Stobbsie's Diary: A Day of Exploring

A Day of Exploring

June 22nd 2015

We didn't have any particular destination in mind today - we just set off to explore some other parts of the island. Because Grannymac really likes maps which help us to see where we are and where we are going, we are going to include a map of Lewis and Harris in this post. Our house for the week was roughly half-way between Tarbert and Stornoway - it took about an hour to get to either of them.

We set off to Tarbert first and from there we explored South Harris, where some of the most spectacular scenery on the island can be seen.

The first place we stopped at was a beautiful sandy beach with waves from a turquoise blue sea washing up onto it. We saw a lady taking her two dogs (which we had also seen on the ferry) for a walk. We didn't take time to go onto that beach but maybe another day we can spend more time on another beach.

Bella and I had an excellent view as we drove on a narrow, twisty road through wide open rocky areas with only a very few houses, or maybe small farms (called crofts), dotted here and there. We all thought it looked very pretty on a day in June, but it must be very different in the middle of winter.

We then had a quick visit to a small town called Leverburgh. The only photo Grannymac took there was of some very strange looking 'baskets', in fact a whole big pile of them. Grannymac told us that they are called 'lobster pots' and that they are put into the sea with some bait in them, so that lobsters (sea creatures with two big long claws) will come into them and be trapped. That doesn't sound a very nice thing to do, especially as it seems that many people like to EAT them! Grannymac explained that this is how these fishermen earn the money they and their families need.

On the next part of our journey we saw something very interesting happening to some sheep but there will be a separate post just about sheep, so we keeping this part of our story for that post. Lady Helen knew about a very old church in this area which she wanted to have a look at. It is not used now but it had quite a few very old stone carvings in it which really were very interesting to look at it - you can see some of them in this collage.

There was a pretty little harbour nearby too.

On we went again and before long we saw some very strange creatures lying on rocks in the sea. We had never seen anything like them, some brown, some grey, all sizes including one or two very big ones and strangest of all, they didn't have any legs! How on earth do they manage to walk? Again, Grannymac told us they are called 'seals' and they don't walk, but on land they have to haul themselves along which is difficult. It is a different matter altogether when they are in the sea, where they live and where they catch fish, because they are expert swimmers, helped by their flippers which they have instead of arms. What a lot we are learning on this holiday!

Further along the road a bit, we saw some more strange animals but this time they were a bit more familiar, in fact rather like our neighbours in the field at home, except that these have a lot more hair and some of them have very long horns! Lady Helen was very pleased to be able to take some photographs of these Highland cattle - she always likes to stop when she sees them. I can't help wondering how some of them can see where they are going with all that hair covering their eyes! And just look at that cheeky black one sticking his tongue out at us!

The only other thing we have to write about today is watching the ferry (we know what that is now) coming in to Tarbert. We stopped on a road above Tarbert - it was fun to watch it and to think it was bringing more people and lots of the things people on the island need. In no time at all, it would be unloaded and then loaded up again, and off it would go back to Uig, doing this twice a day, every day except Sunday.