16 12 07

With the very short days now, sunrise at about nine o’ clock & sunset at about half past three, giving six & a half hours of daylight, there is more of the night & consequently of the moon. The waxing half moon rises at noon & rides high in the sky most of this cloudless day until it slips behind the horizon thirteen hours later at one in the morning. Plates of surface ice hem the lochans all day.

As well as the weather, of importance here is light & clarity. On this clear cold day, when every breath is felt deep into the lungs, there’s much talk of how far can be seen & how clearly.

As the sun rises, the hills make one black & broken line to the south; in full sunlight, they resolve into three clean lines of hills, one behind the other, receding in distinctness. Even now, towards dusk it’s still clear. To the west, the hills of Rum make a jet profile against a low band of coral flushing the horizon. Overhead the high sky is a translucent duckegg blue. To the east & south the sun flares red on the hills, somewhere on the spectrum between the bracken & rusting plough at the grazing called Park & the flames of the fire burning the year’s end scraps at the Kentra croft.

As the sun sets, the lines of hills become one again against an ice-blue sky. Clarity dissolves to dark.