“[…on a Corncrake call…] Fairy music is said to do this; to lead a man on in his confusion and drunkenness, to start, then stop, then begin again from another place, ever luring him on. This was not a beautiful music, it has to be said; hardly the art of fairies. Mind you, it could be a goblin carpenter, sawing away at his little workbench, if you’d had a few too many at the island disco and were of a fanciful mind.” NatureMusicScotlandOutdoorsFairy MusicBird CallCorcrake Call Book:Findings Source: Findings
“Fancy – day after day of summer sunshine, in April. The house grows dusty and neglected because we spend so much time outdoors.” NatureSummerSunshineScotlandAprilOutdoors Book:Findings Source: Findings
“Coll would be a heavenly place to be a child. There are beaches and boats, everyone knows you, it’s the kind of place you leave the door open. If you’re on the island, it’s know. If you catch the ferry to the mainland, well, that’s known about too. Should you have a mishap and require the air ambulance, a helicopter will have you in a Glasgow hospital in twenty minutes, by which time the island will have learned of your fate. A mere thirteen miles of single-track road separates ‘the unspoiled end’ from ‘God’s own country’. There are local land feuds, a limited supply of fresh water, and no high school. In effect, the children leave home when they are an unfledged eleven, to travel as boarders to the secondary school in Oban. Higher education and jobs take them yet farther afield. It seems a price to pay for an apparently idyllic island life, to lose your children so young.” NatureChildhoodScotlandOutdoorsIdyllicColl Book:Findings Source: Findings
“No Orkney weather lasts long, and you can see new weather coming a long way off. There are frequent scraps of rainbow. And birds. At any point you can stop walking, or pull over and lower the car window and hear the cries of peewits and tremulous curlews.” NatureWeatherRainbowScotlandBirdsOutdoorsOrkneyBird Calls Book:Findings Source: Findings