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

SERRANO - MINIMAL, CLEAN, FRESH

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Apr 20th, 2017

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Gluten Free

R seems to have developed a bit of a wheat allergy.  I never knew you could “develop” allergies, I thought you were born with them – but R seems to have managed it.  I wish he could have been allergic to something a bit more convenient, because avoiding wheat is a right pain in the […]

Apr 19th, 2017

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Big Day on Ben Nevis

Ever since R and I started climbing a couple of years ago – my dream has been to climb Ben Nevis – not using the normal “Tourist Route” (which basically involves several hours of walking up a steep man made path in the company of other people) but via the Carn Mor Dearg (CMD) Arete […]

Apr 16th, 2017

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Not going so well so far

As I said, R and I have this week off as a “staycation” – our idea was to do some climbing – starting off in the local area to avoid the roads over the weekend and to finish off a few (notably Stob Eas) mountains we haven’t done yet.  Then after the bank holiday was […]

Apr 15th, 2017

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A bit of self-seeding going on

I can’t say that R and I are keen gardeners – in fact I am not that keen and to describe him as keen would be like saying that the late Iain Paisley was fond of Catholics.  So the garden has got much scruffier and more wildlife friendly (that is a nice way of putting […]

Apr 12th, 2017

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A Goily, Goily Day

R and I have a term for the typical weather in this area, which is “Goily”.  On a goily day the wind sweeps over Beinn Bheula from the west, and brings waves of cloud, rain and sunshine alternately with it.  The picture doesn’t do it justice, but yesterday we must have had at least ten […]

Apr 11th, 2017

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So good to be home

I’ve been having a look around at all the things I have missed while I have been out of circulation in the big city – it is funny how you almost immediately lose contact with the rhythms of nature when you go away from it for a while. All kinds of new things are out […]

Apr 9th, 2017

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Well that’s all over

I think this is the longest time I have ever been away from writing this blog.  The last two weeks have been absolutely frenetic as R and I have been organizing an IT Security conference (BSides Edinburgh).  I’d like to say “never again” and in fact this time last week I was saying just that, […]

Mar 23rd, 2017

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Otter back again

Shortly after we moved in here we saw an otter on the webcam over the pond (it was actually around this time of year).  We didn’t see him again over the next few months and then we had to give up on “Pond Cam” because the network wouldn’t support it and it kept crashing “Shed Cam”. […]

Mar 22nd, 2017

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Night of the Sausages

I bought R some super large hot dogs which he didn’t think much to.  So with half the packet left over, I decided to put them out for the badgers.  This was the result, but not quite what we were expecting (click on the picture to see the video). I’ve no idea where the black […]

Mar 22nd, 2017

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Duke’s Path in the snow

I took a wander up the Duke’s Path towards Coran Lochan today.  The weather was superb, although cold and snowy and the views were first rate. Obviously no one had been along the path since the snow fell; no one human at least although I saw lots of animal tracks (mostly deer and sheep). This […]