It was my dawn
horizon for nearly a year: a craggy shadow meandering across a west-coast sky.
For the first BBC Two series of Great
Escape in 2008, my home was an old cattle shed on a beach, close to the village
of Applecross in Wester Ross. Each morning I would collect rainwater (never in
short supply), boil it in a battered tin kettle, make a cup of tea, and sit
back to stare out over what must surely be one of the greatest views on earth.
It
was my dawn horizon for nearly a year: a craggy shadow meandering across a
west-coast sky.
Before me lay a deep channel called the
Inner Sound, the other side of which lay the islands of South Rona and Raasay.
And beyond them, crouched in the misty middle distance, were the mountains of
the Cuillins. They looked impossibly exotic and mysterious, dark blue with age,
like some distant Mordor. I knew very little about them, only that they sprung
from the Isle of Skye – it self a place of legend and myth.
I knew very little about them, only that
they sprung from the Isle of Skye – it self a place of legend and myth.
Poets, scholars, artists and writers have
been getting excited about the Skye for a very long time, so it seemed a good
idea to find out what the fuss was all about. I was determined to discover what
made the island so special, and wanted to get beneath the clichés to find the
reality. I vowed solemnly to myself that should I ever have to write an article
about the place, I would never, ever end it with the phrase “o’er the sea to
Skye” – I wanted to find out what lay behind the poem and songs.
I knew very little about them, only that
they sprung from the Isle of Skye – it self a place of legend and myth.
I was ably assisted during this voyage of
discovery by the fact that my mentors in my bumbling efforts as a crofter were
Keith and Rachael Jackson, who ran an extremely efficient smallholding in
Dunvegen on the wets coast of Skye. Although their role was mainly to advise me
on my own croft, I soon found an excuse to visit them, clambering into my Land
Rover and driving over the bridge at the Kyle of Lochalsh, and so entering
another world. It’s a journey that continues for me to this day, as there is a
lifetime of exploration on Scotland’s most famous isle, and I still return
whenever time allows.
Keith
and Rachael Jackson who ran an extremely efficient smallholding in Dunvegen on
the wets coast of Skye.
