All the Way to The Isle of Mull

Pleasant Sounds

The rustling of leaves under the feet in woods and under hedges;
The crumpling of cat-ice and snow down woodrides,
   narrow lanes and every street causeway;
Rustling through a wood or rather rushing, while the
   wind halloos in the oak-top like thunder;
The rustle of birds' wings startled from their nests or
   flying unseen into the bushes;
The whizzing of larger birds overhead in a wood, such
   as crows, paddocks, buzzards;
The trample of robins and woodlarks on the brown
   leaves, and the patter of squirrels on the green moss;
The fall of an acorn on the ground, the pattering of
   nuts on the hazel branches as they fall from ripeness;
The flirt of the ground-lark's wing from the stubbles--
   how sweet such pictures on dewy mornings, when
   the dew flashes from its brown feathers!

John Clare

On Wednesday, 13th June, we set off for The Isle of Mull, off the west coast of Scotland, an island in the Inner Hebrides. Trev and I had been twice before, but this time we took friends Jane and Pete with us, for their first visit.

We stayed in The Lake District for two nights on the way, as Jane had never been there, but I'm sorry to say we didn't see much, as we had the usual Lake District weather--rain, rain and more rain. However, we weren't downhearted. We stayed at a nice B&B:

The Log House, Ambleside

and travelled around the area, seeing at least fifty yards below the clouds, mist and drizzle.

Then we carried on up the M6, into Scotland. We travelled all the way round Glasgow on an excellent motorway, and then up the side of Loch Lomond, and on to Arrochar, where we stayed on Friday night. Finally, on Saturday morning, we arrived in Oban and hit Tesco. There are very few shops on Mull, and so we stocked up with enough food to feed the five thousand. As the car was already pretty full, all of this shopping was under our feet, behind seats, between us and all over us---well except for the driver.

Then the exciting part began, we got in the line for the ferry to Mull. We were quite early, so we left the car in the line and went for fish and chips for lunch. We had quite the best fish and chips we'd ever had, and wished we'd had a portion each, instead of one between two. Eventually, the ferry came in from Mull, and disgorged its passengers. Off camed a variety of humankind and transport: bedraggled bikers, footsore hikers, cars pulling caravans or trailers, upmarket 4x4's, lorries and vans, and loads of dogs.

Then it was our turn, and on we went. The attendant parked us within a hair's breadth of the cars around us, we squeezed out of the doors trying hard not to touch the other vehicles and went up to the main part of the ship. The ropes were unhitched and off we went, out through the islands and across the sea to Mull. We all had a drink to celebrate having got so far all on our own, and stood on deck watching the other little islands slip by. It was quite windy but we're hardy.

The ferry took about forty-five minutes and then we docked at Craignure on Mull. We were called to go back to our cars, and I was just opening the car door when I realised I'd left my camera somewhere on the boat.

"Drive off without us," I called to Pete and Jane. "We'll catch you up on land." Trev and I dashed back up to where we had been sitting, but it wasn't there. We looked around in various places where we'd been, but couldn't find it. Then I spotted a crew member and asked if he'd seen it. "No," he said. "But maybe someone's handed it in," and he went to look. And, yes, thank heavens, someone had handed it in. Profuse thanks were proferred to the crew member, but we never had a chance to thank whoever it was who had handed it in. That person definitely made a great difference to my holiday, I would have been so disappointed if I had lost it. Thank you, Unkown Person!

When we landed at Craignure, we had a journey of thirty-seven miles to the cottage at Kintra. The roads on Mull are single track, with passing places, so it was a leisurely drive, through fir trees and glens, past lochs and isolated crofts and houses. We met quite a few vehicles coming the other way, including large coaches, but there was always a passing place nearby and very few people drove too fast. We went through several 'villages'. One uses the term loosely, some are only a cluster of houses, others even only a couple of cottages. One of the villages we passed through was called Pennyghael and, if you look here, you can see a webcam at Pennyghael, mounted on the Kinloch Hotel, showing the view from the upper window:

Webcam at Pennyghael

We continued on, towards the farthermost point of the island, passing through Bunessan, the biggest village in what is referred to as The Ross of Mull. Ross means peninsula in Gaelic.

At last we came to the signpost for Kintra--1.75 miles. We turned right and in a few minutes were at the top of the hill leading down to the village--though I'm not sure if a cluster of twelve houses around a beach at the end of a cul-de-sac can be called a village! However, I'm quite sure it can be called Paradise!

The cottage belongs to a friend and is an old fisherman's cottage--that's the cottage which is old, not the fisherman---and originally would just have had one room downstairs and an attic above. But now it has been upgraded, and has all mod cons, but without spoiling its character.

One of the reasons for going in June was that the longest day falls on June 21st. It was light until after ll.00 p.m. and never really got dark.... Here is a picture of Jane looking out to sea, with Pete and Trev propping the gate up, taken at 9.14 p.m.

The weather was wonderful, too hot on occasion. This was while the rest of the country was being deluged with rain and floods. We had some great days, but may be the best one was when we went on a wildlife trip:

Click here to read the Wild About Mull website

We spent all of Monday with Bryan Raines, and he took us to look for all sorts of the island's animal life. We saw red deer, common and grey seals, golden eagles, white tailed eagles--flying and the eyrie and the baby bird on the nest-- an adder, mountain hares, buzzards, oystercatchers, eider ducks, as well as many other birds. But the highlight for me was seeing an otter. It was swimming in the sea and we watched it for about five minutes. Just wonderful, I'd always wanted to see a wild otter. As well as spotting all of these, Bryan showed us how and where to look for things. He had a marvellous telescope 32x magnification, and now looking through binoculars will never be the same!

The next day we went back to the white tailed eagle's nest and this time the mother bird was sitting on a tree nearby and we had a wonderful view.

The Wildlife Trip

One day we caught the ferry and spent a day on Iona, and walked right to the end of the little island where we sat with our binoculars trying to hone our bird spotting skills. And we spent a day travelling all round the island, and this was the only day it rained. Jane is a keen Balamory fan (via her granddaughter) and wanted to see Tobermory. When we were out on the far west side of the island we could see Coll and Tiree and other small scattered islands some no bigger than a large piece of rock.

Trev and Pete climbed Ben Mhor, the highest mountain on the island, but ut was a very misty day and they didn't get a view. They came back with peat up to their knees. Jane and I enjoyed days just sitting at the cottage, reading or talking and enjoying the total peace and quiet and wonderful views.

Views of and from the Cottage

Sunsets at the Cottage