THE ‘SENSES’ SCOTTISH RETREAT 2026
31st MAY TO 5TH JUNE 2026 - 4 PLACES REMAINING
The Friday Photowalk Podcast community meets each year on Scotland’s Black Isle to celebrate connection through photography. Our 2026 retreat includes five days of mindful walking, photogravure printing, forest writing, and sound storytelling. It’s a creative escape with like-minded souls, presented by The Photowalk Podcast with The Journey Beyond.
Words, thoughts and invite from Neale James, presenter/producer of The Photowalk Podcast. Pictures from Neale James and Lynn Fraser.
“I think of the Friday Photowalk edition as a safe thought-empowering community as much as a podcast. From shared photographic ideas and projects to conversations with those making pictures, to mental wellbeing and mindfulness; this community celebrates the stories, the moments, large or small and the feelings of those who take time to write, teach, show and be there for each other. Photography is more than a swipe and like, it’s a community of similarly-spirited creative people, for whom holding a camera brings a feeling of connectedness with and in the world.
We make our annual photographic pilgrimage to Scotland’s Black Isle, near the cultural city of Inverness, regarded as the capital of The Highlands, to stay on a working soft fruit farm with access to its own shop selling home-grown and local produce, within reach of the most beautiful historic landscapes.
Senses, The Scottish Photowalk Retreat celebrates the feeling our podcast brings to this community. It’s an opportunity to escape the noise and spend time with like-minded photographers.
We’ll be building on the empowering micro-workshops of 2026 to embrace creative challenges, including a new feature on this retreat, which gives you the chance to experience photogravure firsthand, creating your own copper-plate print and watching your photograph come to life as richly detailed, tactile artwork. There’s a new creative writing workshop through a forest bathing experience, we’ll be continuing our sound workshop to help you understand how this sense can be a potent part of your storytelling, and enjoy a break away as we encourage, talk with, eat with, laugh with, and, of course, walk with each other.”
DAY 1: THE SOUND OF YOUR PICTURES AND BLACK WATER FALLS NATURE PHOTOGRAPHY
On our first day together, we’ll walk the banks of the Black Water, a stretch of Highland river known for its mirror-still pools alongside exciting rapid flowing fresh water, and the scent of Scots pine carried on the breeze, to make our first photographs, exploring how sound can deepen the stories we tell through our images in a hands-on mini-workshop on field recording.
DAY 2/3: PHOTOGRAVURE AND CULTURAL CITY WALKS
You’ll have the chance to create something truly rare, your own polymer photogravure, a process that bridges photography and fine art printmaking. Under gentle light, your photograph is exposed onto a light-sensitive plate, etched, inked, and pressed by hand to reveal a print rich in tone and texture. It’s slow, tactile work, the kind that invites you to breathe, to notice, and to connect with your image in a way that pixels never could. The result is a one-of-a-kind artwork: a photograph made permanent in ink, paper, and craft; a piece of you, shaped by your own hands. Also on these days we’ll break to make photographs along the banks of the River Ness and take a dawn/dusk photowalk in local woodland to our base.
DAY 4: FOREST BATHING AND WRITING WORKSHOP
Photography is a way of sharing our wonder for the world pictorially and emotionally, though articulating our experiences as short stories, prose, poems, or curated thoughts for social media is a skill seldom discussed in photographic circles. In the morning, we’ll be joined by author Merryn Glover, who writes fiction, drama, poetry and non-fiction, with work widely published and broadcast on the BBC. In the afternoon we’ll be visit a beautiful Highlands location to put our writing into practise.
DAY 5: THE BEAUTY OF SCOTLAND
The Photowalk Retreat is an opportunity to enjoy time with like-minded friends and occasionally alone with your thoughts in the glens. We'll make pictures, talk about photography enveloped by and in the beautiful scenery we're blessed to be only a short drive away from, on our Black Isle base. The fifth day of the retreat is a day of relaxed photowalking, with a visit to Loch Maree, before returning to our base for a farewell dinner where we'll share our favourite photographs of the week.
YOUR RETREAT GUIDES
NEALE JAMES
The presenter and architect behind The Photowalk Podcast, Neale started his professional career as a broadcaster in the Canary Islands based in Lanzarote at an English and German language radio station, returning to the UK to train and present within BBC regional radio, before joining the national network, Radio 1, to host a wide series of music shows and documentaries, including television.
Upon leaving the BBC, Neale continued to present programmes in the commercial radio industry, including co-directing a radio and television training school. In 2004, he switched to a full-time occupation as a social reportage and commercial photographer, initially based in a studio in Berkshire, UK. In 2019, Neale returned to audio, launching his podcasting interests. He joined forces with Fujifilm ambassador Kevin Mullins to co-present The FujiCast.
In June 2020, Neale launched Photography Daily/The Photowalk, a programme that celebrates the ‘why’ of photography.
LYNN FRASER
Lynn is a photographer and writer based in the Scottish Highlands, drawn to moments of quiet connection and the subtle rhythms of daily life. Her camera has taken her through India, Mongolia, Ethiopia, South Sudan and further afield, where she documents the everyday with curiosity and care — from side streets and markets to festivals and solitary spaces.
She publishes My Journey with a Camera on Substack, where photographs are paired with thoughtful essays, short stories, and reflections. The result is a slow, immersive reading experience that brings attention to the overlooked and the beautifully ordinary.
Lynn’s images have appeared in international exhibitions with the Atlas of Humanity project, showing in Paris, Milan, and London. In 2025, she was named Amateur Photographer of the Year 2024 by Amateur Photographer magazine.
information about this retreat
Our base for this retreat is The Barn at Black Isle Berries, Tore, Muir of Ord, near Inverness, Scotland IV6 7SB. We’ll be staying on a working soft fruit farm with access to its own shop selling home-grown and local produce.
The cost per place is £2,150. This includes a private bedroom, all workshops, transport to all activities, plus continental breakfast and evening meals. The deposit is £300.
Bring the camera/kit you regularly enjoy using. A laptop or similar kit for editing is useful for our evenings discussing work. A tripod is handy for long-exposure photography opportunities. With access to a darkroom on the first day, you may wish to bring your own film camera, although we will supply one for those who shoot only digital.
We’ll be spending time outside and in, plus we’ll be travelling to some remote areas where the wind can be brisker. September is now warmer on record of course, but still bring scarves, a thick jacket, sturdy photowalking shoes or boots. Bring rainproof options too, as we’re not allowing rain to stop play.
The accommodation is wheelchair friendly for one ground floor room (with a wet room). All facilities are on one-floor level. Transportation would need a level of planning and negotiation.
