The loch shows an infinite variety of faces as the light hits it on different days.

Lucky used to be a stray girl but has now found her new identity as a Donich Lodge boy (the vet discovered he was male when we took “her” to be spayed). He would ask you to respect his new pronouns.

The high mountain pass over the Rest and be Thankful is the main route out of the village. Here it is in winter.

Spring sky over the mountain tops.

Sunset from our front door step.

A misty moon over the mountains as darkness falls.

View over towards the loch from near the summit of Cnoc Coinnich.

A rainbow appears in a clear interval between showers.

Lochgoilhead in the distance on a clear spring morning.

As the year turns, the mountains are white on most days.

Looking across the loch from the village, clouds form a band across the hills.

Tora and Schrodi our snow Bengal brothers used to live here. RIP both of you

A dragonfly pauses for a rest by the side of our pond.

The weather here can be appalling. Here gales and torrential rain have blocked one of the village’s few roads.

The colours on the mountains fade to muted browns as autumn approaches.

The Donich Water in one of its kinder moods as it runs through our garden.

One of a myriad insects pollinating our heather.

A group of wild haggis have made a den down by the river.

Our new Highland Tiger Saphy prowling her territory. She is a demon for the wildlife with her specialized prey item being shrews. She is not adverse to mice, voles or birds however.

This is Amber aka as Bramble. She is big, black, rather podgy and a bit of a scaredy cat. We had her cloned shortly after she arrived.

Although we don’t get much snow at loch level, the higher mountains are covered for five months or so of the year

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Apr 9th, 2014

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High Tea

I tried an experiment for my Dad’s (84th) birthday and made a traditional Scottish ‘High Tea’. For non-natives – this is a sort of combination between afternoon tea and dinner. You have a simple but filling cooked dish, followed by a variety of baked things (largely of the sweet variety). It is eaten about 6pm […]

Apr 6th, 2014

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Lochgoilhead Lawnmowers

The sheep have returned.  Two of them this time – and although we have gently shoed them a few times (cats are scared of them and they keep eying up the plants) they keep coming back. We have a fragment of wall that belonged to the former house which burned down (we think immediately post-war), […]

Apr 4th, 2014

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First Fruits of the Garden

Things are definitely getting going now and the polytunnel is pretty crowded with seedlings.   Yesterday I took my life in my hands and moved my first early potatoes which were growing in containers outside in order to free up a bit of space. I now need to get the deer fencing up as a […]

Apr 1st, 2014

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April Fool

Our Doctor’s Surgery seemed to have converted itself to a Vet this morning.   I presume this is for an April Fool – but it would be even funnier to turn up with one of the cats in a box and say that he needed a worming tablet. I don’t think the cats would find […]

Mar 30th, 2014

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Cowal Way

Today R and I walked part of the Cowal way. We took the Helensburgh minibus from Lochgoilhead this morning and got off at Artgarten. The idea was to be able to do a longish walk in one direction without having to loop back to get the car. So this was part of the Lochgoilhead to […]

Mar 26th, 2014

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Drumming Contest

I was out walking at around 7am today and just coming round the road near the loch I heard a loud drumming noise. It was a woodpecker – unfortunately I only got a brief glimpse of him (not enough to identify his exact species), but he was making enough noise to make up for his […]

Mar 25th, 2014

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Wildlife Recap

These are the creatures we have seen in the immediate vicinity (our garden or within a mile of the Donich) since we moved in back in October. Pine Marten Badger Fox Otter Red Deer Red Squirrel Short tailed vole Field mouse Bat Heron Buzzard Falcon Garden birds -Tits (great, coal, blue), Robin, Chaffinch, Blackbird, Thrush, […]

Mar 25th, 2014

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Bats and Deer

This has been a very exciting week for us on the Wildlife front. Not only did we get to meet one of the badgers, and see the encounter between cat and pine marten – but yesterday we saw two new arrivals. The first was when we were sitting in the dining room watching dusk fall […]

Mar 22nd, 2014

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Badger Thrill

Last night I had just put the nuts out for the wildlife when I happened to look out of the window. There was one of our badgers munching away. Luckily R’s sister who is an excellent photographer (her photo included below) was here – so we very quietly went outside to see if we could […]

Mar 21st, 2014

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When Cat meets Pine Marten…

Since before we moved here I have been a bit worried about the cats and some of the wildlife we have here. Although I have joked a lot about Tora having a girlfriend he can’t bring home because she is a Pine Marten, I did have it at the back of my mind how awful […]