The Green Isle of the Great deep

This is the Neil Gunn Monument on the Heights of Brae in between Strathpeffer and Dingwall. Neil Gunn is recognised as one of the ' most important writers to emerge in 20th Century British history'. Writing twenty novels his fiction relates to Highland communities and the landscape of his youth. He was born in 1891 in Dunbeath, a small fishing village on the east coast of Caithness. By the 1920's and after time spent in London during the war, he had married Jessie Dallas (Daisy) the daughter of an Inverness jeweller and moved into Glen Mhore Distillery in Inverness where he was the resident customs officer. He developed a keen interest in Politics.
By 1937 his novel 'Highland River' was published and allowed him to take up writing full time. It was then that he lived in a croft near Strathpeffer. very close to where the monument is positioned. he lived here for 12 years and during that time wrote 11 novels. He would write during the mornings and in the afternoons he would go for a walk across the fields to this very spot. The views from here are amazing. You can see the Cromarty Firth and the Mountains to the West.
As we stood looking at the carvings a heron took off from the pond behind. You may just be able to see it. We could hear skylarks above us and a Blackbird was singing it's last song before nightfall.
It was an interesting drive down a road we had nt been down before. plenty of blip opportunities for the future :)