Ecosse and Beyond: 10th June Friday

Saxa Vord from Fetlar

Sorry, forgot the plan of Fetlar

Plan of Yell

Yell has a problem – people just pass through it to go to and from Unst or Fetlar rather than stop. It is largely peat.

Peats drying

Gutcher pier

I spent Wednesday night on Cullivoe pier which is not the prettiest place in the world. Before stopping I had been to visit the Gloup memorial. At the Unst Boat Haven I had been told all about this where, in 1881 a hurricane blew up from Iceland and 58 fishermen were lost on 10 boats, 9 of them sixareens, and 6 of those from Gloup. The lairds seized the valuables of the bereaved families to compensate for the loss of their boats. There was growing awareness of the risks of “haaf” fishing and heralded the end of it.

I’ve been trying to work out what “haaf” meant, assuming it meant a type of fish. I finally gave up and asked at the Museum in Lerwick only to be informed it refers to the distance from land the open boats went out to sea – up to 40 miles offshore. The Haaf fishermen stayed on the shore in the fishing season and they needed stoney beaches to dry the fish on. When “haaf” fishing was abandoned the boats were used for some other purpose. There is only one left which was used as a mail boat and therefore preserved for longer and this is in the Lerwick museum.

Others are replicas.

Gloup Voe

Looking back to Fetlar

Aywick

The White Wife figurehead, from a 3 masted German barque on its way to Chile in 1924 in Otterswick

I spent quite a bit of time in Aywick and Otterswick looking for otters – no luck – but I did watch a female Arctic Tern for some time. She sat around and whenever another tern appeared made a lot of noise and then they mated. This happened several times, couldn’t decide whether or not it was the same tern that kept coming back.

And I had several random friendly conversations with the locals, who wanted to know what I was doing. One woman came out of her house to advise me on where to go for the otters. Another was a former school head who told me the Council were trying to close some schools to address the Coalition cuts – devastating to a fragile community. I was also told about the fishermen who had been caught selling their over-catch on the black market, another major local issue.

Still can see Saxa Vord