 |
| Craig Maskeldie and My Journey Footprints - pastel sketch on paper |
In monthly idioms, today is the first day of, 'March comes in like a Lion and goes out like a Lamb'. Roseina always mentioned this saying when we were bairns and she loved the drama involved in it. The excitement of swiftly changing cloud formations is certainly here on the high hills of Glen Esk and no sooner have I looked up at the sky but it transforms instantly into some other threatening backdrop. Sketches cannot keep up with the flux of colour, form and temperament of the nature that sweeps across the snowfields of the moor and rocky precipices. Cream glazed yellow on puffs of cloud merge with slate grey against the glowing palette of crystal clear blue that lightens and then darkens with the sun pulsed light. The weather predator draws me to complete three rapid sketches during a twelve mile journey and certifies me as an environmentally friendly artist on four miles to the sketch, not bad for an older model.
 |
| Sketching today above Loch Lee |
The Larches of Inchgrundle are fuzzy brown in their greying confusion of twisted branches, that in turn are laced with delicate fronds of lichen. The wise and old Tawny Owl hoots with the blinking of the sun through the bending branches but lacks the mocking chorus from the usual assemblage of smaller birds that flit underneath the canopied cones, maybe the long tailed Goshawk scouting overhead has sent them for cover. A dragon scaled bole, which bleeds with history, stands beside a large flat stone covered with a table cloth of fresh green moss, the velvet greenness spreading towards the tree in an endearing heart shape and the gnarled bole leans towards the stone in a frozen kiss.
 |
| Mossy Kiss |
The tree and stone are inseparable in nature's love, take one away and the magic goes. I think of Glen Esk as being similar to this relationship between a growing relic and ancient rock in the aspect that the people and nature in this place are irrevocably linked. This glen is a working place, a home to the few nowadays but in the past to thousands. It is a place where nature marches in pace with the people who work here and the handful of people who own the land. It is a reserve for those who use it, including the flora and fauna, but not a nature reserve.
 |
| Loch Lee - pastel sketch on paper |
If feline predators are flavour of the month, then my hopes were riding high that the black and tan Tiger of Invermark would rush in to leave tracks in the snow but nothing was found except the icy hieroglyphs left from the desperate chases between hare and fox on the higher slopes where snow remains. The leaping bounds from a hare being pursued by a fox running at full tilt is evident on a steep snow slope near the corrie edge, with the hare having the advantage with its large rear feet getting purchase on the crusty snow. The hare's sudden diversion onto the flat snowfield on the plateau leaves the fox to crash into the soft heather that is crusted over with fresh snow. Below that topping of snow the heather still has a store of seed which is perfect for the Snow Bunting to forage on. A solitary male rises into the wind and curves in flight to go with the chilly flow, sweetly chirping on his way.
 |
| Sketching today on Drumhilt |
One less fortunate hare was breakfast for an eagle though, and on a table top boulder the bones and fur are laid out on a place-mat of cropped Cross-leaved Heath, Blaeberry, Crowberry, sphagnum, lichen and sedge. This ridge is a good place to see eagles hunting and the, ultimately, poisoned eagle known as Fearnan spent its last days here it seems, so I am ulteriorly searching for possible anomalies linked to its time roosting here. Dumping myself out of the bitingly cold wind on a drift of snow accumulated behind the tall cairn of Drumhilt, I set up studio to savage the snow-white paper with warming colours of pastel and the beast in me scratches out in mountainous passion. Pieces of pastel burst into crumbs over the paper in arty determination and with childish joy grind them back into the paper with cold finger tips and pleasingly turn destruction into shivery creation.
 |
| Mount Keen from the Ford of Unich - pastel sketch on paper |
Large dark wings turn in a diving loop over the snow cornice that plummets down into the corrie where dozens of hare are sheltering. I follow on in haste and end up motionless on steep icy snow. White blob on white blobs and dark shape on dark shapes and the sulphur tinted clouds rushing at zephyr speed over the violet-white corrie skyline directly above, leave me reeling without any sight of soaring wings. Crampons eventually ball up with softer slab and I slip in the hassle to clear the blocks of compressed snow from the frozen steel frame. I slump back into a heather patch with my boots relieved of the sharp encumbrance and peer without focus skywards. Seeking focus beyond, in the dizzying glow of colour and movement, heaven could be believed in. The blue translucence of an unreal lapis-lazuli sky, cleansed by the Aurora Borealis of last week, goes beyond being just a colour, it is existence itself and the renewed humbleness that I feel within is nerve tingling.
 |
| Mayar and The Hand of God |
The harsh sound of a Carrion Crow calling out, rips the blue curtain open and then the blast of a shotgun rings out and echoes over the screes of Hunt Hill, again the fragile egg-shell between dream and reality is broken. No matter what you seek below these blue, ethereal skies the ground that you stand on belongs to someone else.
 |
| Mountain Hare |
A fellow wanderer, in shorts believe it or not, asks me if I had just climbed Mount Keen some five miles away, in the wrong direction, and then after a doubting rebuttal described my route to him, pointing out where an invisible Mount Keen should be. He wanders off down the track as I quell a rumbling tummy with a mini baguette filled with the mandatory lump of cheese and slobbery, slices of tomato. The rumbling continued as an impatient stomach waited on endless gummy chewing and a reluctance on my part to swallow half frozen lumps of cheese.
 |
| Sketching at the Ford of Unich |
The sharp scolding calls from a Peregrine Falcon pierced through the gloaming and as it twisted in a series of attacking aerial manoeuvres directed over a rock ledge, another falcon jettisoned itself from the cold rocks and both revealed their welcome presence to me in a surprising sky-diving stoop. In the deepening twilight and at the culmination of the dramatic display one quickly disappears across the sparkling glen waters, leaving the guardian tiercel to harass a trio of cavorting, black Corbies moving quickly down the glen towards their winter roost.
 |
| Peregrine Falcon |
 |
| Buzzard dog-fight |
Through the inky veil, that was turbulent sky, I can see the forest dwelling Common Buzzards settle into the tree tops. A nocturne of meowing calls follows them down and just visible in the darkness is the same falcon delivering a few side swipes at their tails just to remind them of who is boss in these parts, that is one psyched up falcon for sure. Well, the day ended not with the deliverance of lambs but, in delegation, a few devilish rams appeared from the heather to stare past their heavy twisted horns with a certain impassable attitude. Ah the legendary sheep with attitude, where else but Bonnie Scotland.
 |
| Hare on the breakfast table |
Notes;
All sketches and photos done on the day and are copyright.
Please be aware that it is illegal to disturb nesting eagles or other raptors and you may do so inadvertently in your journeys into the highlands. I do not recommend searching for any of the species mentioned in this blog because this may cause undue disturbance to them. With my knowledge of the areas described in this blog I can locate and observe protected species at a respectful distance usually from about 1000 metres for short periods of time only.
Map of the area.
David Adam web-site
