Living the rather isolated life we do here, we rarely if ever get these things, but the crowded atmosphere in shared transport is just fatal. So not feeling too bright at the moment….

It was a bit grey when we left first thing this morning, but after about 20 minutes it brightened up and we got some glorious views along the way. The loch was like a mirror and you could see the little boats coming and going, leaving huge trails behind them because the water was so still.

There is a little ruined cottage about an hour along the path where there is a bench. Someone has also carved ‘Home Sweet Home’ into a nearby tree stump for a joke – it actually would be a fantastic place to live (in the summer and provided you could live completely off grid).

We didn’t see a single soul on the way out. On the way back a single group of runners went past us as we came back to the lower path.

A lovely walk and we got some of the nicest pictures of Loch Goil we have ever taken. I couldn’t help thinking of the first couple of times we tried this walk back in November/December last year. The first time we got totally soaked to the skin; the second time we didn’t quite make it to Coran because we underestimated how long it would take and we were (rightly) nervous about getting caught on a very rough path in the dark. Hard to believe in today’s idyllic weather that winter will ever come again. But it will…