More Writing News!
Two days ago, I was poised at this very keyboard to start this new Blog, intent on sharing my adventures exploring the Isle of Skye, when the exciting news of the FBCW (Federation of British Columbia Writers) 2021 Literary Contest Anthology Launch was finally announced on social media!
My flash fiction piece “The Jumper” was a winner in 2021 and not only is it now in print for the very first time in this beautiful new anthology Roots to Branches, Volume 1 but I have also been invited to read at the Zoom Publication Launch on Sunday, 19th November. I am including the link here so that as many of you as possible can join me on that momentous day.
I am particularly thrilled to have a prose piece in the limelight, as it has been my poetry that has been getting most of the attention. Having completed one novel (on its slow journey towards publication) and now starting a second, the timing could not have been more perfect.
All that media excitement is under control and I can now return to this, my newest Blog.
THE BEWITCHING BEAUTY OF THE ISLE OF SKYE
I have just returned from a major travel event: several weeks in the UK, the prime focus of which was two weeks on Skye to research historical background of nineteenth century Scotland as the backdrop to this new novel.
I met with such hospitality, kindness and helpfulness during my work-cation: from the accommodating staff at The Marine Hotel, Mallaig; Ruth at Morar Motors who helped organise my vehicle; Den, my host at tranquil Knockview Apartments overlooking the waters of the Sound of Sleat; Rob, the enthusiastic Manager of the historic Greshornish House Hotel, who permitted me to both explore the house and grounds and to take photos; Julie and Stuart Whatley, the talented potters at famous Edinbane Pottery and last but by no means least, Anne and the other assistant archivists working in the Skye and Lochalsh Archive Centre, Portree; I spent a day with them and was saturated with crucial background information for my novel.
I am in fact, no stranger to Skye. During my twenties, I was married to Douglas, a tirelessly-energetic border-Scot of the Johnstone clan, and over the next ten years, we spent more than three months of every year on Skye. His parents had been close friends with Gavin Maxwell (“Ring of Bright Water”) and the family lived for many years one of the lighthouse cottages on Isleornsay , near Armadale, rowing back across to the Island by boat to pick up supplies from the nearby Eilean Iarmain Hotel owned at that time by Iain Noble. Eventually all this rowing got too much for them and they built a grey-slate, white house in Tocavaig, with stunning views over the waters to the majesty of the Black and Red Hills – the Cuillin Mountains.
Visited there on many occasions by friends and family members, we energetically climbed most of the mountains: Glamaig, Blaven, Sgurr Alisdair, wandered the shores of Lake Coruisk (painted by Turner), drank whisky with the serious mountaineers hanging out in those days at the Sligachan Inn; went by small motor boat to look for Bonny Prince Charlie’s cave, hiked to the Fairy Pools, the Fairy Bridge at Glen Brittle, swam at Tarkscavaig Bay, then picked mussels for supper from the rocks, treasuring as precious jewels any of the tiny black pearls hidden within.
And during the rainy, dark evenings with a peat fire in the hearth and a bottle of Talisker to sip, I read my way through the entire contents of the Johnstone family library: absorbing the ancient myths and folklore of Skye, its history and its tragedies.
My poem “Glencoe” (published 2019) is a direct result of that reading, set as it is in on both the Scottish Mainland and on Skye at the time of the repression and disintegration of the clan system and of the Highland Clearances.
Returning now to Skye after so many years of absence, I travelled by train for the best part of a day, journeying up the length of Britain from the south coast to the Highland port of Mallaig, intending to take the little ferry across the water, rather than the ‘new’ bridge. During this spectacular rail journey, I crossed several famously beautiful glens, including Glencoe, before reaching Harry Potter’s famous viaduct at Glenfinnan, wondering all the while whether the magic of Skye would have waned, diminished into just a romantic memory.
Crossing next morning in soft mist from Mallaig to Armadale, my locally-rental car on board the small ferry, I was taken aback by the force of emotions I experienced approaching the ‘Winged Isle’ by water.
Within twenty four hours the feel of the air, the spring of the heather and peat beneath my feet, the soft falling rain, the high call of the buzzards circling above the hills, and the extraordinary luminescent light of the sunset over the loch waters, were as familiar to me as they had ever been. I felt as if I had returned home.
It bewitches still.
Skye and the Cuillins from the water; No. 3 Scalpay, my Knockview Appartment; ruins of Knock Castle; Greshornish House Hotel; ruins of Gesto House; view of Gesto Bay and farm
all photos (c) 2023 cemwinstanley
In My Own Words 
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