in blue and white

Today's walk took me back to my favourite tongue of Sand, Ninian. I spend a lot of time walking the length (500m one way) of that sandbridge...
It provides me with serenity, a sense of home and  inner balance.

Today, that short drive away was full of adventures! As soon as you leave the "motorway" (A970, no passing places...) as I call it affectionately,  your heart begins to beat like a talking drum.  
You enter an area of peatland called da Tivlicks - named after that homebake, tivlick, due to the rich dark brown colour of peats... In summer, there are still a few folk who cast the soil as fuel for winter. But today, da Tivliks were sugar iced.

A closer look at peat (turf, as it is known on the North American continent) in snow and it made me think of a chocolate truffle... Hmmm, I love tasting lanscapes!

Then Bigton Farm... The grand entrance to Ninian Sands... 

the rest is magic :)

to celebrate it all, wild geese flew past as if to salute the magic of this part of the world.

Ninian in the snow overwhelms your heart.

I felt very much like a child in a toy shop this afternoon! The world, our playground,  unfolds so much beauty... It is all around us.

Raw, a diamond.

Then, more wonderful sea scapes... Scousburgh Sands, Rerwick....... Places I share with visitors in summertime. They would feel equally bewildered by such spots at this time of year.

To me, this world sings out its symphony.

Majesty of north atlantic! 

This prompts me to a piece published in Northwords Now a few years ago.

A Tale of Two Harbours

You need to look at a compass,

each arrow points out to a sea;

through a fisheye,

an ocean –

a tongue of land

where we can read

a world of men,

fishers, crofters, navigators,

wave wanderers;

in search of life

on greener shores…

They swapped a sail

for a few oars,                                                                      

scout ravens flew out

to new cliffs;

they pulled their boats and kissed

the ground,

built a new home,

hope & beliefs.

Today

we still dig in the sand,

unearth our past,

look through

the sea,

where mother

wind once blew their sail,

always westwards,

as if to flee.

© Nat Hall 2006