In Scotland this is where the real essence of transition from old to new gets distilled. At midnight tonight on Easdale, a tiny island in the Inner Hebrides, a motley troupe of celebrants will pick its way gingerly over rocks and grass, through pools and over dykes. The three-day celebration to bring in the New Year will have begun.

Easdale has a permanent population of 65 but in the days leading up to Hogmanay and for a day or so afterwards this will have swollen to around 250. No house lies empty; every bed is taken and all sofas are booked months in advance. Not a few outhouses and barns, no matter how inclement the elements, will have turned into havens for a night.

This island-wide massed first-footing will pick out only those dwellings whose outside light is left on. This simple illumination is the signal telling the revellers that the residents are happy to receive them. Around 15 to 20 are normally expected to do so. The tour of the houses will start with a core group of islanders and then build steadily to a small throng, taking on fresh participants en route. Some will have guitars and there will be singing and very possible (this being the north-west of Scotland) some dancing. It will end only when the last person standing decides finally to retire. This can be anywhere between 6am and 9am.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest New Year in Edinburgh may be more flashy, but lacks the warmth and generosity of spirit seen on Easdale. Photograph: Andrew Milligan/PA

Bottles of whisky will be handed over and a few lumps of coal; shortbread too: these being the ancient currency of a Scottish Ne’erday. In a select group of houses something more exotic may be waiting. In the preceding autumn when the brambles are in season they will be picked and then fermented for a few months until a sweet and punchy elixir is produced and ready for consumption on this night of nights.

Veterans of this midwinter pilgrimage will tell you that if you time your steps accordingly you will reach Derek and Margaret’s just in time for a bowl of stovies like no others you will ever have tasted. Around 3am is the target.

At lunchtime tomorrow a grand football match will take place two days after the ancient tribal conflict kicked off in Glasgow. Unlike that one though, the Easdale game is a joyous event where young and old, male and female, sturdy and infirm all participate in a celebration of community values. Afterwards a dozen or so happy fools will offer a further consecration by jumping into the harbour.

A ceilidh will follow where every islander is expected to do a turn. And then the grand finale, the annual Easdale pantomime. This is an almost sacred happening which is scripted freshly each year to include references both sad and happy to events that have unfolded and characters who have figured large in the annual chapter of this island’s story.

Colin McPherson, a photographic artist, built a home on the island in 1999 and has returned here for Hogmanay almost every year since. He has spent most of 2017 travelling the world on an ambitious photographic project. Yesterday he arrived back at the place he calls home accompanied by six relatives and friends, including his eight-year-old daughter. “My job takes me all over the place but I always ensure that I’m in Easdale for the New Year,” he says. “There’s simply no other place on the planet I’d rather be.” In June of 2018 he will return again to host a two-week photography masterclass that he hopes will bring some welcome commerce to this isolated outpost.

“No matter how your year has panned out, as soon as you step on to that little ferry your shoulders relax a little as you encounter familiar faces and the places that still hold your happiest memories.”

Once you have landed on Easdale at this time of the year you are here to stay. The ferry will not resume service until 3 or 4 January. “It’s best that way,” says McPherson, “as you get to experience that feeling of community, of healing, more intensely for these few days.”

Andrew Coyle, emeritus professor of prison studies at the University of London and president of the Howard League Scotland, had a home on Easdale with his wife the baroness, Vivien Stern, for 12 years and remembers the island New Year celebrations fondly. “The New Year events always bring the island together; wounds are healed; friendships are renewed and a shared celebration of the island’s heritage takes place.

Wounds are healed; friendships are renewed and a shared celebration of the island’s heritage takes place Andrew Coyle

“For those who live there permanently it can be an uncertain and challenging existence, though rewarding too. The three-day Hogmanay mini-festival makes it all worthwhile and people come to realise the blessings of living in such a beautiful place.”

In Scotland, the celebration of the New Year has always been about much more than parties and fireworks. It falls amid Scotland’s coldest and darkest days when a hardy and taciturn people traditionally had to draw on each other’s warmth and generosity of spirit. It’s when optimism is renewed and purpose is re-kindled.

In Edinburgh 140 miles to the south-east more than £1m has been spent trying to convey an approximation of a good time. There, once you have purchased a £25 ticket you are allowed to walk in your own capital city as the New Year begins. On Easdale where the entry price is a hug and a smile, perhaps a song or a dance, you get to join in the real Scottish Hogmanay