Out & About …

… on the North York Moors, or wherever I happen to be.

A panoramic view of Tràigh Iar, Berneray’s West Beach, a wide expanse of white sand stretching towards the horizon under a dramatic sky. The sand shows ripples and patterns from the wind. To the left, the turquoise ocean meets the shore with gentle waves. In the distance, a line of the dark mountains and hills of Harris are visible under a mix of bright blue sky and developing storm clouds, with some lighter clouds closer to the viewer.

Tràigh Iar and the Shadow of St Maolrubha

A day of fierce wind, restless skies and an early downpour. We turned north again for a circuit of Berneray — once an island, now leashed to North Uist by a causeway built in 1999. The route included two kilometres along Tràigh Iar, or West Beach — a stretch of spotless, deserted sand that lived up to its name.

A tall, grey standing stone, heavily covered in light green and yellowish lichens on its upper half, stands upright in a vast, green grassy moor under a bright blue sky with scattered white clouds. In the background, beyond the field, a calm blue sea meets the horizon, and a distant, hazy island with a gentle slope is visible. The stone casts a dark shadow on the grass to its right, and smaller rocks are scattered around its base.
Cladh Maolruidhe.

There is always some ancient fragment luring one off-course. This time it was Beinn a’ Chlaidh, a 30-metre rise topped with Cladh Maolruidhe, a Neolithic standing stone1Cladh Maolrithe. Canmore ID 10497. http://canmore.org.uk/site/10497. Broad at 1.1 metres, tall at 2.6, it carried a fine crown of what appears to be sea ivory lichen. Supposedly, a chapel once huddled beside it, dedicated to St Maolrubha of the Columban fold, who straddled the Late Iron Age and early Christian periods. One can still just about trace the outline of the chapel, its wall, and three small cells — or perhaps that is only the eye hoping to see what the ground no longer truly shows. Later cultivation has muddied things further.

The name “Berneray,” or Bearnaraigh in Gaelic, comes from the Old Norse Bjarnar-øy, meaning either “Bjorn’s island” or “bear island.” There are several Bernerays scattered through the Hebrides2https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berneray, _North_Uist#Etymology. Either Bjorn got about, or the bears did.

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