We might have been able to find a room in Stornoway, had we looked, but it had never entered our heads when we went there to pump up the tyre. After spending the previous night sleeping in the car, and given the choice between repeating the experience or a nice, warm room with a bathroom, comfy bed and a cooked breakfast in the morning, there really was no contest. It must have been after ten thirty by the time we arrived at where we had chosen to spend the night and the view through our windows was spectacular.

We tucked the car up for the night in a corner by a derelict building, just outside the enclosure of Callanish II stone circle and we could both see and feel the presence of the stones as we wrapped ourselves against the evening chill and snuggled down. Through the windscreen, the stones of Callanish were silhouetted against the sky, through the back window, I could just see Callanish III, the Circle of the Long-seers, peeping over the rise. Across the loch, the Cailleach slept, her form still visible in the dusk-blue hills. It was a perfect spot.

Solstice, the longest day, was almost upon us. There would be no darkness this far north… no starry skies, just those patches of darkening blue glimpsed through low, grey cloud. There was utter silence, complete stillness, and a sense of being held safe in a sacred space.

I have always wanted to spend a night sleeping and dreaming within a stone circle… and we were surrounded by them.

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