Image Details
The above photograph was taken at the end of a January in which the rain had been more or less incessant, and the lochs and rivers were running at high levels in the North-west Highlands of Scotland. The rain, having momentarily stopped, I ventured out into the world to see what I would find.
On nothing more than a spur of the moment whim, I decided to go down the narrow single track road that leads to Tollie Bay, a small bay at the north-west end of Loch Maree. It was late in the afternoon and soon the light would start to fade in our short winter's days.
On reaching the shore I was surprised by the height of Loch Maree. Trees, normally well back from the shore were being flooded by the loch, and seeing small waves running around the tree's trunk made for an unusual sight. Under the tree's spreading branches, my favourite mountain, Beinn Airigh Charr, looms.
This is just another example of the serendipity enjoyed by landscape photographers from time to time. Completely out of the blue a wonderful image presents itself, and in this instance I found no others that day. However, that mattered not, this was sufficient.
North-west Highland Place Names
The landscape of the North-west Highlands and the Gaelic language are intimately connected. Other languages have contributed to the richness of our place names, notably Norse, but the North-west Highlands have for centuries been a Gaelic landscape. In listing the meanings of place names I have relied on authoritative sources wherever possible. For further information about sources please refer to North-west Highland Place Names in the main menu.
Beinn Airigh Charr; Gaelic. Listed by Watson as Binn Airigh a’ Charr and explained as ‘hill of the shieling of the projecting rock or shelf’. Listed in Dixon’s ‘Gairloch & Guide to Loch Maree’ as Beinn Aridh Charr its meaning is given as ‘the mountain of the rough shieling’ from the following roots; Beinn, ‘mountain’, aridh (accepted spelling is àirigh), ‘a shieling’, charr, a corruption of garbh, ‘rough’.
Loch Maree; Gaelic Loch-Ma-rui(bh), Loch of St Maelrubha, an Irish monk who came to Scotland in 671A.D founding a church in Applecross before coming to Loch Maree where he founded another church on the island now known as Isle Maree. Professor Watson writes in his ‘Place names of Ross & Cromarty’ on page 230 “That Loch Maree was formerly called Loch Ewe is clear from the fact that the River Ewe issues from it, that Kinlochewe (meaning ‘Head of Loch Ewe’) stands at its upper end, and Letterewe on its north side”.
Tollie; Gaelic is Tollaidh, ‘place of the holes’, there are also Tollie Farm, Tollie Bay, Tollie Rock, Tollie Burn and Loch Tollaidh
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