Showing posts with label Iona. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Iona. Show all posts

Tuesday, 25 June 2013

Six resume adventures

and so away from Yorkshire and Wales and back to Mull and our wonderful April holiday.

Sunday 28 April
Great en-masse breaky at the cottage then skin-of-the-teeth catching of the 11am Iona ferry over choppy seas
to the atmospheric Abbey
and a corncrake hunt (could hear them seductively near us), followed by lunch at the St Columba Hotel and an exhilarating hike over the Machair to Back of the Bays beach

 where the colours were just stunning

 with horizontal lashing rain and calm sunshine all in good measure!!
 and little lambs braving the storm
Ferry back to Fionnphort and a cosy evening of left over delights from last night's feast and our first hirlarious round (of many) of QI.

If you'd like to read on, then click here for Monday's adventures on our wildlife tour . . .


If you are new to this blog, you might like to go back to the beginning of our Mull holiday and the short pics I put up on the blog while we were thereIf so, please click here

Wednesday, 9 May 2012

peace comes dropping slow

MONDAY - Six go island hopping . . . to Iona

Not a cloud in the sky or a breath of wind today.  Blue skies, turquoise waters and calm sparkly seas in the Sound of Iona.  People thought I was joking when I got to work today - but HONESTLY, the weather was just amazing.


Caught the ferry on foot from Fionnphort over to the tiny island of Iona, gannets diving all around us for fish and the sea bed clear as anything.




Beautiful little harbour village and check out the cute Post Office on the beach!


and five of you were lucky enough to get a postcard posted at this very moment - cos they were they only ones who's addresses I knew off by heart, having forgotten my address book!


We passed the old nunnery and the Primary School scarecrows and the Peter Rabbit allotments



Made the pilgrimage to John Smith's grave - very lovely and peaceful and glinting in the sun.  Loved the inscription.

and the view


Wrote my journal in the sun


Got some shots of the gargoyles in the Abbey cloisters



Then some of the ancient gravestones and celtic crosses in the Abbey museum






and the Abbey itself, with it's beautifully coloured local stones



and it's celtic crosses against Toledo blue skies



and dark mysterious interior




Then we took our picnic across to the northern tip of the island and the most amazing beaches - the pictures will have to speak for themselves as I know I can't do justice to the incredible colours, the rocks, pebbles, shells and the backdrop of the Hebredian islands all around us.


Just what I imagine tropical waters to look like  . . .










Fantastic patterns in the sand dunes too.



as well as Sea Campion (or so I am told) nestling in the rocks



This was the view as we ate our butties - wild, remote - could have stayed there forever





and not another soul in sight (thank goodness)


a final twin baa-ahhhhhh factor


and farewell to Iona it was



and next you'll have to read about how we went wild in Mull on Monday!!!  Just click here