Saturday morning, the Frigate Café, Ullapool. This is a great cafe. Catero (my wife), Kieran (my son) and I were here last autumn when we came up for a long weekend. Kierie, who's in his 20's, and I climbed two Munros, Conival and Ben More Assynt in quite high winds. I remember him up at the top saying something like "What do you do this for, Dad?". I guess it's something I...

Friday morning - I wake at about 5.00am and lie for 15 minutes or so listening to the weather and doing a savouring exercise for the past, the present, and the future. The past: remembering yesterday, the two deer, the white-splashed ptarmigan flying so fast along the contour of the hill, the curve of the ridge...

I wrote a post at the beginning of the week entitled "Looking ahead to the walking retreat".  Now it's happening - Thursday morning 6.30am.  It takes some effort of will to emerge from the only-just-warm-enough sleeping bag, put on more layers of clothes and bring this little computer back to...