I find myself suddenly wanting to be back on Colonsay - a magical scrap of an island, 17 square miles of it, stuck on the edge of the Atlantic. A "thin" place, where anything seems possible, and also a place where I felt we had gone back half a century. There are few cars, only single-track roads, two shops - plus the tiny bookshop on the west coast, with an extraordinary collection of books second-hand and new, and the promise to get you anything you asked for. The Colonsay Hotel is the only place where you can eat in the evening; The Pantry is only open during the day.

There is only one doctor - the one who had to close his surgery to go off on the medi-vac helicopter. It can't be an easy place to live, not with 21st century expectations anyway. But in another sense it felt simple, with fewer choices and limited options. And I felt safe there - even the cows seemed less threatening than I tend to find them! And as this photo shows, much of the rain we are used to in Argyll passes Colonsay by: there are no mountains to force the clouds upwards, so they pass on to dump their load on Mull or Jura. This purple beauty was heading for Mull while we walked on the beach in sunshine.

I think I shall have to go back again...

1 comment:

  1. Anonymous1:04 AM

    That looks amazing. It's a place I've never been but you make it sound enchanting. Thank you

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