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This was a return to Port a'Bhata, with a good chance of
seeing some butterflies. We had sixteen explorers: Abbie,
Adrian, Alexander, Alexandria, Allan, Benjamin, Chloe, Chris,
Jan Hendrick, JD, Peter William, Robbin , Robin D. Sarah and
Thomas; eight helpers: Andrew, Becky, Cherry, Chris M, John
Dove, John MacMaster, Pamela and Philippa. With Lady investigating
odd smells. With this expedition, John Donaldson reached 55
attendances, placing him equal first with Robert Nairn.
Once again, it was a fairly strenuous trip, but at least the
big effort was concentrated at the beginning. We parked at
the old school and made good speed up the steep track to Borrodale's
Grave, to find another dog, Holly, waiting for us. She just
stayed long enough to meet everyone and then left for other
duties. The explorers heard how the story of Borrodale's grave
seemed to have appeared about a hundred and thirty years ago,
and that it certainly wasn't a grave of any kind.
The expedition then took a path across the hill and began
a series of gradual climbs, which eventually got us to a nice
lookout from which we could all see Tobermory in the distance.
Everyone was ready for Tunnock's wafers at this point, but
we didn't stay long. There were a few deer on the skyline
but most of the explorers were looking out to sea.
We carried on climbing and stopped at some ancient oaks high
on the hill, at the top of the tree line. Just above the oaks
we found a fine recessed platform where everyone gathered
again. I was looking for shieling huts but we didn't find
any although there were areas of cultivation all over the
hill. We cut across the hill towards the Innish burn, climbing
all the time and looking at the old iron pipeline as we passed.
Our highest point was where the burn flowed under the fence
and we waited there for everyone to catch up again. Several
colourful caterpillars were spotted in the grass and we found
two flowers on the hill: Lousewort and Milkwort. Just to the
east of the burn was an area of peat cuttings with the remains
of a hut close by, the only hut we found.
Then we descended along the line of the burn, finding, and
picking up, two small lizards on the way. We saw all the tanks
which form the many water supplies to the village and eventually
found a small hill covered in oaks which seemed to have a
cairn on top of it.
From this point it was a steady walk down the glen to the
school, stopping at intervals to admire the waterfalls.
John
Dye
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