The Vikings would have felt quite at home here, the closest thing Britain has to subarctic tundra. It is an area of blanket bog extending over 200,000 hectares of Caithness and Sutherland that came under Norse rule between the ninth and thirteenth centuries. Flow from the Old Norse flóa, meaning flood or deluge.
Slow gradients slope off in every direction in the distance a few low hills poke their noses into the air. The cow-brown flats tussocked and pockmarked by puddles and pools. A single sweeping line demarcates the heavens and the earth: God’s rough draft, the Earth formless and empty still. Wet as a dropped cloth and as heavy as sin, the earth wears a black mantle of peat that smothers the surface for mile upon mile into the far off distance.įrom a train window, moving at speed, what strikes you first is the utter absence of the picturesque. It is a rare and unusual landscape, stripped back and open to the sky – a blanket bog, to give it its proper name. I was going north to find a tree farm, in a land where there are no trees. In the 1980s, driven by big money and hubris, foresters rushed into these northlands to conduct one of the most reckless environmental experiments in this country’s history, the results of which have been tattooed to the face of the Highlands for decades, and will disfigure the landscape for many more to come.
Ten miles from the nearest metalled road, Altnabreac may be the remotest station in Britain, but I’d heard too that it was at the epicentre of one of the forestry industry’s most egregious errors. In July last year I boarded the train at Beauly, the tiny slab of concrete that serves as a platform near my parents’ house, and bought a ticket for Altnabreac, a three-hour journey and a world away. Users flag down passing trains as one might hail a bus, a necessity I’ve enjoyed since I was a child, leaning out over the edge of the platform to wave like the Railway Children with their scarlet knickerbockers. Most trains are only two carriages long, most stops only operate on request. Each world brings new elements, mechanics and surprises.The Far North Line runs up the forehead of Scotland, from Inverness to Thurso, tripping through the fertile fieldscapes of the Black Isle, clinging to the coast, edging past the nursery of oil rigs in the Cromarty Firth before finally gathering the courage to let go and jet up through the bleak, empty spaces of Sutherland and Caithness. The timing of the button press must be precise to carry the planet through the portal to the next level.Try to beat the levels as fast as possible to collect stars that will unlock more levels. Use one button to control a group of complex mechanisms. One button controls everything - Think that it's simple? Will the missing planet be behind the next portal? Find out, Beat the high-score or compete with your friends in this new Physics-Puzzle! You have the ability to manipulate the world elements to guide him safely through the galaxies in this Physics-Puzzle-Adventure. «Tales of the Tiny Planet» tells the story of a Planet searching through the galaxies for his lost friends.
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