Oh deer!

We’re in Lochinver today. At least I am; James is walking here from Little Assynt via Suileag Bothy, about 12 km. It’s another hot sunny day and I have finally learned my lesson - I can’t hike in hot weather! Luckily we live in Scotland so there will be plenty of cool days ahead when I can do a bit of walking. So I am going to head for a small beach on the other side of Culag Woods, I have a leaflet that I picked up from the tourist office with a rudimentary map on it. 

I’m not there yet though. I stopped in the centre of the village to pick up ingredients for a picnic, and immediately noticed that there were half a dozen deer (young stags) nibbling the grass in the childrens’ playground. There weren’t any children there at the time. I have never seen deer right in the centre of the village before, word among the few other passers-by was that the staff in Spar said that the deer tend to come down very early in the morning, but not late morning like today. Those of us who were privileged to see them so close up, with their cute fuzzy antlers and gangly legs, watched them respectfully from the road side of the playground fence. Of course someone had to spoil it. An extremely foolish man entered the playground by the gate and approached the deer, who got a bit restless. He was talking angrily to a couple of people across the fence; he pointed out that the deer had done some poos in the playground (true) and that they were probably covered in ticks (also true) and that they were dangerous wild animals (true again!) And he continued to creep towards the deer, who all lifted up their heads in alarm.

I just couldn’t help myself. I asked him why he was on the same side of the fence as the dangerous animals. His response was “to see what would happen” So I politely but firmly told him that he should exit the playground before he got hurt, or even possibly frighten the deer so much that they might jump into the road in front of a car or a camper-van. I could see that he was absolutely furious at me for telling him what to do, and he stood immobile, staring at me angrily like a sulky teenager. I ignored him and after a few minutes he sidled out of the playground. Not because I had told him to, of course! 

I presumed that the Lochinver locals would know how to move the deer onwards safely, as I can’t imagine that this is the first time it has happened. And sure enough, while I have been tucking into a delicious hot pear and chocolate pie here outside the pie shop, I have seen a police car arriving, presumably to sort out the errant deer. * 

So here I am, eating pie, drinking coffee, looking at the loch and relaxing. Meanwhile in London city far far away, Prime Minister Boris is facing a no confidence vote this evening. ** I’d rather be here in Lochinver.

* update - when I walked back to the car the deer were indeed gone.

** Boris won his vote by 211 to 148 (about 60%) although who knows how long he will be able to carry on.