Weather: Heavy rain, cold becoming dry later and windy.

Inevitably the storm calmed down but the day started wet and grey. There was a message from Sheenagh that the weekly yoga class was due to start this morning at 10 30. This took us somewhat by surprise but Nicola had been meaning to go and so we drove down to the Carinish Hall. Having dropped her off I went back to the House at Lochmaddy to make some calls and to pick up the table that we were using to put the computer on and one or two other items. The yoga class was a great success Nicola felt appropriately relaxed due to the restorative stretches. She also most importantly, met lots of new interesting people. We then went back to the cottage at Minish to set up our office and computer workstation.

As we had just closed the second of the 2 gates that contain the property, we heard an alarm sounding in the kitchen. This turned out to be some smoke from the stove finding its way into the kitchen and activating the alarm. Apart from deeply alarming the cats whilst in their daily relaxation sessions, we were relieved to find that there was no real problem. Having set up the office and made the house a little more comfortable, we put on our wellington boots and took a soggy stroll around the perimeter of the land surrounding the house. It was very windy and bitterly cold.

We were soon back indoors settling in for a relaxed weekend ‘à la maison’.

There is an old shed on the foreshore of the loch that houses disused fishing equipment, assorted obsolete farm machinery and building waste. This is Angie’s favourite hang out, as rats live here. He is a large rather beautiful cat and is a great sight with his white fur blowing in the wind as he strides out to give those rodents a hard time.. not that he actually catches any.