Country diary: ancient survivors and wild dune edges

Magilligan Point, County Derry The botany of the spit was once so rich that it was known as the 'medicine garden of Europe'

The view from the top of the basalt outcrop of Windy Hill is sublime. Below, the flat expanse of Magilligan Point, County Derry, narrows into the distance as it almost reaches across the mouth of Lough Foyle to the heather-topped green hills and little white cottages of Donegal, six miles away.

Most of the sandy spit has been converted into grazed farmland, the field boundaries following the lines of ancient sand ridges deposited as the point has grown since the last ice age. A half-mile wide strip along the western edge, facing the Atlantic, is still wild sand dunes, tall and rough. A stiff breeze blows up and over the rocky ridge and to the east dark grey storm clouds roll.