Safe Return Doubtful

Though the title for today may sound like a crime novel, it is actually the name of the northwestern part of the Esha Ness peninsula, and it’s many rocky outcrops.

Esha Ness’s lighthouse is a Stevenson build (by David, one of the ‘lightthouse’ Stevensons that included, if only briefly, Robert Louis) quite a recent one, from 1929. It was automated in 1974, and is now a holiday let.

Esha Ness is the remnants of a stratovolcano, active just short of 400 million years ago. The features of the coast indicate that the eruptions were extremely violent.

Twenty metres from my park up is the Calder’s Geo, the largest natural chamber in Britain. (Below)

At the northwest most point, the end of the Villians of Ure, is the Grind o da Navir, an amphitheatre of rock that opens out through a breach in the cliffs.

Another relevant geographical feature is that there is an excellent 4G signal.. important for me as it was a big day of sport, though, unlike my four hour hike, the sport didn’t really deliver, with two fairly disappointing games of international rugby.

Fortunately, I was interrupted a couple of times. Once by the guy who spoke to me about Scottish cricket two days ago at Muckle Roe. He was a few minutes ahead of his wife on their trek, and sneaked into my van for a beer and to watch some rugby. They were from Newtonmore, he was ex-RAF, and had then run a backpacking hostel in Aviemore until the pandemic, when he sold up. He was desperate to use my WiFi to get the Newtonmore shinty score.

The weather had been fine and warm all day, at almost 20C, and the hike out to the Villains is a popular one with lots of international visitors. I met people from Pau, Montreal, and Prague, all their home towns with good memories for me.

Late on, as the sun turned orange and very slowly moved lower in the sky, I watched a really good French noir from 1955 called Pickpocket with an Orkney beer and a small glass of Talisker.