View from the island

Eoropie Beach Sunrise (taken on mobile)

This morning I saw my first golden eagle for 2009!
Frank and I were out by the Eoropie cemetery – a regular morning stroll and as we were leaving a very large bird landed on the ground near the track (I am pretty sure it was a golden eagle) – I was in the car and stopped and sat and watched it for a few minutes until it took off and soared beautifully in a circle and landed once again for a few moments and then took off in search of its breakfast – which is plentiful up there – rabbits are in their hundreds.

It is moments like that I feel so privileged to be living in such a beautiful place with such amazing wildlife.
I do need to learn to take my camera out with me though, I didn’t have it with me – Wiesmier will be telling me off as she was only saying the other day i needed to take it everywhere i go!

My encounter with animals was not over – when I got the exit gate our way was blocked by 3 cows and a calf who looked like bouncers – deciding who was coming in and out, and they weren’t allowing us out!
I moved the car forward and they didn’t budge, I tooted the horn and not even eyelid was batted, I did contemplate getting out and trying to shoo them away but was too scared (see below), so there we sat probably for over 5 minutes just staring at one another. I had visions of having to ring into work to explain my late arrival – they think I am a city girl enough without that!
Eventually when they decided that they had made their point, they looked at each other and decided to move own – very slowly.
I do think cows are beautiful but I seem to have developed an irrational (?) fear of them. At Bruce and Sara’s wedding I was chased across a field by some very angry cows (no they weren’t bulls). I have a dear friend who is convinced that cows are the ramblers greatest enemy, so maybe my nervousness is well founded. I think I need to find someone to give me some aversion therapy and tell me how to behave around them!

(photo not mine!)

62% more expensive to heat house in Stornoway than Bristol !

A Parliamentary Answer received by Western Isles SNP MSP, Alasdair Allan, shows it costs 62% more to heat a home in Stornoway than it does in Bristol…
“In my constituency it is 62%. more expensive to heat a house in Stornoway than in Bristol. In Braemar it is a staggering 67%; and in Aberdeen it is 57% more expensive.

Not really sure why Bristol has been chosen as the comparison, as it is quite different from Stornoway!

The other day I was pondering what the Island is going to do about moving forward with renewable energy. The reason for this pondering was that a reviewing committee has recommended that a wind farm be established in exactly the same place that was rejected last year, at the last moment by the Scottish government in the face of massive opposition form islanders for good reasons, unfortunately the Comhairle nan Eilean do support this wind farm. It seems such an obvious answer – we are one of the windest places in the UK and we are not harnessing that power.
But today some very good news for renewable energy production came about.

The Scottish Government gave planning permission for a “Wave Station” at the small village of Siader and Ballantrushal on the west coast of the island. Apparently it will provide power for up to 1800 homes, producing 4MW a minute! and it will not be visually intrusive though there is going to be 40 generators placed in a damn across the bay.

First Minister Alex Salmond said: “Today’s announcement is a significant step in Scotland’s journey to become a world leader in renewables. The Siadar wave farm will be one of the largest consented wave electricity generating station in the world”

The other upside it means 70 new jobs for islanders! Lets hope the Government continues to approve plans like this.

Tonight I attended a new group that has just recently been set up – a knit and natter group. For you knitters you will understand my excitement at this development! Particularly that this group is run by a 30 something woman and that we meet in An Lanntair (which is a nice venue) – is good news.

There are many knitters on the island – at work we get lots of people volunteering with their time to knit all kinds of things but the projects are mainly run for retired people, so it is great i have found some ‘younger’ knitters. Hopefully lots of ideas, support (especially as latest project not working out quite as one expected!) and chat!

On Monday morning I was surprised to find Stornoway was headline news on Radio 2 and apparently BBC Breakfast and Sky News, because twins were airlifted off the island by an RAF Hercules plane.
I was rather surprised that this was so high up the news editors priorities, not because the twins are unimportant but because people get airlifted off the island on a fairly regular basis.
We have a very good hospital here (the Western Isles Hospital) but because of its size it doesn’t have very specialist care units and staff and so people in need of this care get taken off usually by the helicopter, to Glasgow or Inverness.

