Dunnet Forest Walk

You know how smells can transport you to another place and another time?  How a smell can put you in an exact moment in your personal history?  Isn’t that an amazing thing?

My grandma’s house was like that. It had a smell. A really wonderful smell. I would say it was a combination of homemade bread and cinnamon rolls and ham loaf and carmel icing and Davenports and humidity and horse and buggy and rain on the tin roof. These are smells (ok, and sounds) of my grandma’s house. When I walked in, it smelled like her.  It was a definite smell that defined her house. Even after Pappy and Grandma were long gone, the smell remained. It is their smell. And unfortunately, is gone forever, since the house had to be torn down a few years ago due to extensive termite damage. But the memory remains inside me. I cannot recreate it, but I recognize it when I smell it. It has come to me once or twice when I was far away from their house, and immediately I was 'in' their kitchen. How wonderful of God to create our minds with that ability! 

Well, I had one of those moments last Sunday in the Dunnet Forest. We had only walked in a short way when I inhaled deeply and was immediately transported. I exclaimed, “It smells like home!” “It smells like the Cascades!” And for that moment, I was in a familiar place. Home. It was an earthy smell. The smell of dirt and pine trees and dampness. And surprisingly, it didn't make me cry. 

This northern part of Scotland is almost treeless. Apparently that was not always so. If I interpreted correctly what I read at the Caithness Horizons (the museum in town), there were trees here many many years ago, but the bog land took over. 

 In an effort to restore trees to the area, the Dunnet Forest was planted in the 1950s. It is 260 acres big. The land was purchased by the Forestry Commission and they began planting trees as an experiment. They wanted to see what would grow in ‘poor soils’. So they planted a variety of trees. What seems to have survived, though, has been mostly pine trees. 

I read that the experiment was deemed a failure, but I do not understand why. I cannot seem to find out if there was a larger intention behind the experiment.  Were they trying to grow trees for lumber? Were they trying to recreate an ecosystem? Was it considered a failure because only a certain kind of tree survived? These are questions I have, and even though I have looked on the internet, I cannot seem to find the answers.

So, they have turned the forest into a recreational area and made it very family friendly. As I was walking through it, I could imagine tent camping there. It reminded me of the Newport News Park in Virginia, where a large group of us with our small children and dogs would go camping on a weekend. 

It was close enough to home to take the kids to soccer games on Saturday morning. Close enough to leave the dog at home if you didn’t want to mess with them and the dirt. Close enough for many of us to drive two cars and one parent to come later after work. Close enough, even, to order pizza delivered!  Really!  And yet, once we were there, it was like we were miles and miles away from town and from home.

But there is no tent camping in Dunnet Forest. There are many wooden picnic tables, though. And we saw a tree swing and a rope climbing thing. There are wood carvings and even a log ‘house’ shelter area. And lots and lots of trails. Oh, and even a giant wooden xylophone, which we did not see on this trip.  

A lot of the forest had dead trees and trees that had fallen over. Apparently, they are suffering from ‘windthrow.’ Windthrow, or blowdown, refers to trees uprooted or blown down by the wind. As you can see from the picture, the root structure is not deep. So, the Forestry Trust is at work clearing these dead trees and planting more broadleaf trees.  

So, Dunnet Forest is a work in progress. It is a great place to go on a windy or rainy day because one is pretty protected within the trees. But if you make the mistake we made of venturing out to the edge of the forest on a very windy day – which Sunday was – you will realize just how calm and lovely and peaceful it is inside.

After this walk, we drove over to Dunnet Head lighthouse.

Did you know that Dunnet Head is actually the real most northern point of Britain? Not John O’Groats, which is well-advertised to be. I do not know how John O’Groats got that reputation. 

The wind was so strong that I wanted to shout out to others, "Hold on to your small children and dogs!"  In fact, I would not have been surprised to see a small sheep fly out of the field and right out over the cliff.

We did not stay there very long.

this was an old mill at the mouth of the cove

 Instead, we drove down the road to a small cove where Mike had heard there had been some seals. And there were!  They were not very active – just bobbed their noses up out of the water. But we enjoyed walking inside this cove. 

As you can see, it is covered with layers and layers of rock. This rock is everywhere and is so interesting.   

It is in sheets like slate and makes me wonder if it is the Caithness flagstone that is everywhere here. There is so much of the flagstone that the rock walls in the fields are built with it.

After spending all afternoon in the gale-force wind, we were completely worn out. We were in bed by 9:15 pm. 

And on the way home, as we drove through the small town of Dunnet, I made Mike pull over so I could get a good picture of this sign. 

You know what's coming, don't you?

                                            Been there........