Christine's walking & birds blog

There was a flat calm on Loch Ewe, and from Aultbea a flock of what looked like scoter could be seen far out. They were probably about a kilometre away - and were more likely to be Eider in eclipse plumage. Even further out were two red-throated divers, while common terns flew to and fro and a gannet crossed the car park on its way to somewhere else.



Later, at Poolewe, I walked along the road towards the gardens and stopped to look at a family of redshanks picking about in the wet seaweed. Greger had driven on and parked at Inverewe Gardens to buy an ice-cream, and as he walked down to join me, all the birds flew off along the beach. Not in a panic or anything, just as if all the gulls, curlews, oystercatchers etc had suddenly thought "Oh well, think I'll just move on a bit" and very casually, but very definitely, left. There was no peregrine that I could see in the sky, and no-one walking out on the salt marsh; and then I saw them - two white-tailed sea eagles rising slowly and majestically above the trees of Inverewe Gardens.




The eagles spiralled up and up, sometimes drifting close together and then separating again until they were lost to view. A pretty fantastic way to end the day!

There were no crested tits to be found in the forest, but two unexpected small creatures were worth seeing. The first was a wasp with a very long ovipositor, investigating a decaying log that I couldn't get near, requiring full zoom with the camera.


After research: It's possibly the largest ichneumon wasp in Britain (Rhyssa persuasoria) but it looks more like Dolichomitus imperator. Rather grand names, whichever it is. LATER: or it could be Ephialtes manifestator.)

Not far away, another log held what seemed at first to be a tiny lizard.


But looking more closely I realised it was a newt - probably palmate as they seem so widespread here.


An osprey appeared over the hill carrying prey and was soon lost behind trees to the south.

Beinn Liath Mhor (Strath Carron)

Greger has bought himself a Tilley hat, to help prevent sunburn in the hills. With good weather forecast for today he was looking forward to trying it out - and ten minutes into the walk, he realised he'd left it in the car. After climbing up through woods from the road, you have to cross the railway line - and while he was away fetching his hat, I heard a train in the distance. I hoped he'd heard it too, but it gave quite a loud blast on the horn as it approached - and soon afterwards he re-appeared on the path below. Hat retrieved and sudden death averted, we set off again; and soon we could see the first top of our walk, rearing up behind the shadowed spur on the right-hand side of the picture.



















  
The land of lochs and rocks: These lochs have the collective name of Lochan Uaine and give their name to Sgorr nan Lochan Uaine, rising behind them.

With a warm sunny day forecast, I knew the beach car-park would be full; so I parked in the lay-by at the junction and walked the first part of the headland walk instead. In a channel in the machair, a shoal of tiny fish with pointed snouts and large eyes, and some with bright spots of colour, were probably lesser sand-eels (Ammodytes tobianus).



A family party of twite were flitting along the shore of the channel; one hadn't yet learnt to be wary of humans.


A juvenile dunlin was less tolerant, and flew across the channel with a hoarse call, scurrying off into the fading thrift. The beach was busy, with many people in bathing gear and a few hardy souls swimming and surf-boarding - but in wetsuits. Three women waded in wearing ordinary cozzies - and there was much shrieking as they got further and further out. One eventually started to swim but the other two continued to shriek until they too had a brief swim. They made me laugh - which was good, because the sun soon went in, a cool breeze got up, and many people began to leave the beach.

I enjoyed my walk, though - it was still a fine day, after all. On the way back I flushed a snipe, and a stonechat and a reed bunting were seen nearby in the bracken.


A juvenile cuckoo perched briefly on a rock further up the hill.


A peregrine came across the dunes and machair uttering a high-pitched complaint.


It was answered by a second bird and they later went flying high westwards together. Two ravens then   sauntered past. One carried on towards the sea, but the other one circled, called, did some tumbling in front of me, and then dropped down onto a crag as if to say "All this is mine!"


Actually, not far away was a dead sheep, which I had originally seen floating but which the falling tide had left marooned on the machair; so that's probably what they were after. A great black-backed gull was also cruising - but from the bloodied face of the unfortunate sheep, I thought it likely that the eyes at least had already gone.

Yesterday: Still a southern birder at heart, I went temporarily into depressed autumn mode at the sight of a lesser redpoll, feeding with twite and a smart male linnet on the machair.


A dunlin in breeding plumage was picking its way through the seaweed.


Close by was a juvenile wheatear; two common terns were fishing; and a singing sedge warbler way out in the reedy pool showed itself for a nanosecond. Where the road climbs high above a loch, two red-throated divers seemed becalmed; they were very distant but I didn't hang around - they could well have a chick hiding in the grass and the fluffy white bog cotton.


