Over the last 20 years, Niall has spent a lot of time in this area, shooting personal work and commissions for the government agency, Scottish Natural Heritage (now NatureScot). It manages this, the UK’s first National Nature Reserve, founded in 1951 in recognition of its internationally important flora–principally of mosses, lichens and liverworts. It is also a redoubt of the once vast Scots pine forest that covered much of the Scottish Highlands for thousands of years but which has been reduced to a few scraps and remnants. At Beinn Eighe, we can see the work being done to re-establish a corridor of woodland from the pine-clad slopes above Loch Maree, down the length of Glen Torridon, to join with other fragments of old forest around Shieldaig.
Mountains built from Torridonian sandstone, capped by glistening quartzite, seem to fill the sky. While it’s not necessary to climb to gain a good vantage point, doing so can bring its own rewards. The summits conjure with clouds rushing in from the Atlantic to produce squalls then drizzle then brilliant sunshine then hail–all within an hour. On other days it is utterly still and the dark lochs fill with reflections of emergent plants and sombre mountains. It’s as if the whole landscape is holding its breathe: a time to be quiet ourselves and get a sense of the endurance of life here.