Category: water

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Easdale

We sailed not far from Easdale last summer. We were going to sail right in and anchor by the island but, as we drew out from Colonsay and glided along its east coast, clouds began to gather in the distance ahead and, by the time we reached Colonsay’s northern tip, the Firth of Lorn looked dark and ominous. The wind had moved round too and was bearing down upon us and the sun was shining in the west, so we changed course and sailed into the sunset instead.

This year we were again going to sail there but our boat was in the north and the winds were from the south, so instead I took a collection of cars, buses and ferries to arrive, crossing the final short stretch of sea in cold windy rain.

I came to visit friends and took shelter in their cosy cottage with a cup of tea until the rain eased off and we set off round the island with wellies and children, sliding over the slate-heaped beaches and exhilarating in the wild washing of the waves over the sharp serrated lines of rock.

A big mist was still hanging around the coast but bits of brightness were starting to seep through and, as the others trailed slowly round the path, I quickly climbed the lumpy slice of hill. The island from up here looked astonishing, a strange gouged-out darkness with whiteness and lights crashing all along its shattered shores. As the air gradually cleared, the whole cauldron of island-ringed water beyond stretched itself out – to Seil, Luing, Scarba, Jura, Islay, the Garvellachs, Colonsay, Mull. I let myself drift out to meet them, following their rising rims, slowly navigating them in my imagination and last summer’s memory.

I was in a gentle dream; but as I picked my way back down the hill and ran the thin path round the north of the island to catch up with the others, I was caught by the quarry pools. They were so deep, so still, so blue, they seemed to gather into them all the wide distance of the waters outside, and to concentrate all their colour. I stopped at one, then another, then another – the deepest blue of all. A fine drizzle soaked into my skin as I stood gazing down and in.

Eventually I pulled myself away and now I stand in a glowing pink evening at the back shore staring out over that island-rimmed horizon. The wind comes across the waters, breaking them in white froth on the dark slate at my feet, but still my eyes are in the deep blue quarry pool on the other side of the island where all the wet world is, secretly, hidden and held.

deep blue quarry pool on Easdale

Easdale, Argyll, Scotland
7th July 2014

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by yon bonnie banks

Water is everywhere, pouring, rushing, pooling; the land is alive with water. White burns bubble through the woodlands on one side of the road; on the other side, trees are drowning in a wide field of water. It’s impossible to tell where the course of the river is or was – the whole field is flowing, and high on the hillside beyond it, huge falls roar where there were none before.

We’re safely north of Loch Lomond now, but as we wound round its banks, the loch itself was beginning to take its share. The outer half of the road towards Pulpit Rock had disappeared and road crew were there on built-out platforms rebuilding it – on stilts. It was a tight passage round the cliff there, squeezing between the water rushing down the rocks and the gouging maw of the loch.

As we come further north, the streams multiply. The steep hillsides are threaded by strings of white water and, as we approach Glencoe, the hills are scarred and scored in white. Snow fills each high crevice and ravine, highlighting the bare black bones of the rock shouldering through. Below the snow, streams continue the white lines, racing down the creases to the valley floors.

It’s not just the intensity of the water but its frequency that’s overwhelming. Each rock face is run over by a hundred slim streams. Even on the lower slopes and flanks by the roadsides, a new stream is gushing down every few yards, flooding the road and forcing us through ford after ford. Water is just pouring off the hillsides.

Water falling, water rising. And through the air too, great banks of rain move in horizontal gulfs. From safe inside the car, they almost feel sheltering, these great grey washes, engulfing us, until the wind harnesses them into harsh lashing whips. And so, through the water-ridden world we travel, sheltered and invigorated alternately, and all the while feeling secretly blessed by these thousand bright white streams.

Buachaille Etive Mòr, Glen Coe

Driving up the A82 (past Buachaille Etive Mòr, Glen Coe), Scotland
20th February 2014

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a rain of light

A rain of light – a fine white veil sweeping along the sea horizon like a swishing curtain against a backdrop of slate grey. There must be a gap in the sky to the south but it’s gone now and the illuminated downpour becomes absorbed into the wall of cloud behind it. The tide is far out and the beach is flat and gleaming and, as I walk along the lacy hem of the water, I remember another rain of light.

That one was land-based but equally short-lived. It didn’t pass past but showered over, tiny particles of water scattering around me like myriad stop-motion gems.

I was pottering about in the corner of an overgrown stone-wall enclosure beside a ruined cottage on a green hillside up behind Fairy Glen, behind Uig, on Skye. I was standing in the slim shelter of a silver birch and the light beneficently showered down in the late evening summer sunshine. It was a sudden refreshment, gone as quickly as it arrived. But it was utterly beautiful. For those few moments, light was domain and dominion, and relief.

Coney Beach, Porthcawl, South Wales
18th January 2014

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winterlight

cold light on cold water
clear stream rushing over our bones

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winterlight
lowglow
sheltersun

Nant Gelli Wern / Stream of the Alder Grove

Nant Gelli Wern, Cwm Garw, De Cymru / Stream of the Alder Grove, Garw Valley, South Wales
28th October 2013