Farewell to the Outer Hebrides

On Monday, after over three weeks in the beautiful Outer Hebrides where we endured two gales that topped and tailed a week of fabulous weather, we headed back to the mainland not before we spotted a lightening of the skies and a reduction in the wind to hire a car to explore Lewis. We're very happy that we did and found some memorable places.

Lewis is definitely an island of two characters. The northern half is relatively low-lying moorland (no trees, they all blew across to the mainland long ago) whilst the southern area, as it joins Harris, is impressively hilly. The south west coast is particularly beautiful and we were lucky that we chose to do the south in the afternoon when the sun peeked out.

Here are a few photos to give you an idea of the place. We should say that we had the car on a Sunday and broadly everywhere in Lewis shuts on a Sunday, including all the tourist attractions and cafes!

The inner harbour and marina in Stornoway

The lighthouse on Tiumpan Head at the tip of the Eye Peninsula, east of Stornoway

The Iolaire memorial - on the 1st January 1919, His Majesty's Yacht Iolaire was bringing around 290 Lewis men back from the war when a navigation error led to her foundering on rocks known as the Beasts of Holm in a terrible gale. More than 200 perished in spite of the wreck being just yards from the shore. One man, John Finlay Macleod, bravely dived into the chaotic seas with a rope and managed to swim ashore, creating a lifeline that saved 40 men. On top of the 1000 Lewis men who died in the trenches, this additional loss of life had a profound impact on life in the islands.

The Bridge to Nowhere - in 1920 Lord Leverhulme who then owned the island, started a project to build a road up the east coast from North Tolsta to the Point of Ness. It involved building a reinforced concrete bridge but the project was abandoned in 1921, leaving this relic

The Butt of Lewis lighthouse, at the northern tip of the island

A restored Lewis Blackhouse, once a common sight on the island. A peat fire would burn in an open hearth all year round, with the smoke escaping through the thatched roof. The space inside would be shared by people and their animals

Standing stones at Callanish

A splendid couple in full highland dress; the gentleman sported a sword and an American accent!

Impressive harbour-building at the tiny Port of Ness

They built a drying harbour whose narrow entrance must be challenging in anything but calm weather

Tombs with a View on the western end of Great Bernara island 

Another picturesque final resting place

The moment the sun finally shone on Stornoway

When we were sailing into the harbour, we followed an interesting wooden vessel with tan coloured sails called Swan. We met her crew in the very good Indian restaurant and Graham was invited aboard the following day as he walked past. Swan is 120 years old, built in Lerwick and the last example of the Shetland Herring Drifters. She was rescued, having sunk in Hartlepool docks and rebuilt by a charitable trust to provide sail training and charter trips from her Shetland base.

Her skipper is a 28 year old woman called Maggie who is also a member of the Lerwick lifeboat crew and an award-winning fiddle player as well - this link shows her at the Glenfiddich Fiddle Championship in 2018 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vc0T67A91lQ

With the weather finally showing signs of improvement, and us feeling that we'd explored all that we wanted of Stornoway, we sailed a few miles south for our final Hebridean anchorage of Loch Mharabhig which, despite the gloomy skies, was a beautiful place.

Loch Mharabhig, looking east.

The other boat in the anchorage was Swiss

From Lewis, our next passage was to Loch Laxford, on the north west coast of the mainland and from there we rounded Cape Wrath and headed for Orkney. Photos and stories of wild tidal races to follow in the next update.