The hunk of rock above is Out Stack, which happens to be the northernmost point of Britain. It’s located a short way north of Muckle Flugga Lighthouse, which is a short way north of the Shetland Isles. I certainly wasn’t on my own, out on the water up there on top of the UK. The [...]
Archive for the ‘Shetland Islands’ Category
Out Stack Leave a comment
In a Flap Leave a comment
This fellow’s take-off was much more impressive than what followed. He got caught up in the gusty draughts in the cliff gulley and zig-zagged seawards out of control, barely avoiding the walls with manic flapping. In fact, I suspect that was what he meant to do…
Lutra Lutra 1 comment
I’ve just been writing about otters, which prompted me to dig out these images. Britain’s otters are not marine animals. They evolved as river animals, but have successfully adapted to survive and even thrive in UK coastal environments, especially areas with few major rivers. Otters are part of family mustelidae, which includes stoats and weasels. [...]
Mutually Assured Destruction Leave a comment
Post-WWII, the development of atomic weapons made coastal fortifications obsolete. The ‘strategy’ of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) reduced the concept of defence to, surviving a Soviet nuclear onslaught just enough to be able to retaliate in kind. This ‘Cold War’ left its imprint on our coastal landscape. Enormous radar domes were constructed to detect incoming [...]
Visit Shetland 1 comment
Pretty well the only thing about Shetland that failed to impress us was their Tourist Office. Maybe it was just the particular staff we ran into at their Lerwick office, but they didn’t seem particularly informed or helpful regarding their home. For example, we had to practically beg on knees to view and then get a photocopy of [...]
Paddle World – Shetland Leave a comment
The aforementioned issue of Paddle World carrying my feature on Shetland is now on sale. All good.
Paddle World Leave a comment
This is the cover of the 2011 edition of Paddle World magazine. Paddle World is published annually by the same French/ US team who produce Kayak Session. Just as Kayak Session is indisputably the highest quality white water magazine, Paddle World is the best of the various touring-specific paddling magazines available. As the cover above [...]
Reasons Why…Shetland is the best Sea Kayaking destination in the UK 2 comments
The following article is written by Heather and was previously published in Canoe Kayak UK magazine… —————————————————————————– Reasons Why… …Shetland is the best Sea Kayaking destination in the UK There! I’ve said it. I’ll even repeat it: Shetland is the best Sea Kayaking destination in the UK. Now, before you spit in horror and say [...]
Out Skerries 1 comment
The most easterly point of Shetland is a group of rocky islands known as the ‘Out Skerries’ – ‘Out’ being derived from ‘East’. The crossing from the island of Whalsay is only a few miles, but traverses one of the UK’s cetacean hotspots; paddling through the swelly tide race on the way out, we saw several [...]
Muckle Flugga Leave a comment
Right at the very top of the Shetland Isles is the island of Unst, the most far northerly bit of the UK. Just north of that is the lighthouse of Muckle Flugga and just north of that is Out Stack, a rather unimpressive rock. Nothing else to be found, north of there. That’s it.
Cliffs Leave a comment
I have cynically used the word ‘cliffs’ in the title here, as this Google search engine keyword brings more people here than any other, by some distance. So, if you came here looking for your GCSE Geography homework, bad luck, you’ve been conned - but you can at least copy and paste the two pictures into your [...]
Foula – The Edge of the World 3 comments
The westernmost point of the Shetland Isles is the Isle of Foula, about 20 miles offshore. You can see the jagged outline on the horizon in the above photo, and indeed you can see this tall island from spots all over Shetland. We had to go there. Our first attempt (in dense fog and heavy [...]
Fair Isle Leave a comment
The picture above is borrowed from a splendid blog about life on Fair Isle. I’ve just been enjoying some photos on the blog of this remote island in winter. But, given that one of my pet hates is blogs simply reporting what other blogs say (or websites about other websites, etc) I’d better offer something original… [...]
Canoe Kayak UK Leave a comment
My photo article on the Shetland Isles (above is an uncorrected rough draft) is still available in Canoe Kayak UK magazine; on the newsagents’ shelves for another two weeks or so. I’ve also just seen a preview of next month’s issue – they’ve used one of my photos as the cover, splendid! Please rush out and [...]
Life is Good Leave a comment
…but that doesn’t stop me dreaming of other places.
Oops 2 comments
This is by far and away the most expensive photo I’ve ever taken. Whilst I was photographing my friend Steve on the River Dart yesterday, my waterproof camera bag (which was unsealed) rolled off a rock and into the river. Inside was my lovely Nikon 80-200 f2.8 lens (if you don’t understand the nerdy nomenclature, [...]
Shetland Images 1 comment
The December issue of Canoe Kayak UK magazine has a photo-feature about our fantastic trip to Shetland, last summer. Hope it’s of interest. There are also some pics of our trip here…
“NOT routine traffic…” Leave a comment
The two paddlers obscured by waves in the photo above are both on the crew of the local lifeboat. They joined a group of us yesterday for a lively and lumpy paddle along the cliffs and tide races from Kimmeridge to Swanage. Apart from an unscheduled swim in the surf on Kimmeridge reefs just after [...]
South West Canoe Show – Talks Leave a comment
Coming to the SW Canoe Show in Exeter this weekend? Heather and I will be doing a couple of talks on the Saturday… in the bar of the Canoe Club, just along the road from AS Watersports on Haven Bank Quay. 1 pm Mark Rainsley – Thuli Bheri Adventures (Expedition WW paddling in Nepal) 2 pm [...]
So anyway… 1 comment
…there we were, having a chocolate break, chatting about how amazing it was to see hundreds of porpoises continually surfacing around us…when 9000 kilos of Minke Whale surfaced, full length, directly in front of us. Which was nice. Actually the fellow in the picture above was not the same whale; this is another fellow whom [...]
