Traigh Gheal

Traigh Gheal is a delightful bay on the south side of Erraid, an almost uninhabited tidal island apart from an off shoot of the Findhorn Foundation since 1978, a small spiritual community living in the old light house keeper cottages, where you can go for a personal retreat. It is also known as David Balfour's bay because it is where Robert Louis Stevenson imagined Davie – in Kidnapped - was thrown ashore clutching a spar from the Covenant, his sinking ship wrecked on the Torran rocks ("are there many of them?" the captain had asked, revealing his poor sense of navigation). RLS was certainly the black sheep of his family who were mostly engineers who built most of the Scottish lighthouses – indeed his father used to take him on trips by boat around the coast so he knew very well the places he later wrote about, at least in his memory because most of his stories were written after he had left Scotland. In 1980 he wrote: “Whenever I smell seawater, I know that I am not far from one of the works of my ancestors. The Bell Rock stands monument for my grandfather, the Skerry Vhor for my Uncle Alan; and when the lights come out at sundown along the shores of Scotland, I am proud to think they burn more brightly for the genius of my father”. If you want to know more about Scottish lighthouse you can do no better than read Bella Bathurst's marvellous book - the Lighthouse Stevensons. The old observatory at the top of the hill used to be for communications with the Dubh Artach Lighthouse. It is unlocked and there is a bench and a couple of windows to gaze out of and imagine yourself watching out for the light before the days of radio. This anchorage is described further under the Tinker's Hole.