Lost village
Standing at the head of Loch Broom in Ross and Cromarty, I am watching a magnificent white-tailed eagle hunt for prey. Nearby is the road north to Ullapool; to the south-east the bare summit of Beinn Dearg looming over a deserted interior of high lochs and barren land punctuated by remote rivers and glens. Immediately in front of me is the dark outline of Inverlael Glen, densely planted with conifers in the 1930s.
It is a tranquil spot. You might hear the piping of oystercatchers or, in summer, the howling calls of mating red-and black-throated divers. Today, the glen is devoid of people.
Rewind around 200 years and this would have been a vastly different scene. With widely spaced deciduous trees, this glen was home to around 77 multi-generational families and upwards of 600 Gaelic-speaking inhabitants. Their centuries-old lifestyle came to an abrupt
