Winter sunset, Newton, Loch Fyne

The wee village of Newton lies on Loch Fyne , a couple of miles from Strachur. It is where our friends Jean Bell and Don McNeil live, whom I have blipped before.   We had lunch with them there today and afterwards went for a walk along the shore.

I have a soft spot for the village as it was the first place in this area that Cathleen and I visited with Cailean just after he was born.   Graham Wilson was an HMI on the Board of Network Scotland which I ran from 1983 to 1991. I got quite friendly with him and he and his wife Sandra - who came from the village - had a cottage here.   We  went up a couple of times from where we lived in Lanarkshire (in the fictionally named village of Tillietudlem, but that is another story) to spend the night with them.

Graham died very suddenly when I was still working in Network but  sometime after moving to Glendaruel, which is only about 15 miles away, we  got to know Don & Jean who live just behind where Graham & Sandra had their cottage. 

Newton is a clearance village which means that it was originally established by the landowner as a place to which he could clear his tenants from their crofts so that the land could be let as sheep runs or for deer forest.    This was, and partly still is, the MacLachlan estate and it is said that the chief at that time (around the 1770s) personally chose those who were to have the houses in the village , forcing all others to emigrate.  

Now the village consists mostly of holiday homes as less than a quarter of the houses are permanently occupied.   That is a problem for many small picturesque villages in Argyll and it needs a solution , though one is not presently being provided by the lacklustre local council.