Stop, Look, Listen

Stop, if you can on this page; go, if you are able today and look at what's happening in Portree. If getting to Skye is a problem, then link to Cuillins FM 106.2 and listen to the radio. Atlas Arts has an event, Bonnie Boat, involving the Celeste, which is sailing around parts of the island and broadcasting to people as well as featuring things about them. It's interactive and sounds interesting. 

Scottish Islands Explorer - tuned in

Avro Anson Accidents

David Earl specialises in aircraft history and has just completed his latest reference book - Avro Anson UK High Ground Crash Log. In the 24 years between 1937-61 this aircraft was involved in 140 crashes on the hills and mountains of Britain. Publication will be in November / December of this year and the price, including postage and backing, is £8.44. Expressions of interest should be made to David Earl who will send you full details of his latest publication which will engage aircraft enthusiasts, some family and local historians as well as museum authorities. David has produced several previous books and is a member of ARGOS - Aviation Research Group Orkney & Shetland. His website, about several areas concerning air disasters, features a photograph of the Beaufighter LX798 propeller at its crashsite on St Kilda.

Scottish Islands Explorer - also documenting current and past events

A Far from Golden Promise

This photograph by Gordon Campbell is of the Golden Promise, an Oban-registered scalloper, that ran aground off the west coast of Stroma in the Pentland Firth early yesterday. All five members of the crew were rescued by a helicopter from RAF Lossiemouth and none was hurt. The Longhope and Thurso lifeboats had been requested to launch. It's a timely reminder of the dangers that beset 'those who go down to the sea in ships'.

Scottish Islands Explorer - about islands, from a secure land base

From Larks to Sharks

The body of a 6' long blue shark was found beached at Barvas on the Isle of Lewis. The BBC report gives full details of this find by Martin Scott the RSPB's Scotland conservation officer, who is more accustomed to locating birds than fish.

Scottish Islands Explorer - tries to find out about things

Getting Home

The problems of getting there safely with a toxic load came to light on Shetland last week. Two items appeared in the Shetland Times. One involved fears of nuclear waste being transported through the Fair Isle Channel and the other concerned a driver, appearing before the Scalloway magistrates, having consumed alcohol apparently to over four times the legal limit. Warning off for the former; immediate disqualification for the latter.

Scottish Islands Explorer - tries to steer an even course

Water Supplies Safe Again

This North Ronaldsay member of the local flock has that quizzical look, as though thinking of the paradoxes of living on its Orkney island. Its range of weather is wide and conditions can change quickly in the stormy and treacherous surrounding waters. The first lighthouse, the Old Beacon (below), was, as a consequence, constructed as early as 1789. It was replaced by the tallest land-based lighthouse in the UK some 43 years later. With so much water around, it is ironic that local water-supplies recently became suspect and boiling it before use became necessary. This advice was lifted at the beginning of the month. Humans may safely consume.

Scottish Islands Explorer - safe to digest

Islands to Highlands

If you are in the vicinity of Dundonnell House, south of Ullapool, on Thursday, are able be there from 14.00 - 17.00 and have £3.50 to spare, then there's a treat in store. Lady Jane Rice, the estranged wife of Sir Tim Rice, is opening what has been described as 'an inspired walled garden'. It's three acres in extent and is tended by a brilliant young gardener who was employed at Inverewe, Will Soos. The illustrated blog by Annie Hoff is the next-best-thing to being there. Worth coming back from Islands to Highlands.

Scottish Islands Explorer - tries to be inspired

Filipinos and the Fleet

The skills of Filipino fishermen will continue to serve the fleets of the Western Isles now that their visas have been extended for a further year. However, there will be no extension beyond 2012. Many skippers are finding it difficult to recruit suitable UK crew-members and supplies to the fish-processing factories have been threatened, with local jobs at risk. The variety of species caught between the North Atlantic Ocean and the South China Sea must be extensive, with a range measured by the wide gap between fishermen's hands.

Scottish Islands Explorer - creating work locally

On Course for Profit

The Askernish Golf Course on South Uist has had a successful time during August, when its Open Championship attracted both players and spectators. The Stornoway Gazette provides the current news, while the history of the course goes back 120 years to the time when Old Tom Morris (1821-1908), the St Andrew's professional, greenkeeper and course-designer pictured below, created this course from the machair. It fell into disrepair, part of it was levelled in the 1930s to create an airstrip and then it re-opened as a 12-hole course. Its first major revival was in the 1970s as a nine-hole course, but in 206 a new project started and within two years it was transformed or rather reformed close to its original routing. These 18-holes have, according to reports, brought in £18,000 to the local economy during last month alone.

Scottish Islands Explorer - on course to assist local economies

Switching Sources of Power

The Caithness coast certainly has that edge-of-the-world feel. To the north, the Atlantic currents are channelled through the Pentland Firth, producing strong tidal flows and big waves. New companies, particularly engineering ones, have been set up to assist in the harvesting of its potential energies with the innovative devices that are becoming available. At the same time the nuclear reactor at Dounreay, which was set up in 1955, is being decommissioned and its 1900 associated jobs are dwindling. Nuclear energy has its detractors, wind farms have their objectors, but, as yet, tidal generators have not aroused waves of protest on either the mainland or the islands.

Scottish Islands Explorer - powered by prose and pictures