We're moving again, heading back to Scotland in less than a fortnight, to live in a small cottage while we find a new home, so we will have, once again, a chance to find a house with a view. When we're looking, we will have in mind the house which we built in Kilchoan. In 2006 we moved a mile or so along the single-track road on which the shop stood to a site overlooking the Sound of Mull, to a house designed so that....
.... every room in which we spent any time took full advantage of the view, which extended some twenty miles southeastwards down the Sound of Mull to
Beinn Tallaidh on Mull and to the mainland of Morvern.
The Sound of Mull is a major shipping lane so we saw everything from cargo ships to warships to fishing boats and working boats, in all sorts of weather. The Sound was also home to whales, dolphins, otters, seals, basking sharks and a wealth of other marine life.
One never knew when outside the house whether a glance upwards would reveal a sea eagle, Britain's largest bird, wheeling above, while a spectacular collection of small birds visited our bird feeders. The night sky glowed with the northern lights, moonbows and moondogs, comets and shooting stars, and....
....wildlife of all sorts came to visit us, pine martens, weasels, mink, mice, voles.
The birds and animals and insects gave it focus but it was the view, painted and repainted moment by moment by the sun and the weather systems moving across it, that captivated. Never before have I spent so much time so immersed in a view. Perhaps I never will again - but we do now have the chance to find a new one.
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