Stag Cottage Ardnamurchan; a little piece of Heaven on Earth

After an unhappy series of personal events in the first few months of 2017, a long planned and much postponed visit to Scotland was just what we needed to get away from it all and recharge our batteries. Stag Cottage, tucked away beneath soaring pine trees at the end of Loch Doilet, proved to be exactly the right place.
Our trips to Scotland have invariably been wet and dismal, weatherwise, and as we set off sure enough down came the rain! Stopping for lunch at Inverbeg on Loch Lomond, we wondered if we would be in for a full week of wet weather, as we had on our previous trip, to Skye. As we headed towards the ferry at Corran, for the short crossing to Ardgour, the skies began to clear and the sun peeked out at last.

On reaching the village of Strontian, the route to Stag Cottage then climbs steeply upwards on a winding unclassified road, by the side of which Red Deer graze unconcernedly.

Reaching the top of the hill there is an equally steep downward descent towards the Glenhurich Estate. A sudden breathtaking glimpse of Loch Doilet appeared before us.

Finally, we had arrived. 

Within an hour of our arrival we saw our first Pine Marten, albeit briefly, scurrying along by the perimeter of the garden. The local Siskins seemed very pleased with the peanuts we put out for them.

After quickly unpacking, we had a stroll beside Loch Doilet towards Polloch. Peace, quiet, birdsong. Peace, peace and more peace. A single car passed us, other than that we saw only nature. 

 Stag Cottage is tucked away below the tall pines on the right of the photo.

 Returning to the cottage we were delighted to see a Pine Marten feeding on the peanuts we had left out earlier. The cottage looked very welcoming in the pink light of sunset.

As darkness fell, we set up our Trailcam to see if we could capture footage of any night time visitors. As you can see it was a busy night!

The following day dawned bright and sunny and word must have spread about the replenished supply of peanuts, jam and sandwiches on offer on the picnic bench in the garden!

 

This Pine Marten was our most frequent visitor. We could identify different individuals by the unique markings on their chests.

This one was a little more shy and hid at the edge of the garden, waiting for the first one to bring the picnic! 

 

The Pine Martens had a definite preference for jam, however I only put it out once as when I saw how this one demolished the whole lot in one go, I thought it seemed all the sugar in jam might not be a good idea for a wild animal. Probably peanut butter sandwiches are not the best thing either? There were no crumbs left though, that's all I can say about that!      

Honestly, I could have spent the entire week just watching these gorgeous little fellas. The nearby oak woods were calling however. More of that in my next blog post. 
Thanks for visiting; I hope you've enjoyed the photos.

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