Wet in the Sun

The Diary commented only yesterday on how hot it's been in the sun over the last few days. One should never make comments like that, because the weather immediately shows its opposite face, in this case by spending twenty-four hours dumping a load of Kilchoan Sunshine on us, spurring the burns into furious flood.

We've had upwards of 20mm in the last twenty-four hours. How quickly, rather than how much rain has fallen is measured on the hills - in this case, Glashbheinn - by the white ribbons of stream run-offs. After a deluge, this one boils down the hillside for an hour or two, then disappears.

The soil is so thin, and the underlying rock largely impermeable, that the water has nowhere else to go. Visible to the right is Kilchoan's old parish church, St Congans, now a ruin, surrounded by its graveyard.

This yacht came into Kilchoan Bay during the late afternoon to pick up a mooring on one of the public buoys. The number of yachts moving up and down the Sound has fallen off in the last couple of weeks. By the end of September, after which many insurances cease to be valid, most will be tied up for the winter. The land can't have made a very attractive picture, but.....

....there was a damp beauty in the high tide as it flooded the saltings at the back of the bay.