Island Adventure

IHAD a fantastic holiday planned for the first fortnight in September. My mate Alex and I were to head to Corsica to take on the GR20, a high-level route that runs some 200km along the mountain range that forms the spine of the Mediterranean island. It’s billed as supposedly the hardest long-distance route in Europe.

We’d talked about it for years, and finally booked up and arranged flights about 12 months ago. We looked forward to it all year.

And then came the Covid-19 pandemic. Of course it’s disappointing, but it’s no big deal. Plenty have endured hardship, illness and grief this year. If we simply miss a holiday, we know we’re lucky.

We’d already booked the time off, so the cancellation left us with a two-week window to fill.

As with pretty much everyone else, it was going to be Hameldaeme for the holidays this year – or a staycation for non-scots.

And again, we know we’re lucky when we call Scotland home. We packed up and took off and did nothing but climb hills, sleep, eat and drink good beer for a fortnight. We decided on a news blackout early on and barely looked at our phones the whole time – a digital detox, as the jargon goes.

It really was bliss. A chance to totally disconnect from the stresses and strains of the here and now, and to connect with life in a different way.

Highlight of the trip was a few days we spent on Colonsay. We’d decided to climb all the wee hills of the island – the Mcphies. There are 21, and one more on neighbouring Oronsay, to which you walk to at low tide.

It was my first visit to the island and I loved it. We camped at an idyllic spot called Queen’s Beach. We had the white sands and turquoise waters all to ourselves.

We saw incredible wildlife, including sea eagles. We enjoyed wonderful hospitality at the Colonsay Hotel and great chat with welcoming islanders.

And I couldn’t help think of the magazine’s Adventure Is On Your Doorstep campaign. In Scotland, it really is!