A Sunday up in Sutherland

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We took a drive up to Sutherland County on Sunday to locate a house we knew was for rent, and also get a feel for the area. Sutherland is a lot further north than we'd ideally like to be. The distance from Steve's work is forty-one miles, so his daily commute would be between 50 and 60 minutes each way. But the house is large and the landscape is pretty much spectacular, as you can see in the following photos. Since we're only going to rent for a year to eighteen months, maybe living a remote and rural life would be a nice, relatively short-term change.

This is a viewpoint along the road we took into Sutherland County. This is the Dornoch Firth.

The same spot but from a different vantage point. This is looking roughly west.

Here's the view looking in the other direction.

When we found the house, we pulled by the side of the road to have a gander. This is farm country and we were parked across the street from a herd of young bulls (who would be our next-door neighbors if we move there). They were spread about their field doing things that bulls do. Then one-by-one each bull looked at us. This continued until the entire herd was looking at us. We had about thirty pairs of bovine eyes fixed upon us. And then they all came walking toward us. I took this photo to try and capture at least a portion of the transfixed herd.

Here's a close-up of one fellow. As you can see, the bulls in the distance are making their way toward us at this point. It was very strange. After about five or six minutes of staring at us, they all suddenly trotted away. It was quite funny.



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