What was even more surprising was a Daily Mail journalist got in touch via this blog, to talk about the story. I declined this offer for a variety of reasons (nothing to do with my destine of such a paper!!), but I did wonder what she thought she was going to achieve – it crossed mine, and various island friends, minds, if she thought we were such a small island that somehow i was involved in the actual delivery!

Anyway all this to say as the national press are no longer particularly interested in this story that you might like to know the twins are stable – you can read the latest here!

Clearly I got off very lightly!!

Hebrides News reports on some of the damage caused by the winds

This is a garage on the westside in Arnol – over £100,000 worth of damage to nearly new cars, caused by a collapsing wall.

A fellow island Flickr member Tamed Shrew lost her greenhouse and had some serious damage to her chimney and roof.

A house in Eoropie (just 5 mins up the road!) had its windows blown out. Hebrides News reports on other more minor damage.

and maybe this is the shed, all the way from South Uist, that my friend found behind her house!

The wind reached 113mph up here in Ness last night, which meant not much sleep was had but amazingly we didn’t loose our electricity!
There are a good few slates off the roof, but unsure how others fared – friends said that in the field opposite them there is someones shed!
Frank and I popped down to Eoropie whilst the skies were blue, though it was still quite gusty and obviously the sea had been half way up the machair as it was covered in sand. I took a short (not very good video) of the very rough seas!

PS – i’ve still got TV!!!

The council (Comhairle nan Eilean Sia) and the Northern constabulary have issued a severe weather warning for the islands – predictions are that it could be as severe as the hurricane of 2004, with pressure levels dropping below those of Jan 04.
we have had a glorious morning – blue skies, bright sunshine and a little breeze but this evening the council and police are advising:

• We all stay indoors
• Loose garden items to be tied down
• Public amenities will be closed at 6pm
• Bus services will also cease at 6pm
• Some roads will be closed

the worst of it is predicted to hit at around midnight, also at the same time as a high tide.

Be safe fellow islanders!

photo from Bluewave

One of the challenges of living on a fairly remote island that is regularly battered by high winds is what it does to your signals! your phone signals, your TV signal and your Internet signal (if you are with Connected Communities)!

A large portion of today has been spent trying to get some signals back in my life. When there is high winds inevitably the TV satellite signal is disturbed and you can’t receive TV, but some of you will be aware that there has been somewhat of an ongoing saga with Sky. Where I live the only way to get any TV is to have Sky- so if I want to have TV I am kind of over a barrel as it were, (given the long dark evenings and being on my lonesome I like having it) and unfortunately we have had nothing but a catalogue of bad service, broken boxes, broken dishes and badly wired wires (!) etc. I could rant for hours about Sky and their appalling customer services but I won’t – as this morning the very nice Sky man came out and fixed it (for the 6th time) and it seems to be holding up in the 70+mph winds we have this evening.
After this was sorted out I then started with Vodafone – I don’t get a signal at my house normally, but once up the hill I usually get a signal but since Saturday we have not had signal over here on the northwest-side of the island. Apparently the mast was damaged at the weekend but they seem to have failed to have mended it properly – even our MP has been on to Vodafone to try and get them to sort it out. It seems a bit ridiculous as O2 and Orange seem to have worked quite successfully through out the storms – so here is hoping that Vodafone will get their act together soon!

Thankfully my Internet comes through a cable, not through the air – as I understand Connected Communities customers have been suffering badly with lack of service over the last few weeks. Though there appears to be some good news from Ofcom for rural communities and receiving better broadband services, lets hope they remember us way up north.

I often think I really should just accept that this is island life but I think I am so reliant on modern forms of communication and media that when it is gone (albeit temporarily) from my life I struggle and miss it. I need to learn to be more accepting of ‘that is just island life’ which is what I am gradually learning to do. I guess I just don’t like paying for a service I don’t recieve – which is actually more the issue with Sky for me at the moment!