Qualla: Black Isle https://qualla.com/black-isle en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:24 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/h/z/black-isle-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Black Isle https://qualla.com/black-isle Black Isle: Introduction https://qualla.com/black-isle/ Photo credit Dr Julian Paren, CC BY-SA 2.0. Start with the name, which lies twice. The Black Isle is not black - in winter, when snow lies thick on the surrounding hills, this peninsula stays green and dark by contrast, which is the most cited explanation for the colour. And the Black Isle is not an island, even though the Cromarty Firth borders it on the north, the Beauly Firth on the south, and the Moray Firth on the east. Only on the west does it cling to the mainland, and even there a tributary of the River Beauly does most of the boundary work. The Encyclopaedia Britannica's eleventh edition called the original Gaelic name Ardmeanach - height of the monk - after an old religious house on the wooded ridge of Mulbuie. The Black Isle is one of those places where the name is the smallest thing wrong with what people think they know.

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Image: Dr Julian Paren | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/h/z/black-isle-wp/gfhz-black-isle-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Black Isle: Three Firths and a Ridge https://qualla.com/black-isle/ Photo credit Postdlf, CC BY-SA 3.0. Geography first, because everything else flows from it. The Black Isle is a fat green peninsula about 20 miles long, ribbed down its centre by the wooded ridge of the Mulbuie. The Cromarty Firth to the north is a deepwater anchorage where decommissioned North Sea oil rigs queue a...

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Image: Postdlf | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/h/z/black-isle-wp/gfhz-black-isle-three-firths-and-a-ridge.mp3 0:06 2 full Black Isle: Dolphins at Chanonry Point https://qualla.com/black-isle/ Photo credit Shirehorse at English Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0. On a strip of shingle between Rosemarkie and Fortrose, where Chanonry Lighthouse marks the narrowest part of the Moray Firth, the resident bottlenose dolphins come within yards of the beach. They surf the tidal funnel, hunting salmon that have been forced into a narrow channel by...

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Image: Shirehorse at English Wikipedia | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/h/z/black-isle-wp/gfhz-black-isle-dolphins-at-chanonry-point.mp3 0:06 3 full Black Isle: Castles, Clearances, and Hugh Miller's Cottage https://qualla.com/black-isle/ Photo credit Groam House Museum, CC BY-SA 4.0. The Black Isle wears its history in pieces. Castlecraig and Redcastle survive in part; Kilcoy Castle still stands; the tower house of Kinkell was rescued from ruin in the late 1960s by the sculptor Gerald Laing. Tarradale, Chanonry and Ormond castles have left only mounds. Hugh M...

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Image: Groam House Museum | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/h/z/black-isle-wp/gfhz-black-isle-castles-clearances-and-hugh-millers-cottage.mp3 0:06 4 full Black Isle: Kites in the Hill, Wells in the Trees https://qualla.com/black-isle/ Photo credit Diliff, CC BY-SA 3.0. Between 1989 and 1994, 93 red kites of Swedish stock were released on the Black Isle as part of a reintroduction project to bring back a raptor extinct in Scotland for more than a century. They thrived. The forked tails and rust-red wings are now a regular sight wheeling over the...

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Image: Diliff | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/h/z/black-isle-wp/gfhz-black-isle-kites-in-the-hill-wells-in-the-trees.mp3 0:06 5 full