Tuesday, April 13, 2021
Yesterday: We walked the geology trail at Knockan for the exercise. The steep path was slippery where the sun had not yet reached, with snow and sometimes ice coating the rock steps; and at one point it led directly below clusters of icicles hanging from the crags.
Some had broken off and were lying on the path, and we hurried to get to the end, not relishing the thought of being hit by others. I thought I heard a quiet "chack" from somewhere above, and a thrush-sized bird went flying strongly along the cliff and out of sight. Could be a ring ouzel, but more likely to be a fieldfare.
I climbed joyfully, my painful hips from the previous day forgotten. I felt great. Coming down at the other end, we looked down on four whooper swans in a bay of the loch.
Once down (and after coffee and cake, of course) we walked a short way over the moorland opposite - and several cracking sounds from across the road alerted us to icicles breaking off and falling above the trail. The sun was rising high enough to shine on the edge of the cliffs, making the icicles watery and unstable.
Today: Greger kindly took my car to Inverness to get a new battery fitted, after he'd started it with jump leads from his Toyota. Later, I went for the usual village walk and saw my first common sandpiper of the year foraging quietly in the Ullapool river.
The sighting was compensation for my hips hurting once again; I had to sit down twice during the walk - and yet I was bounding up the cliffs yesterday like a spring chicken. I seem to have become an elderly person, and I don't like it.
