doubt whether any red-blooded Scot can ever
I
take The Road to the Isles without being tempted
to sing at least one verse and chorus of that
grand old song of the same name. Whenever
I swing on to the A830 at Fort William and point
my nose west toward Mallaig, it’s Kenneth McKellar’s
magnificent tenor that’s in my head and in my heart
and I fancy I can already smell the tangle o’ the isles.
There’s a far croonin’ apullin’ me away
As tak I wi’ my cromack to the road
The far Cuillins are puttin’ love on me
As step I wi’ the sunlight for my load.
“Och,” I hear older people say, “they dinnae
write songs like that ony more.” “Aye,” I reply, “and
more’s the pity.” The Road to the Isles passes through
beautiful countryside: braes and glens steeped in
Scottish history. It winds out through Corpath,
Glenfinnan and Lochailort, through Arisaig and
finally bypasses the village of Morar to end in the
salty old seaport of Mallaig where you’ll find some of
the finest smoked kippers in all of Scotland.
This was hallowed ground for those with Jacobite
sympathies long ago, for it was on this stretch of coast
that Charles Edward Stewart’s misadventures started
and finished in 1745-46. Indeed Bonny Prince Charlie
deserves at least some of the credit for the building of
Rathad nan Eilean (the Road to the Isles) in the first
place, for it was in the wake of his Jacobite Rising that
the British Army sent the engineer Thomas Telford to
push his military roads into Argyll’s backwoods.
It wasn’t all that long ago that the Road to the Isles
was little more than an ill-made single track affair
with innumerable laybys or passing places. Now that
the upgrade has been completed, the road whisks
visitors along a little too quickly for my liking. Scots
generally drive much too fast and unfortunately,
visitors often find themselves being swept along with
them. In Scotland it pays to slow down and observe.
As I came into Lochailort recently, my eye was
arrested by the dazzling white shape of Our Lady
of the Braes, the wee Catholic church on the hill. It
was lit with a wonderful ethereal light, but behind it
there loomed a truly apocalyptic blue-black sky. We
were in for a drenching. That’s Argyll for you: glorious
sunshine one moment, howling gales the next.
For further details on Andy Lock’s photography visit
www.changinglight.co.uk
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