Arran floating

I can't resist taking pictures of Arran from the bay at what is almost the southernmost tip of Cowal, where there is a perfect beach of white, fine sand. This afternoon, at the end of a week of growing heat, the sea and sky seemed to flow into one another around the mountains of northern Arran and the beach was busy with families doing exactly as families did on the beaches of my childhood.

There are no facilities at all on this beach - not a toilet, not a shelter, not a car park. You have to walk a mile to get to it, and that's after finding the right spot to leave your car in the first place. It is completely unspoiled.

Today the water was warm from the hot sand and I went swimming in the bay with not one goosebump to show for it. Bliss!