There and back again (hopefully) - Molly's Hebridean Adventure Day 7

There and back again (hopefully) - Molly's Hebridean Adventure - Day 7

One of the days I was most eagerly anticipating on this trip was the visit to Askernish Golf Club. Old Tom Morris, the legendary golf course designer, had laid out a course in the dunes and Machair for Lady Cathcart in the 1870's to impress her guests. Whilst it was originally maintained by the crofters, priorities changed, the maintenance stopped, and the course was retaken by nature and the dunes in the 1920's.

In the last 15 years a group of locals, with some outside expertise and celebrity backing, have re-found the original Old Tom Morris course and restored it. Various commentators have said Askernish is now the perfect and the most natural links course.

Well setting off at 10 am this morning it was pretty perfect because I was the only person on the course until 12! After a lot of rain yesterday evening the weather was lovely as well. My money duly posted through the honesty box, I set off.

The course is stunning. Simple, unpretentious and pure links. And for 9 holes I thought I'd mastered the art of links golf. Then I took on the back nine, next to the beach and with the wind picking up. I went from hoping to maintain my good score to hoping I had enough balls in my pencil bag to get me round!

Actually I did pretty well, and credit to Master Lewis at WGC for his pitching lesson, as I hit the perfect 9 iron pitch and run from about 30 yards on the 18th stone dead to finish with a par.

It was completely different to parkland golf, and bloody though, but I absolutely loved the course and it lived up to my expectations. I want to come back and play it again.

I called in at the Kildonan Museum and cafe next. Really good museum exhibition. Next up was the ancient chapels and thatched houses at Bowmore and the statue of Our Lady of the Isles. All of this in the amazing, almost lunar landscape of South Uist which is not like anything I've ever seen. Hundreds of small lochs and lochans, huge areas of flat landscape with heather covered hills rising up. And everywhere, the beautiful Machair just behind the beaches, and the peat bogs covering the land.

I love driving on these Islands. With single track and passing places, people always wave to say thank you. However, I now realise people just wave anyway, whether it is single or dual track and whether you have waited or not. People who are walked just wave as well. It's lovely. And I've just started reading Preferred Lies by Andrew Grieg which Martin Thomas gave me for the trip. He sums it up beautifully "a rust bucket with four wheels trundles up behind me and I step off the road as he trundles by. The driver lifts a hand in greeting. I return the salute. Why does he greet me? He doesn't know me. He greets me because I am here and he is here, and we are on the same island."

I know in the real world the polls say the independence vote is very close. Well, not out here it isn't. There are YES stickers, flags and signs everywhere. I understand the emotion of the YES vote, but the economics of splitting up terrify me. It costs enough for a firm to merge, for a couple to divorce and so on - I can't begin to contemplate the cost of separating two countries, their real estate, their armies, their administrations and so on - especially after 300 years.

But if it does happen, and me and the kids are allowed to apply for our second Scottish passports (thanks Jimbo, your Scottish DNA is probably the most important legacy you left behind) then I hope the waving on the islands will not stop.