Terrafirma Travels

Only two islands today. After a pleasant night with the roof up, hoorah, we had a shower and guess what ... the room heater didn't work. Honestly, this place. On the plus side, check out the perfect rainbow. First stop was back down the road through Leverburgh (ah you blinked and missed it) to St Clement's church, a 15th century marvel with tombs in the walls and a 19th C roof. The drive of the trip followed, up the east coast of S Harris, in and out of 'The Bays' and up and down a lot too. Cracking views and a very narrow road with few barriers and many steep drops. Loved it! Harris is much more hilly/mountainous than the previous islands, and the east side with many sea lochs is very different to the west side with its long, flat beaches. We drove through Tarbert, eyeballing where our ferry will be in three days, and on down a narrowing road to the island of Scalpay which is reached over a splendid,  modern, single-track bridge. It seemed as though every third house i...

The huge winds that had shaken the van had abated a little by morning. We had showers, breakfasted and were finally able to lift the roof, though the northerly winds made it quite cold. We filled up with water, emptied the loo and drove the few yards to the RSPB site next door.  We set off on a walk around the great horseshoe beach of white sand, in a fierce wind of between F6 and F8. As we passed a rusting old tractor, Lesley spotted a bird trapped in the cab. It was a starling, very distressed, throwing itself at the windows. With some effort, we wrenched open a rusted door and after a few minutes it flew to safety. Good deed for the day, done.  At first there was little other birdlife to see but herring gulls on the shore, but as time went on we spotted more waders on the shoreline, around rock pools. It turned into an hour of walking on machair, in drizzly gales, and then on the beach, peering through our binos at some wonderful birds. Here is a list of what we saw: Curlew...

Another day of three islands, and another day of fierce SW winds, that built up to 34kn gusting 42kn at tea time. That's F8 gusting F9. We got up a tad late to a sunny morning. The roof was up overnight, a bit rattled but OK. First stop was Daliburgh beach. Parked the van when the side road became a stony track, walked over the machair pock-marked with rabbit holes and peppered with their dung. The beach is huge, curved, covered in seaweed and too windy to stay. A raincloud directly upwind seemed to have our name on it so we retreated at pace. Next stop Kildonan museum, cafe and craft centre, in that order, all of which were excellent. We learned much of the social history of S Uist, and saw much of what's being crafted today. We even bought each other presents. Well, you've got to support the local economy.  Intellectually and gastronomically fortified we headed north again. The land became much flatter in the northern part of S Uist, and riddled with freshwater lakes that...

It was a fiercely windy night, with the van shaking in the gales. The roof was down and only one window was cracked for a little ventilation. Going to the loo was a crouching affair. Once awake, we braved the wind for a nice hot shower in the excellent facilities. Had porridge, sat about until it was time to go to the airport to watch the propellor plane touch down neatly despite huge, gusty wind on the nearby beach. Huge rainstorm just as the pilot was taking off again. All through this drama, a crowd of busy little redshank scurried about the foreshore feeding.  We drove to St Barr church, a modest Catholic church where we sat and remembered Felix. Then we drove to Castle Bay where we parked up, made ham sandwiches in the van and ate them looking at the aforementioned ruined Kisimul castle ... in the bay. A quick walk to see the RNLI boat, well tethered against the gales, and we had tea and a scone in the Post Office's own cafe. We tried to visit the Heritage Centre, but it was c...

Up at 0645 to pattering rain and grey skies. Very carefully made breakfast, still mildly traumatised by yesterday's coffee chaos. Rain had stopped in time for trip to ablutions block. Everything is shiny new here as the site only opened 6 weeks ago after complete rebuild. Lovely drive down to Oban, along the Lochside and over bridges. Got to Oban at 0940 in time for checkin.  Worried about whether our ship will actually sail. But it arrived 20 mins late and left 8 mins late, not at all full. The observation deck at the bow has splendid views. Weather is grey. We have binos at the ready and L spotted dolphins twice in the Sound of Mull. We passed three yachts with small sails up - fair play to them being out in this weather with a gale blowing in open waters. We feel lucky CalMac decided to sail early rather than cancel which would have shredded our schedule. In the Sound of Mull the wind was easterly and the sea flat. As we emerged the wind switched to forecast SSW and increased. O...

The morning started with late breakfast, and a tsunami of hot coffee and coffee grains caused by Lesley's clumsiness. It went all over the kitchen area and ended with feverish washing of the precious van curtain, pillow, pillowcase, drying up cloth, hairband, etc. Nic wiped valiantly while L washed.  At least the campsite has a drying room, warm and woody and comforting. Not something we've seen before, very useful. Apparently it rains a lot here and walkers get wet. After a whole day in the room, most of our stuff was dry. It was twelve by the time we escaped coffee grain hell. We set off walking towards the Corran ferry, a large vessel which plies across a small but very tidal neck of water. Foot passengers go free.  On the other side we walked through pretty scenery and into woodland by the water's edge,  and found a fine bench for lunch, pork pie and sandwich.  We mosied through the woodland and by a small crofting village, and back to the ferry. At one point we ...

The alarm goes off at 06:45, roughly with the dawn. We leave the site at 09:45; it's a leisurely start to the day. Drove through Glasgow on M8, and headed north on A82. L had genius idea of a SWIM in Loch Lomond on the way. N initially horrified but quickly won over by the spirit of adventure ... and the idea of 'getting one in the bag' despite the overcast skies. A quick bit of research suggested the beach at Luss, and Googlemaps was swiftly reprogrammed. Satellite view enabled us to park v close to the water, and in we dove ... well, waded carefully. It felt like about 13°, perfectly calm, no wind, lovely. Six minutes was enough. As we were getting dried by the van, a school trip arrived and started pumping up 20 paddleboards, a motorboat pulled up on the beach, and the wind picked up - so we timed it just right.  Onwards a few more miles along the Lochside (is that a word?), to a viewpoint and Bonnie & Ben's café for a very welcome panini, flapjack and hot choc. ...