Sunrise, Highland Cows then Portree 10th Jan 2020

Vince was keen on some Astro shots at 4.00am but the cloud cover came in so he slept in instead. About 8.30am I encouraged him to go and get some early light shots of Duntulm Castle with his drone before the sunrise at 9.03am.

I stayed home and caught up on chores but couldn’t help myself when I saw the colours coming over “pointy mountain” - our name for the end of the Quiraing we can see from our house. (By the way - we are quickly developing our own names for places here including - Crow Hill, Vince’s Island, Stingray Island (Flodigarry Island), Photographers Curse - a waterfall our of Sconcer.).The colours were just amazing and are SOC (Straight Out of Camera) which is how I like my shots!

Whilst I was out shooting, Lorraine - our landlady walked by, she had been out also taking early morning shots. Vince returned and we got organised to go into Portree for supplies - warm gloves, a necklace and earrings he wants to get me, picking up some acetone to remove my acrylic nails from the wedding, and oh yes - FOOD!

On our way in, just before Portree, we saw “Mable’s Fold” coming in to be fed - so I jumped out of the car and tried to get some shots - new fact - Highland cows look like they move slowly - but that’s just illusion, they can go faster than me - so I had to start running to try to keep up - no award winning shots but all in good fun. Including me standing in the middle of the road trying to not get run over! As it turns out it looks like Mable has a new boyfriend, Bruce! (at least that's what we are going to call him).

Then it was on to Portree and what is starting to become our regular I think - the Granary - a diet coke, flat white coffee with and extra shot and two bacon and runny egg rolls - at our regular table which allows us clear view out of the window at the car with a lot of camera equipment in it!

Then it was a stroll around a few jewellery shops at Vince’s insistence - we saw a pendant with the Isle of Skye anodised with water behind it and matching earrings - but it was much too big for my liking. Then off to my 12.30am appointment to pick up some acetone for removal of my acrylic nails.

They have become a bit of a saga - I had them done in Perth (down at Drover’s my local) for the wedding but have had no end of problems trying to find someone on Skye who can remove them. The only girl who used to do it had a baby and that’s that!. We even tried to get an appointment in Inverness - some 4 hours drive one way - but everywhere we tried is booked out for a month or more! Eventually, I came across someone in Portree who offered to give me some acetone to get them off. When we arrived at the ARMS centre we met Jyrna Batters of Springtone Salons, who was just lovely, and who actually soaked them off for me for just 20 GBP - which was a very pleasant surprise as I had expected to have to do it myself! It took about an hour and forty minutes and she sent me home with some bits and pieces to try to keep my nails healthy. She also does other beauty treatments and I am keen to have a hot stone massage with her sometime in the future.

Then it was back to Portee to speak with David, Cloe and Richard from “Inside and Out” to get some advice on proper glove and hand protection in this climate. David even gave us a gift of some heat packs and merino woollen gloves as an interim measure whilst he orders in our specific choices in our sizes that should be here within a week.

Next was then necessary food supplies - from the local Bank Street Co Op for a change. Just the basics - bread, milk, tea, coffee etc served by the lovely Joan then it was home again, home again before dark at 4.02pm!

Dinner was just frozen pizzas and wine/whiskey and we arranged to catch up with Davina (Celebrent) to drop off some wedding cake in Edinbane, whilst we are out at Skye Skyns with a special order in mind!

We had a quiet night by the fire and watching my choice of movie, BRAVER! This was a complete fizzer as it was a cartoon, not like the animated version of BRAVE which I thought was a prequel. So we ended up not watching it. Oh well you win some you loose some, but as 1 GBP you can’t complain!