The circumnavigation was now on – out of village bay and heading widdershins round the point and hogging the cliffs we paddled furiously up to various cave entrances for exploration. One cave had seals singing plainsong echoing around the cliffs and caves, joined by Andrea singing to them from her kayak – it was so very eerie and one can imagine mermaids and sirens easily. We reached a bay where the boat awaited in case we needed rescue (the cliffs prevent any sort of landing) but we went into yet another cave this time with a waterfall pounding at the entrance and Nick went for a shower under it. It was truly like exploring a new world – you get so close in a kayak with seals popping up at my bow and slipping below with a pop and small wave. We paddled up to puffins on the surface with one in particular too fat too take off and another deciding to dive under than risk a bellyflop like his mate. The St Kildans used to catch puffins and eat them as small snacks. We were being investigated by Fulmars who would fly over us and then straight at us.
We had to head through the Soay gap – Soay is where the sheep all came from (1,500 moved from there onto the inhabited island of Hirta and the gap between Hirta and Soay is infamous for currents. The Cuma powered through and we took it one at a time paddling fast and strong through the gap to emerge thankfully on the correct side and in brilliant sunshine. We had the current with us and Tom decided to go for a piece of white water to emerge with a broken paddle as he had been chucked several feet in the air when the waves decided to disappear leaving a rocky landing. We couldn’t make it through various caves due to strong waves and Andrea succumbed to a Green and Black’s migraine so we made it back to the Dun gap and through that to the Village Bay and the Cuma for celebratory drinks and the news that the weather was set to change with Cirrus (Wind in the Skies) clouds appearing in the sunset.
We set off early in the morning to walk around the Village and see the day boats arrive form Harris with exhausted travellers. The gap is a point in the cliffs where you walk up to and hang over the edge to see a precipitous drop and then find out the grass you were lying on is actually not attached to much. We had been attacked by the Arctic Skua on the way to the Gap and now climbing up the hill overlooking Village Bay we had the more determined Great Skua – forming circuits of attack. Jim had tried to photograph them by lifting his fist in the air and the bird flew into it, landed a few feet away and looked at his foot that had struck Jim’s fist and then stared at Jim – words were not required to be exchanged – he was off to get his dad! We had very near misses and scampered down amongst the sheep to return to the village.
We came across Willow, who we had incorrectly labelled as the mouse woman – there is a field mouse warden on the island – it turned out she was Dutch and was camping there as she had Soay sheep. Jim and she made it to the ‘Lover Stone’ and photographed each other as they balanced on the rock – he was reluctant to give any more details and had censored his photographs before his evening slide show.
Linda had used her feminine wiles to get access to the restored manse and I tagged on to see the great woodwork being done to restore it for use by the National Trust. Apart from the black houses and stone buildings the military constructed portacabins (they used to be military grey but now a civilian contractor is degaussing out there and they painted them dark green to ‘blend in’) – they look awful. In addition there was a huge generator plant that we peeked in before someone came running over and shouted at us and said he could confiscate my camera – quite possibly with it embedded in his skull I mused (I had already swapped out the photo card anyway like any professional spy – you don’t get deported for spying from Romania without learning from your mistakes). The shop didn’t open until 2 and we were set to leave before then to make it back before the bad storms hit, but a National Trust guy met us heading back the jetty and said he would open it just for us as we were off the Cuma. I now possess a puffin sun hat and sent Kim a puffin postcard ‘Weather is here, wish you were lovely’ and bought her a tea towel which she will treasure.
