Fair Isle

Fair Isle,

A Gem of  a magical place. Arrival was following a hazy lazy motor boat run with the tide from Lerwick to a hole in a rock. The electronic charts lack land contour lines of shore features, they would have helped.  We never fully trust the charts and rely on what we can see as real…there was nothing there…no entrance, no marks, no smell of burning peat, no signs of humanity and we were about 1/2 mile out of the only harbour?? Must have faith and proceed so we did…eventually spying about 6 masts of other boats so in we went dead slow only to find that this was not ideal as the currents were swirly so needed more speed right when we were coming to a dead end….well we made it and rafted along a boat from Kirkwall that was a charter boat being used by a Grandfather teaching his grandsons sailing. Then another boat’s mast appeared behind the rocks and yet another after that, we had seen neither on our way….

Nesting Fulmars, sea weed eating sheep and one road yet 11 cars, 1 tractor and a flat bed truck met the ferry the next day and we know that there were another 2 cars at least on the island., + the one that they loaded onto the ferry that was going for its warranty service work.

We saw sheep being fleeced and met a lady who was all excited as she and her partner had been granted the croft the month before. She cooks for the bird observatory and he crews on the 1x/week ferry. I figure the house may have been what they were after as 8 acres and 25 sheep just can not be viable their new dog will cost more to feed then the yield of the lambs each year.

The one shop was closed when we got there but had a public loo (most welcome) complete with condoms and sex ed info.

We stayed 2 nights and celebrated my birthday that was a lovely sunny windy day and we walked the length of the island and ended by rubber boat dingy pot holing in the shore caves. A seal we disturbed belched offence at our presence and launched himself directly at us so we backed out to the sun and found another  cave to explore. 

That evening Sea Pilgrim rafted along side and the two boats have been sailing together for a week since. Good company and boat of similar speed and daily cruising range.