When our youngest child was newborn we travelled extensively around the UK.  We spent a month in Orkney and I have to say that it was the most wonderful experience.  If you ever get a chance to go there then I have no doubt that you will come away moved. 

It’s a wonderful combination of farmland and highlands.  Deserted white sand beaches, seals and windswept moorland are mixed with crofts.  The weather moves fast on the Orkney isles, a feature those familiar with Scotland will understand.  Often you can literally see the wall of rain moving across the landscape and the sheets of water plummeting from the dark clouds.  This is most impressive when it’s mixed (as often it is) with paler and warmer skies behind it.  These storms can turn water gun metal grey and heathland to a moody bluey brown. 

Of course you can feel the atmosphere on the skin, but you can also somehow sense it within your whole body.  There’s an intensity, an excitement, an anticipation in the air when a storm like this passes through.

10x7 inch original watercolour painting. Unframed.