All the best expeditions start off with an omen of some sort and one turned up at the top of my drive:
I stopped off in Reay. Every time I've driven through it in the past few weeks there have been pheasants in a field just outside the village. Were there today? Were there heck! I did find these two on a garden wall though:
James at the post office had told me he'd heard there were seals at Ham and since it was on the way I stopped off. Jackpot! Not pups, but plenty of seals. This fellow saw me standing on the cliff top and sounded the alarm:
So I lay flat on my stomach and spent the next hour watching the seals:
This one amused me. He'd been eyeing up this rock:
...and since none of the senior seals seemed to want it, decided to haul up:
...only to be foiled by the seaweed!:
Lots more seal pics on Flickr if you click on any of the pictures.
I reluctantly heaved myself up out of the heather and headed on down the coast. I didn't actually know where Scotland's Haven was, just that it was between East Mey and Gills Bay somewhere. I turned off the main road at what I guessed was about the right place and 500 yards down the lane found a parking spot with a pedestrian gate next to it, so pulled up and went to investigate.
Half an hour's walk across a peat moor later, I was in the right place - but there were no seals! They must be somewhere else this year. The light was beginning to fade (it's a location to photograph in the mornings, after midday it's heavily in shadow), so I headed back for the car, stopping only to photograph a tanker heading to pick up the gold at the end of the rainbow:
