Wednesday, April 18, 2018
On this bright, breezy day we headed up a small hill we climbed last year - only this time, we were a couple of weeks earlier. This was taken with Greger's new camera, a Canon digital SLR.
It was fine enough to sit and enjoy a leisurely lunch at the top, which was useful as we needed the rest - at least, I did. I'm very unfit and fear that I might not get up the bigger hills this year. We'll see.
This place is wonderful, the bleak, wet moors stretching out towards mountains which still hold patches of snow after a long, hard winter.
A greenshank called in the distance, the sound faint and alluring on the strong gusty wind. On the way up we'd flushed a pair of golden plover - they took off, but didn't fly far. Meadow pipits and skylarks were present on the slopes, and a mistle thrush was foraging.
We continued on our traverse with the Fannaichs ahead, and a red grouse went whirring up the hillside behind us.
Back down on the path, we looked into a gorge only slightly less impressive than nearby Corrieshalloch - and much less frequented. The arched bridge above the waterfall is reached by a made-up path and must once have been a tourist attraction - but now a sign states that it's dangerous and shouldn't be used. Nevertheless, I found a video clip on the internet showing kayakers not only braving the waters in the gorge, but also crossing the bridge. Yikes! Partially framing the picture is one of a number of pine trees that make such a nice feature of this part of the walk.
Ravens were hereabouts, and a bit further downstream a pair of goosanders flew over. Dippers, a pied wagtail, and our first common sandpiper of the year were near the confluence of the two rivers. As we neared the road and the end of our walk, I looked back to see a small, square-tailed raptor crossing the wide valley and just disappearing behind the trees; so merlin almost but not quite made it onto the day's bird-list - along with a martin seen at the start of the walk which was probably sand but which I couldn't identify for sure.
// posted by Christine @ 1:22 PM 
