[This walk was completed on Thursday the 18th May, 2023]

The sides of the cliffs are covered in flowers – thrift, daisies, tiny violets – flowers everywhere. I spend a long time on Sandside Head, taking photographs of the view, including this photo of the beautiful (and empty) beach at Sandside Bay.

My walk back takes me close to a long wall. And what a wall it is! Just look how the stones are organised. It really is a work of art. Wonderful.

I head to a point on the shore where the rocks seemed to create a natural slip-way leading down to the sea. Almost as artificial-looking as the wall, the slip-way is covered in sheets of stone that appear to be deliberately carved and laid as paving slabs.

What a wonderful landscape this is. I sit on the rocks – Scarf Rocks according to my map – and enjoy a rest and a snack. Then, heave my rucksack back over my shoulders and set off again.

Back past the cottages, back past the little harbour, and back into the car park, where I climb into my van and set off to collect my Scooty bike.

Later, I return on the bike and leave him chained up in the little car park. I soon leave the road and head down a path through a bank of grassy dunes. Towards the beach.

More ominous signs remind me that this beach is contaminated with radioactive particles. No shell or pebble collecting today.

The beach is lovely – and practically empty. Earlier, from a distance, I saw a young couple (who appeared to be naked!) run laughing into the waves. Maybe they hadn’t seen the warning signs? Anyway, they soon ran out again – shrieking – because the water is blooming freezing.

Now, I have the sands to myself.

Walking along towards the top of the bay, I startle a groups of feeding gulls, who take off with a great deal of indignant squawking and flapping.

I look back towards Sandside Head. You can see the old harbour wall – and from this side the cottages by the harbour look far more substantial than they did from the landward side. Crikey, that sky has grown dark. What a lovely contrast with the sea and the sand.

I take more photographs looking in the direction I’m heading. I was half-heartedly thinking about sticking to the coast when I left the beach – but the sight of all those cows puts me off.

So, I stick to Plan A and head up into the dunes, following a path that runs along the bank of a pretty little stream – the Burn of Isauld.

I love the way the Scots describe their places. The Burn of Isauld sounds far more impressive than Isauld’s Burn.

End up on a golf course – they are everywhere in Scotland. And stop to take more photographs of the dramatic sweep of Sandside Bay.

From the golf course, a lane leads back towards the road, meandering between the greens. As I near the cottages, I hear a ferocious barking.

The noise is being made by a fat, old labrador, who barks out of one end, while the other end is wagging a greeting. His owner comes over to see whats going on, and we have a chat. She is recently widowed and used to live in Portskerra (where I was yesterday) but is about to move to Lincoln.

She is looking forward to living in a city (I mean, Lincoln is hardly a city – in name only – but compared to Reay and Portskerra it will seem huge). Turns out she has a granddaughter who now identifies as a boy, and Lincoln has more facilities for such troubled teens than they can find out here.

I wished her well with the move, and commisserate on both the loss of her husband and the loss of her granddaughter. She shrugs and says she just has to accept it.

Back on the road, and I’m heading out of Reay. The buildings begin to peter out.

My van is parked down a side lane, at a place that is rather grandly called the Bridge of Isauld, but which seems to consist of a couple of storage yards.

Tomorrow, I’m moving on from my lovely campsite with its heated shower block. But I’m looking foward to reaching Thurso. It has a petrol station and supermarkets!

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Miles walked today = 7 miles (yes, consistently low!)

Total around coast = 5,012.5 miles

Route (morning black, afternoon red):

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