Why autumn is golden

Experiencing Scotland in October, and how autumnal colours come to be

October is, I reckon, the best time to be in Scotland. The tourist invasion has dwindled, and these are the last few days when evenings feel like evenings. Tonight we wind back the clocks and savour the homely withdrawal of daylight, when whisky by the fire begins to feel like a more reasonable luxury. (The transition feels special at first, but soon it becomes hard to resent the early imposition of night.)

Here in the Outer Hebrides, the slow procession of squalls rolling in from across the Atlantic is yet to begin – apart from last week’s 75-knot warmup – and the last biting midgies have ceased to be, leaving behind a few billion eggs to lurk in the soil and plot next summer’s torment.

The ruins of a small building on the edge of the Cairngorms, a few miles from Dalwhinnie.