Sanna Sands & Chocolate Pudding

After a week of wonderful October weather, which we feel is rather richly deserved after the dismal summer we've had, the weather has turned cloudier, though this hasn't prevented us enjoying some fiery sunrises.  But for those of us who are sky-watchers, it's disappointing when the annual Orionid meteor shower is obscured both by clouds....

 ....and by a full moon known as a Hunter's Moon - which is, apparently, the next full moon after the Harvest Moon.  The picture here shows a cloud-obscured moon setting this morning behind Druim na Gearr Leacainn.

Talking of harvests, the Community Garden is holding its annual Harvest Feast celebration on 1st November, full details on the West Ardnamurchan News, here.

With a mixed forecast for today, and the need to work up an appetite for a Sunday lunch at the Kilchoan Hotel, we spent the morning walking along the beach at Sanna, starting at the end where the Sanna Burn reaches the sea.  This picture looks up the burn from its mouth towards the footbridge and the abandoned stone houses on the north side of the burn.

The tide was high at 7.15 this morning, so we walked along a beach which had just been wiped clean.  We met only two people, a couple who had driven up from Lancashire in their camper van and had never visited Sanna before.  In this picture of one of Sanna's multiple bays, the island low on the horizon in Coll.

Our progress was watched by these two oystercatchers and a small flock of rock pipits, but otherwise the beach was surprisingly empty of living wildlife.

We didn't hurry, stopping at one point where the sea had, for its own reasons, collected a mass of small shells.  We spent some time, like children, collecting as many of the rainbow colours as we could and arranging them for a picture.  They resemble the much plainer and slightly larger winkles - wilks as they're called locally.  They may be Littorina obtusata, the flat periwinkle.

Our walk along Sanna beach ended at the deep bay just beyond Sanna Bheag with a quick climb up the hill beyond, following the path to Portuaik, for a look back along our route.  The islands in the distance are Muck, Rum and Canna.  Appetites whetted, we hurried back to Kilchoan for a lunch of local lamb followed by a chocolate pudding which ruined all the good our walk might have done us.