Five years (and a few days) ago we woke up in our new Highland Home, high up on a hill above Loch Ness. It had snowed overnight and all our belongings were, it transpired, stuck at the bottom of the hill. It was something of a baptism of fire into our new lives.

I had wanted to move back north over the border ever since I decided to move south. It was one of those things that I instantly realised was a mistake on a number of levels, although there were huge positives that I will never regret – the main one being the chance to spend a lot more time with my Mum in what turned out to be her final years. My heart and sould belong to Scotland though, and whilst many people love the Lake District, to me it was a poor substitute and one that I came to resent.

We didn’t know where we were going when we decided to move. The scope of our search stretched from Dumfries and Galloway right through to Orkney, although that was ruled out on the grounds of being just too far away! Our main focus for a long while was on Perthshire, centering on the Perth and Pitlochry areas. We wanted more space than either could accomodate withing our budget though, and this pushed us to look into Angus and Highland, with the latter winning out.

I had spent a fair bit of time in and around Inverness over the years and it is somewhere that I knew to a degree and had always had good impressions of, so when a couple of properties presented themselves in the area we came to view as soon as Covid restrictions lifted, and then bought our eventual home on that very trip.

The Highlands of Scotland are one of the most breathtaking environments on Earth, although sadly under threat by the development of renewable energy initiatives – something that we are actively involved with fighting against, despite my deep held beliefs in environmental issues and decarbonising the economy. It is a case of too much concentrated in one area and to the detriment of the landscape and ecology of a unique area rather than the technology itself that I have issue with, the load needs to be spread more evenly!

By and large, though, it is a great place to be – and a wonderful place for the boys to grow up and find themselves. Which they are doing so well!

I just wanted to mark the first half decade of life here with some thoughts and reflections, whilst looking forward to what comes next.