My Personal Blog

A skein of honking geese hug the contours of the land. A black bag, ripped, flaps against a barbed wire fence. A window creaks in an abandoned house. The wind gets everywhere, like water. Ducks are alarmed at my approach. By the time I reach them, they are only ripples in the burn. A hailstorm sweeps the landscape. I bow my head and plough on. The green earth has turned white. A hint of red

We arrived in Orkney for a short break. Orkney in February? But why not? Perhaps we would see the Northern Lights. Northern stars: "You should have been here in winter!" said the first man we talked to. I looked around. There was snow on the ground. Isn't this winter? He shook his head. The sun was shining. Loch of Harray: We returned to a favourite spot. Above, the Kitchener Memorial.

It's soundless but for my boots crunching snow. The trees are furred with frost, the dark extremities of birch white, looking like the ghosts of trees, like a photographic negative. The fog has closed in but the hint of sunrise I saw earlier, that hint of an extraordinary day about to begin, appears in a hole in the fog, a rosy mountain peak plastered in snow. The forest I am wandering in smells

We arrived in Fortingall late on a dreich afternoon, lights already on. What a handsome place this Perthshire village is! Its arts-and-crafts thatched cottages look more like a chocolate-box English village than the more usual grey boxes of Scotland, setting their faces against the weather. The church site is old. Monks from Iona preached here in Pictish times. The reason this site was

I was browsing the map of our locality. How far up the River North Esk could I extend my training runs? My eye was caught by what looked like a stately home and grounds. Penicuik House. Never heard of it. I looked it up. Penicuik House: How could I have been living here so long and not have heard of this vast pile before? Explorable ruins are catnip to my wife. We vowed to visit as soon