Ardnamurchan - The Freelance Shepherd
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| Sheep in Ardnamurchan |
About 20 years ago I was sitting looking through some maps and thinking about having a holiday 'away from it all'. I just wanted to go somewhere that I had never been before, on the West Coast of Scotland. There it was - a tiny bit of yellow - a beach somewhere on the West Coast. I was looking at Sanna Bay in Ardnamurchan. Never heard of it. I telephoned a friend and said 'how do you fancy a trip to Ardnamurchan?' 'Never heard of it - why do you want to go there?' Well perhaps stronger words than that if I remember rightly.
After a bit of to and fro we found ourselves on the way to Ardnamurchan from Perth. Quite a journey and crossing over the little stretch of water from Corran to Ardgour (Loch Linnhe) we found ourselves on Ardnamurchan. Its remoteness is accentuated by the main access route being mainly a single track road for much of its length. We were staying near the village of Kilchoan - possibly a two hour drive from Corran. We just absorbed the beautiful scenery with a few interjections of 'what are we going to do here and My God! this is a long way from nowhere'.
We had booked into a small hotel between Kilchoan and Portuick. The views were spectacular.
On our first day we decided to explore Kilchoan, parked the car and wandered along the road looking at all it had to offer, which was not very much apart from one shop, one pub and a few houses set back into the headland. We walked out towards the headland and watched a farmer and his dog running up and down the hillside gathering in the sheep. The sheep had wandered down to the shore and were happily munching the seaweed. The hill was quite steep and in places quite thick with gorse bushes. The farmer was not deterred, up and down he went tending to his sheep. As he approached the top of the hill where we were standing he took a moment to gather his breath and we said 'Hi'. His dog was glad of the rest and flopped at his feet. We started to chat and asked him about sheep farming and where he was living. He said he was a 'freelance sheep farmer'. He actually lived in Edinburgh but went around Scotland tending to sheep, shearing etc. Quite intriqued by this we asked how he came to be working in Ardnamurchan. He told us he had been left 100 sheep in a 'Will', and he was currently living in Kilchoan in a caravan. He loved the outdoor life and all the variations that it brought. Ardnamurchan was a very special place to him - the remoteness, the weather (mostly rain) and the midges. What an amazing story. I can just imagine the reading of the Will.
'To you Sylvia, my dear niece I leave all my silver and £5000, to my nephew John I leave my First Edition Book Collection and to Jack I leave 100 sheep on a hillside in Ardnamurchan'
With the story told off he went with his dog to finish rounding up his herd. We never saw him again but we did see his sheep eating the seaweed.
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| Ardnamurchan Highlands Scotland |
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