Phoning Greger to let him know I was on my way home and had stopped off at the recycling road (where it was fairly windy), I was mystified when I thought he said "Oh, you'll have seen the coots flying, leaving then" which didn't seem to make any sense at all. What coots?! He had to repeat it twice before I twigged that he was actually saying "You'll have seen the cruise liner leaving then."

I hadn't, but travelling down Morefield hill I realised the liner was already behind me, so I turned and drove along the road to Rhue, managing a couple of shots just before the ship disappeared behind the headland.


This looked a nice ship, so it was worth the effort. Some of the cruise liners are just over-big and plain ugly, but there are one or two that call in here that are moderately sized - and one, the name of which I've forgotten, is very elegant.

This was the Boudicca, and it was on a Fred Olson cruise. A few people were standing on the decks watching the scenery slide by - and as I stood watching the ship move gracefully down the loch towards the sea part of me wanted to go with them.

A drive out in the rain was all I could manage today; but it brought the welcome sight of a pair of whinchats.

Sgurr nan Each

The surface of Loch a' Bhraoin was almost perfectly still at 6.30 this morning - and grey, green, or blue, depending on whether it reflected land or sky.


A common sandpiper was snoozing on the triangular rock and Greger spotted a dipper flashing away downstream; but best of all was a red-throated diver. We had heard it calling before we could see the loch, and hurried through the plantation with fingers crossed it would still be there.



Some recce work by Greger the previous day led us off the path to this bridge; we felt it was worth the detour and extra distance to avoid the awkward stepping-stone crossing of the river.


Rejoining the path, we set off up the valley that we have come to know so well, heading for our last Munro on the eastern side of the river. Once past the first Munro on this ridge we were making our way past the second, when the pointed top of Sgurr nan Each (923m) came into view.


After the 6 kilometre, steadily-rising slog through the valley it didn't take long to get up to the col. We rested there and had a drink, looking up to Sgurr nan Clach Geala (our previous Fannaich) and across the valley to Sgurr Mor. I found a couple of tiny bugs (diving beetles?) and a larger beetle in the small pools on the col, before setting off for the summit.


After the rocky path below and then the boggy flank, the hard dry path across short, tundra-like vegetation was a delight. Sgurr nan Each's eastern slopes are steep and unassailable, and the path keeps close to the edge for much of the way. A short, very easy rock scramble gave dizzying views of Allt a' Choire Mhoir, rushing and splashing in a series of falls to its end in lonely Loch Fannich; and then it was the final pull to the summit cairn.






We walked a little way down onto soft moss and ate our lunch, looking over an inviting plateau to the distant mountains of Torridon. The bare patch on the left of the picture is probably a deflation surface, where an exposed area (usually on sandstone) has been stripped of vegetation by persistent strong winds.


I'd hoped to walk down onto the plateau, finding a way back down to the valley path from the next col - although this would obviously have made an even longer walk on the valley path. But when we realised that the large deer herd we could see grazing down there was composed of hinds and calves, we decided to leave them in peace. (The presence of calves made sense of the hind barking at us on our previous hill-walk.)


We stayed up here for some time - three other walkers meanwhile arriving, lunching, and leaving again - but at last we dragged ourselves away and set off back down. I kept an eye and an ear open for ring ouzel, as we had seen one on this ridge before. But nothing doing today.


Down on the path again, we found ourselves surrounded by meadow pipits - and that was it, as far as birds were concerned. The birds on the loch - together with a snipe, flushed from the side of the track right at the start of the walk - had been the best of the day. No birds had been seen above the valley - only a bumblebee (probably buff-tailed) and a medium-sized black beetle close to or on the summit. And on the flank of the hill, several frogs.


We couldn't be bothered with the muddy detour this time, and followed the path to the cairned crossing point of the river. Greger got across the river on stones, some of them submerged, and without caring at this stage about getting wet feet. However, while still up on the summit, I'd had a bit of a fright; I was sitting down and had taken off my boot to put a fresh plaster on my sore heel. When I pulled my knee further in to get my boot back on, it felt as though my hip was cramping, or about to go out of joint. I straightened my leg out slowly and stood up carefully, my hip seemingly okay again - but now, I was scared of slipping on a wet stone and doing something to it, so I decided to go barefoot using only dry stones and paddling where there weren't any. Bare feet give better grip.


Greger had kindly offered to cross back again and take my boots and camera, but I wouldn't let him - so he sat on the bank and took a series of pics of me instead.

The last thing we saw was a helicopter (identified by Greger as a Squirrel) which hovered over Sgurr nan Clach Geala, then crossed the valley and hovered over Sgurr Breac before going down out of sight; eventually it rose again above the hill and flew off to the east. We didn't think it could be a rescue with that particular type of helicopter, and Greger said it was probably a rich Munro-bagger, doing it the easy way! The length of our walk was 15 kilometres.