A Sunny Road Trip to Gairloch & Loch Ewe

Beinn Eighe, Liathach and Beinn Damh from Loch A'Chroisg (Canon ES 5D Mark II, EF 85mm f/1.8 USM lens, 1/125 sec at f/11, ISO 100, handheld)

Ths Sunday was a beautiful early spring day and I took the opportunity to take a road trip to Gairloch and Loch Ewe with my camera.  Essentially it was really more of a reconnaisance visit to check out possibilities for future photo shoots but I managed to capture a few decent shots of what has to be one of the most picturesque parts of the country.  There is a lot of fuss about Skye, but to be honest I think Wester Ross has evrything and more that you can get on Skye.  Fabulous mountains, beautiful coastline, magnificent beaches and lots of lovely little communities.

The above shot is one that I have often thought about stopping for but have until now never quite been there with my camera when I had the time and the conditions.  The remnants of snow on the hills makes their cragginess really show well.  The reflection in the loch, with the old fence post in the foreground adds drama and a little human interest.

The next few shots were taken at Melvaig and at the lighthouse at Rubha Reidh near Gairloch.  This was a new road for me to explore as I had never gone beyond Big Sand before, which is quite hard to believe given the number of times I have been to Gairloch and I worked at Poolewe for a summer back in 1986.  This is certainly an area I will go back to as there is an interesting walk further along the coast towards what looks like a great isolated beach at Cama Mor just about 1km beyond the lighthouse.

Lighthouse at Rubha Reidh, near Gairloch (Canon EOS 5D Mark II, EF 85mm f/1.8 USM lens, 1/250 sec at f/16, ISO 200, handheld)

Lighthouse at Rubha Reidh, near Gairloch (Canon EOS 5D Mark II, EF 20mm f/2.8 USM lens, 1/200 sec at f/16, ISO 200, handheld)

Old Croft House, Melvaig (Canon EOS 5D Mark II, EF 20mm f/2.8 USM lens, 1/160 sec at f/16, ISO 200, handheld)

After visiting Melvaig I headed back towards Gairloch and then on to Loch Ewe and Inverasdale, and some of my old haunts from 1986.  The landscape is enormous with the Torridon hills to the south and looking north-east across Fisherfield, and this can be challenging to capture effectively on the camera.  I resorted to a few panoramas as follows..

View across Loch Gairloch with the Torridon Hills in the background (Canon EOS 5D Mark II, EF 20mm f/2.8 USM lens, 1/160 sec at f/16, ISO 200, handheld, panorama of 7 images)

Torridon Hills from Loch Gairloch (Canon EOS 5D Mark II, EF 85mm f/1.8 USM lens, 1/160 sec at f/16, ISO 200, handheld, panorama of 5 images)

Beinn Airigh Charr and Beinn Dearg from Naast, near Poolewe (Canon EOS 5D Mark II, EF 85mm f/1.8 USM lens, 1/125 sec at f/16, ISO 200, handheld, panorama of 3 images)