Category Archives: Landscape

Rockall, Malin, Hebrides …

A few years ago I took up running. It wasn’t long before I stumbled on the kerb, turned my ankle and had to be scraped off the road by a passing motorist. A physiotherapist subsequently told me that injuries within … Continue reading

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September

September is a month of renewal. People are back from their summer holidays. A new academic year is starting. Autumn is in the air. And it’s the month of my birth. In September I always have a strong feeling of … Continue reading

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Out of body

I have always thought that the last word in disembodiment was Tenniel’s illustration of the Cheshire Cat in Alice in Wonderland. ‘I have often seen a cat without a grin but never a grin without a cat,’ says Alice, watching … Continue reading

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Time in Hampi

Even in Goa it’s hard to avoid politics. Apart from the constant temptation to check on the latest Trump outrage or Brexit dumbfoolery, it’s state election day here tomorrow. That means, among other inconveniences, that the whole place is dry … Continue reading

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Poetry path

In the hills a few miles outside our village of Birnam is a Camphill community. Here, on the Corbenic estate, 27 adults with learning difficulties live with their carers and a number of volunteers in 50 acres of agricultural land, … Continue reading

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Feet of clay

Last night I finished reading H is for Hawk, Helen MacDonald’s extraordinary and much-fêted memoir about how she worked through her grief at her father’s death by training a goshawk. I loved the book for the luminosity of the writing, … Continue reading

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Altchroskie

I first met my friend Pete Clark almost 25 years ago, shortly after we had moved into our house in Strathardle, one of Perthshire’s least known and prettiest glens. The house was called Altchroskie (‘alt’ means stream or burn in … Continue reading

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Lost in the fog

From to time fighter planes come roaring over our village on their way to Lossiemouth, or heading off to do whatever they do over the emptiness of the Highlands. Dunkeld sits in the cleft of the Tay valley, at the … Continue reading

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Winter spell

The last four days have felt like real winter. The thermometer has hardly risen above zero since I arrived here. The cold bites my cheeks as soon as I step outside and the snow crunches underfoot. Through the picture windows … Continue reading

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Wayfaring strangers

When I got home at lunchtime today there was a large and magnificent-looking book sitting on my kitchen table. It was warmly inscribed to me by its author, my close neighbour, Fiona Ritchie. Fiona is the presenter of The Thistle … Continue reading

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