Last Updated on May 20, 2020 by PowersToTravel
In the days before the Internet, we were vacationing with only our trusty printed guidebook in hand. We meandered down the single-track coastal road, which at that time was the only road, towards the village of Morar. The guidebook had proclaimed the wonders of the Silver Sands of Morar and we were eager to see them. However, on our way, we saw a car park, sitting in the middle of nowhere north of Arisaig. Where there is a car park, there certainly must be something of interest, because in Scotland, often sites of interest have no parking at all. So a car park is a clear sign of an important place. We pulled in. There was a placard which spoke of the dune ecosystem near the entrance to a walk. That was the only invitation we needed.
As we headed down the path lined with prickly yellow gorse, the footing became sandier and sandier. Finally we sprung free around a dune and found ourselves on the most beautiful beach I had ever seen. A clear stream to our right carved a curving path through the sand to the beach. The beach stretched to our left, and the waves lapped lightly on the level sands. The tide was out, and a huge expanse of smooth golden sand spread wide and deep.
We gazed in awe. We stayed for hours.
We continued our vacation, traveling out to Skye and the Outer Hebrides; finally a week later, we returned in our footsteps to Camusdarach. We eagerly hurried down the gorse-edged path to our beach. To our dismay the strong winds of the previous week had wreaked havoc with our sands. The golden sands were strewn with black seaweed and gouged with the crashing of waves. The scene was no longer peaceful. Instead, Dad found many purple jellyfish stranded on the sand, and proceeded to set up shop with his camera. Mom and I decided to stroll, and see beyond the headland.
I reached the headland, found a path up, and at the top paused, my breath a thing of the past. The small isles of Eigg, Muck and Rum hovered on the horizon in the evening light, the sun painting a golden blue path from me to them. Dad was a small figure behind me, on his knees, camera pointing to the sand.
“What a fantastic view,” we would tell him later.
“That’s nice,” he said. “I got some great jellyfish.”
But did he lose his breath? Did he see something that would lodge in his heart? Did he see something that would change his dreams forever?
I have returned to Camusdarach five times in the past eight years. During the most recent visit, we rented a flat at the Camusdarach Farm. I spent an entire week, morning and evening, strolling over the dunes to Camusdarach Beach, climbing to the headland and gazing out. It didn’t matter each day whether the view was in sun, or in cloud. It was Camusdarach.
It is now a long time since those pre-Internet days of wandering around with a guidebook in one hand and film camera in the other. To my friends and colleagues, Scotland became a yearly, or even semi-annual picture-show. They used to query, “Scotland, again?” But that question quieted down to a soft murmur. They know, if it isn’t Scotland in June, it will be Scotland in September.
I come home with my digital camera memory chips filled with impressions – scenery, B&Bs, my parents in peculiar photographer positions. I pare down the approximately one thousand images to a short show which takes about twenty minutes to run. People used to ask to see my shows. They have stopped asking. I have now only a few die-hards who know which side their bread is buttered on, who ask, “Oh, and can I see your show?”
Yet, still they ask, “But, why Scotland?”
I sit on the headland at Camusdarach, the cold wind whipping my hair. I pull up my hood, and slip on my gloves. It is only June, but June in Scotland is not like June in Boston. The car thermometer said nine degrees yesterday. I wish it would tell me this in Fahrenheit.
The flat rock on the tip of the headland has been warmed in the sun, and it warms my legs. The bowl-shaped rock beneath me seems hollowed to my shape. My eyes trace the entire expanse of the sky, almost horizon to horizon. Nothing is static; all is changing. The clouds quickly fly across the sky. The occasional seagull screeches as it staggers by in the wind. The sun peers through the clouds for a instant, and then is engulfed. It pops out again, turning the sand from grey to golden silver.
I see no one on the sands. A couple with a child had been to my right, but they’ve moved on. There was a hardy swimmer to my left, but he too, has disappeared from sight. I look to my rear, and the foothills and mountains of Knoydart hover as grey, ghostly shapes in the mountain mist. I look down at the blades of grass, struggling fitfully in the wind. The small wildflowers cling to the rocks. Below, the waves crash on the headland. I wonder, where did the sand come from? Why this cove, these headlands and not the next one, or the next one?
Water on rock is always changeable, yet seems monochromatic; water on sands is shifting: wind and sea carve new patterns hourly. I perch above my sands, and watch the waves come in, and pull away, crash in, and struggle seawards – never changing, always changing. My mind is quiet, yet not empty, thinking, but with no words forming.
If I had one gift to give you, it would be this moment on the headland above Camusdarach.
Then you would know why.
