... to the Isle of Gigha, one of the southernmost of the Inner Hebrides. Silver water, barely there waves from our wake and the Paps of Jura shadows on the horizon (here's the view forward).
From the jetty it is a minute or two drive up to the hotel, the island itself is only 6 miles long. We took the car just in case.
The island is community owned and run and we stayed at the hotel, checking in just as the sun was setting and the midges were making themselves known.
So we made a hasty retreat to the bar for smoked mackerel pate with oatcakes and halibut in a lemon butter with vegetables washed down by a nice bottle of red wine. Before moving on to 10 year old Springbank, Crabbie's Ginger Ale and Guiness (Wayne) and 10 year old Springbank (me).
And in the morning in the sunshine we played the nicest nine holes of golf I have had the pleasure of playing. Which is meant as no reflection on my actual play.
I am still waiting for the official match report (Elliot!) but the short version is that we started out with fifteen balls and returned with approximately six. I take most of the credit for that. The rough was rather rough, as evidenced by my getting a nettle sting on the nose whilst walking upright through it to find my ball. One of them.
The club house was a shed (see above), you left your ten pounds in an honesty box and signed yourself in, there were only nine holes and the match cards were finished, but the nice farmer man (who drove over to our hotel to lend us his clubs and for whom we left a fiver to replace the missing balls at the end of the round) did throw in a souvenir members tag, which Elliot now holds as the winner of the coveted Lost the Least Balls trophy.
It was my first game of golf for over a year and at the end I was pleased enough to want to play again soon. There was even a memorable hole where the ball soared over the bank of shrubs below to land near the edge of the green; such I could only dream of. The sun was shining, we had splendid views over the Kintyre Peninsula, Jura and the other small islands and wildflowers and sunflowers were growing in the field, sorry, at the edge of the course.
We had the whole place to ourselves and could hit as many balls as we wanted and take all the time in the world, which was handy when lost spectacles interrupted play.
And when we were done we had coffee at the beach in the sunshine (views above and below)...
... took the top down while we waited at the jetty, ...
... and caught the ferry back to the main land, ...
... before heading north to Oban, west to Crianlarich and south to home.
Perfect. Just perfect.
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