Plockton, the Tidal Cove

Plockton can be a busy place, especially in the summer. That view across the harbour (and the decent chip shop) really brings in the visitors, but there is still the opportunity for peace.

We stayed in a holiday home just outside Plockton a few years ago. A great little place at the end of a track, clad with corrugated green iron and with a huge fireplace and views of sunrise and sunset over the Loch. Best of all, it had its own cove at the bottom of a path through the woods.

We’d been down the first afternoon. The tide was out and so was the drizzling rain and mist, so we headed back up and saved it for the following evening, which turned out to be clear and warm enough that we set off in shorts.

The cove changes completely depending on the tide and by the time we arrived it was coming in, slowly turning the rocks at the end of the beach into a little peninsula sticking out into the loch. This is where we set up the fire pit, got the drinks out and stayed for the next four or five hours.

Four of us and our two dogs, we spent the evening watching the light change, paddling at the water’s edge, taking photos and keeping the fire going. The water was so clear you could see the dogs’ legs paddling under the surface and patches of seaweed growing through the cracks in the rocks around the waterline. Over the water, the lights of Kishorn Port were visible in the distance and the dark outline of the hills that hide Applecross and the Bealach na Ba behind them.

The sky went gold then pink then into that long blue and purple you get in Scotland in September. We stayed out through all of it, adding layers as the temperature dropped and none of us particularly wanting to be the first to suggest heading back up through the trees.