Winter's First Snow

At about eleven last night the sky was gin-clear, the stars icy.  Picture shows the constellation of Taurus the bull.  The bright star in the centre is the planet Jupiter, and the small cluster of stars at top right the Pleiades, which form part of the constellation.  The V-shaped collection of stars to the right of Jupiter are imagined as the bull's head, the two bright stars towards the centre and bottom left are the tips of his horns.

This is the chilly Sound of Mull shortly after eight this morning, with a small trawler in the foreground CalMac's Loch Linnhe, back on the Tobermory-Kilchoan run, in the distance, and a wintry shower passing over Morvern.

The cold night had brought on the sharpest frost of the year, with some of the roads dangerous, but what we hadn't expected was snow, not only a fresh dusting on the distant hills of Morvern and Mull....

 ...but also on some of the higher mountains of West Ardnamurchan - picture shows Ben Hiant.

With snow and frost for us to get excited about, the sunrise wasn't going to be out-done, so we were treated to yet another beauty.  The sun broke the horizon at exactly 08.48 - getting on towards the winter solstice.

This picture shows some of Kilchoan township's Highlanders with the foothills of Meall an Tarmachain behind them, seen from the small quarry on the Sanna road.  With a sunny if cold day in prospect, a walk to the abandoned settlement of Glendrian seemed appropriate.

By early afternoon the sky was almost completely clear of clouds and Ben Hiant magnificent with his capping of snow.  But the temperature had hardly lifted at all as the road and paths around our house were still slippery with ice.

Sadly, this lovely weather isn't forecast to continue into tomorrow.  It's due to rain all day - to coincide with a power cut from 10.00am to 3.00pm, part of the ongoing effort by our electricity company to clear some of the trees which have been falling on lines and causing the unscheduled cuts we've suffered over the last few years.