The end of the road

When I’m up in the Highlands, it feels so far away from my home in London, I often forget that I’ve only travelled halfway up Scotland. A glorious day is a great excuse to down tools (we’re prepping our Aviemore house for holiday lets) and trek across the Northern Corries. I feel I’m up as high as high can be and, looking north, I can see the waters of the Moray Firth and the land stretching far beyond.

From the Cairngorms, across Loch Morlich, to the Moray Firth

The following day I borrow my brother’s car and drive in that direction. I’m joining my sister and some friends at a cottage they’ve rented in Sheigra. I've never been as far north-west as this. So off I go, across the Black Isle, along the shores of Loch Shin, towards the west coast, much of it on a single track road. It’s so quiet there isn’t much call for the passing places. We pass Kinlochbervie, the local metropolis, and a once-bustling fishing port, now well past its glory days. Finally I pass a sign to my destination… and the end of the road up the west coast of Scotland. The very tip of the mainland, Cape Wrath, is about 10 miles further on, but you have to get there on foot.

As far as the road goes

Here is a landscape of endless, deserted, curves of white sand, of cliffs and stacks, of lush green moorland dotted with sheep, and distant mountains with mist clouds creeping up their flanks.

Sheigra with backdrop drama

White sands of Polin beach

I walk the coastal path, navigating dark, soaring cliffs and descending tussocky headlands to cross vast empty beaches. I find a rusty old mine lodged in the sand, swept in from its ocean grave. A couple’s footprints wander across my own.

Dunes of Oldshoremore beach

Old mine washed ashore

The next day the haar rolls in, a cold sea fog that hugs the coastline. My sister and I walk inland and are soon above cloud level, following a stony track to Sandwood Bay. After an hour or so we arrive and take in the scattering of ruined crofts – a legacy of the Sutherland Clearances – before descending into the haar again, missing out this time on the bay’s famously glorious dunes and expanse of white sand.

Moor and lochans above the haar

Approaching mist-enveloped Sandwood Bay

Spooky beach view

I opt for a boat trip back to base with our friends and all the kids. It’s an atmospheric ride with ghostly stacks looming out of the swirling mists.

Boating through the stacks

Rainy weather suggests a trip to Smoo on the north coast, a huge cavern with water rushing down from the river above with a deafening roar. It’s too wild to take the boat trip up into the back of the cave so we go geocaching instead, finding a stash tucked away behind a boulder at the side of the road.

Geocache found

In nearby Durness, an old nuclear warning station and barracks, dating back to the Cold War, has been converted into a creative hub for all kinds of art, from painting to shellcraft. The Balnakeil Craft Village is also home to the mainland’s most northerly chocolatier, Cocoa Mountain, which not only boasts handmade truffles and cakes, but serves proper, rich, melted hot chocolate. Who minds a rainy day when such deliciousness is available?

Choccy high at Cocoa Mountain