Autumn at a Campsite

March 18, 2025

Between 2021 and late 2023 I had a bit of a gap from writing here. I was still taking photographs here and there, documenting small snippets of my life on film, but the habit of writing a few words with every roll had took a bit of a back seat. Life was a little chaotic at the time, and my focus was on about a hundred other things.

Now that the ability to form sentences has returned, I can catch up.

These were shot in October 2023. I was living in my little Eriba caravan, with a full winter awning up on a long term pitch amongst the birch trees. The Talbot motorhome was parked next door to me, looking a little sad to be honest. It started to get a bit neglected towards the end of it’s life with us. Fox was just a few months old and still settling into life with me and life on a campsite. I forget how tiny he was… he was a little guinea pig of a puppy.

The End of Winter

March 11, 2025

We’re coming to the end of winter… it’s nearly time for us to move on, the weather is changing (although it has been a considerably warmer, brighter winter this time round, up on the Moray coast) and soon I’ll be wandering a new bit of coastline.

When I know I’m leaving somewhere soon, it can be hard not to wish the time away and give in to the itch to see new sights, but I’m reminding myself to enjoy every moment of the bright, mild days in Findhorn.

Finding the Fisherman's Bothy

March 06, 2025

I have no idea how I heard about the Fisherman’s bothy. Even now, as I’m writing this, I’ve been searching and searching online for information about it but I can find nothing. As far as I can piece together, it’s refurbished (it does look very smart, nice new roof, well looked after) and it’s probably now a privately owned holiday home. If anything, the lack of information just adds a nice bit of mystery to the adventure.

So I’d heard snippets of a red tin roof bothy on a beach near Nairn, but no definite information about where it was. My trick is to scour google maps for car parks that are off the beaten track, and then just walk and hope for the best.

On a warm, breezy morning we walked through gorse bushes along grassy tracks until we emerged at a long stretch of very quiet beach, which felt like it went on for miles and miles. We picked a direction and started walking, and not too long later a tiny pin prick of a white building with a red roof was visible all the way along the coast. When you’re there, it feels like the bothy is a million miles away, but the backpack was filled with rolls of film, snacks and a flask of coffee so I felt invincible.

The walk is mostly on the beach, unless the tide forces you to scale the pebbly bank and back into the gorse tracks. You eventually reach a strange sparse area, which leads right up to the building. It really does just sit by itself, a bit of a beacon in a sandy, grassy desert.

The bothy is locked tight, they mean business. It’s most certainly not intended for public use (inside, at least) but there are benches at either end so you can pick the most sheltered and rest your feet before heading back.

We set ourselves up on a bench and unpacked everything onto a stump and had a good little hangout while chatting about what could be inside. The only open windows are up high, and whilst they’re absolutely adorable, they’re not ideal for nosey buggers like myself.

A good walk, a good amount of steps on my health app and a tired dog later, the day was successful. It always feels good to get a roll of film back when you’ve been excited to see the results, and they’re just as good as you expected.