I walk down every evening, and stand on the shore.

Despite an extra hour this morning, I still dragged my backside from bed at my usual time with no extra joie de vivre, managed half a cup of coffee and clambered into the car.

Turning the corner onto the beach however my soul was restored, and rather than carry on driving, I pulled into the beach car park and wandered to the beach and plonked my butt down on the cold dunes for five minutes.

I don't understand the "atmospherics" that makes Arran seem closer or farther away depending on the air quality, but I do look at it in awe and wonder and know that those fantastic shapes on Goatfell were formed by glacial movements.

I look at Arran, and I can imagine thousands and thousands of years ago when it was buried deep under Glaciers, and all the slow work as the glaciers moved and eroded and created the Aretes and Corries so clearly visible from over here.

It's seeing landscape like this that encouraged me to pay attention in Geography at school, and its one aspect of learning that always interests me. - Glen Nevis is another amazing place to experience glacial landscape - nothing quite like laying on your back at the foot of the valley and imagining the size and scale of the glaciers which must have created that.