Natural highs and lows

It is said that whilst on holiday there's the chance to do things differently, maybe staying up late and sleeping all morning, or skydiving, or eating and drinking oneself into an absolute stupor. We may have had the odd lie-in, and the occasional meal out, but the one thing we had less of on holiday was sky. No, we didn't go caving or exploring a nuclear bunker, our 'different' is habitat, rather than habit. At home, there are not, as yet, any trees in our garden, so the views are quite unrestricted, less for buildings and neighbours' planting. Consequently, the birds we see in, or from, our garden are not the usual garden birds. In fact, as I've been typing this paragraph, a Great Skua flew by, pursued by an irate Curlew. So our holiday indulgence is trees, and if possible a river. The cottage we were staying in is very much in the category of 'can't see the wood for the trees', mainly Scots Pine and Birch, and the birdage is so very different from...

Severe gales and driving rain are not an unusual occurrence in Orkney, but three days of the same weather, any type of weather, very much is. So Storm Babet (or normal meteorological conditions for October) is actually a bit different - not in intensity or maximum speed, but in sheer staying power. Coming out of the east, she is hitting the front of the house full on, and we are experiencing a whole new raft of unnerving noises, bumps and rattles as we figure out just what Burnbank sounds like in a gale. We have lost at least one roof tile, but I won't be going up a ladder to investigate until wind speeds drop significantly. Living at the top of a hill, thankfully, we're relatively unlikely to experience the flooding which is causing so many problems elsewhere. Weather from the east always excites the birding fraternity, as migrating species can be blown across the North Sea to make landfall in Orkney. Birds which are rarely seen here are suddenly there in front of you, and a f...

Recently, a day's work was cancelled at the last minute when the spare part we'd been waiting for finally turned up but was not what had been ordered. Gah! Still, the sun was shining, the sky was blue and there was a rarity loitering at a wetland pool in the West Mainland. Better still, checking my life list, the bird wasn't on it. There will be plenty of dreich days this Winter so I reasoned that making the most of the fine weather was probably allowable. The pool in question was quite close to the shore, so we left the car at a nearby car park and wandered along the coast. There were loads of thrushes about, a trend for a few weeks now, with Blackbirds, Redwings and Fieldfares to the fore. A small flock descended to the ground before our eyes and we were pleasantly surprised to discover that they were Song Thrushes. Song Thrush But on to the pool, for the main event! This diminutive wader is a Grey Phalarope, a species which breeds in the Arctic and then spends much of Wi...

For me, a keenly-anticipated holiday can have a bittersweet moment as it becomes a reality. Although I am always ready for some downtime, travelling doesn't usually fill me with the same sense of gladness.  This year, my grumpiness was mitigated to obscurity by circumventing a ludicrously early start and treating the rest of the day as continuous birdwatching. We booked B+B on the mv Hamnavoe, so spent the first night of our holiday berthed in Stromness harbour, which meant that we didn't have to be up at stupid o'clock to pack the car and drive to the ferry. It also allowed me the opportunity to reprise a motif from a previous blog. Although there wasn't a kitchen sink or a pen involved, I woul d like to think that Dodie Smith would've approved. After a smooth crossing of the Pentland Firth, we set off from Scrabster, on the north coast of Caithness, at a leisurely pace, and turning west, not east like the majority of our shipmates. Just before Melvich, we took a t...

Occasionally, in Winter, if I need to travel to Shetland for work, it pays to keep an eye on the weather forecast and the ferry company's operational news. If there's any possibility of the ferry not calling in at Kirkwall on the return journey, then I make my apologies to customers and re-arrange the trip for a more benign time. Up until last week, this approach has stood me in good stead. Are you detecting an iota of foreboding yet? This Winter has been rather stormy so far, and doesn't look like kicking the habit any time soon. So, whilst Pentland Firth sailings were being delayed or cancelled and the timings of freight sailings between Lerwick and Aberdeen juggled to miss the worst of the weather, the passenger service twixt Aberdeen, Kirkwall and Lerwick seemed to escape all of the red ink normally associated with an Atlantic gale. How very odd, thought I, but if the ferry operator thinks tide times, wave height and wind speed are ok, then who am I to argue? After all,...

After a week in the Cairngorm area, it was all change for the rest of the holiday. Between cottages, there was time for a pilgrimage to Beinn Eighe National Nature Reserve in the hope of seeing a male Azure Hawker dragonfly (readers who have followed me from another place may remember expeditions in 2012 and 2015 where there was only a sighting of one female). With fours hours available before resuming the journey, it was always a long shot, but hope springs eternal, as they say, even in overcast conditions. Walking past the first wooden bench shortly after leaving the visitor centre resulted in a double take, as there, bold as brass, was sat a male Azure Hawker. Woohoo! Now I could enjoy the scenery... Beinn Eighe Slioch and Loch Maree The cottage for the second week was located just off a single track road between Lochinver and Achmelvich. After all the driving, it was good to be leaving the car to its own devices for a few days. Harbour Seal with pup, Achmelvich A beach at Achmelvic...