Tag: Foula

Foula 3

Some facts about Foula

map of FoulaMy final day. I was up quite early and had a strip wash and washed my hair in the toilet block. It’s very basic and there was only a cold tap, but at least there was no-one around so I was able to take advantage. Then I made a flask of coffee and packed up. I walked back to the pier in thick mist and arrived just after 9am. I had plenty of time before the ferry left at 9.30am, but had just missed seeing the ferry being lowered to the water. I could hear the whirring of the lift through the mist as I walked along the road, but of course could see nothing.

Once on the boat I went into the cabin and stayed there for the whole journey, reading and drinking coffee. It was much colder and windier than on the way out and I was the only passenger. Once we cleared the harbour it was really choppy. The boat was getting tossed all over the place. Brian came into the cabin and offered me a sick bag, but I said I didn’t think I’d need it. He was a bit sceptical, but seemed impressed when we arrived and I hadn’t needed it. I’m so glad I don’t get seasick as I can imagine how horrible that must be on a journey like this one.

pony sheep

Reflecting on my few days in Foula, I feel quite satisfied even though I didn’t see or do any of the things I wanted to. For starters, I now have a good reason to go back. But also, I feel like I saw the real Foula. It spends so much time shrouded in mist it wouldn’t have been the ‘real’ experience if I’d had great weather. Also it was so eerie and mystical with the mist, and also so peaceful and calming, that I felt really relaxed and content. People pay a fortune for spas and health breaks to get that kind of feeling, when all they need do is spend a few days living in a tiny tent with a load of sheep in a bog on a remote foggy island.  

fire station
Fire station in the mist at the airport

Here are a few Foula facts:

  • Population – 30
  • Location – 20 miles west of Shetland Mainland
  • Length – 3.5 miles
  • Width – 2.5 miles (at its widest)
  • Area – 4.8 sqare miles
  • Highest point – The Sneug 418m
  • Shops – 0
  • Pubs – 0
  • Campsites – 0
  • Public transport – 0
  • Ferries – 1 every couple of days
  • Flights – depends on fog
  • Nurses – 1
  • Teachers – 1
  • Lighthouse keepers – 1
  • Sheep – lots

Foula 2

Wandering through the mist on Foula and chatting with the locals.

I woke up, after my first night on Foula, a short while before before the first plane was due. I was wondering if I’d have to move my tent, but was surprised by how quiet it was. I know it’s a tiny airport, but surely there should be some noise? A quick look outside my tent soon confirmed that the mist was back down as heavy and thick as it had been yesterday. No flights then.

Gaada Stack
I stayed in my tent, reading, writing my diary and enjoying some thinking time until the afternoon. Then as the mist started to lift a bit I went for a walk to the north end of the island. I stuck to the road, but as I got towards the north the mist cleared enough that I could see the outline of the tops of the hills (hills I should’ve been walking in) and I did get to see Gaada Stack which is a spectacular looking arch standing on its own in the sea. It looked particularly good with the mist behind it.
The primary school
Peat drying
On the way down I’d passed the primary school so I had a peer in through the windows. It was a modern building and looked like it had great facilities. There was a big kitchen too, which I couldn’t see the point of. Later I was told that the school also contains the community hall and the kitchen is for community events. There are seven children in the school.
Keeping the ferry safe from storms

I walked back down to the pier and saw more seals and took pictures of the boat hanging up. It has to be winched up when not in use to protect it from storms. I passed a couple of the crew members tending their crofts and had a chat with them. As I walked back towards the airport a 3rd crew member pulled up beside me in his car. We had a chat and he checked that I was going out on the ferry next morning. He offered me a lift, which I accepted as I thought it would be nice to chat. He was going to the lighthouse at the south end of the island as one of his jobs is that of lighthouse keeper. The lighthouse is automated and so he just goes once or twice a week to check it. He’s about 70 and should be retired, but said that people on the island just tend to keep on working. The oldest islander is a lady of 92. He told me that when people get too old to really manage on their own the other islanders all muck in and help.

We did some off-roading to get to the lighthouse and briefly got stuck. He was only going to pick up a toolbox that the maintenance men had left there. They come once a year and are going to Fair Isle next. They’re probably the same ones I saw on Fair Isle last year. I was able to go into the lighthouse with him, though there was nothing exciting to see. Going in sets off an alarm in Edinburgh so he had to phone to say it was him. Otherwise they’d be phoning his house to tell him to go and check it out.

Things Brian told me before dropping me back at my tent are:

  • He’s lived in Foula for 35 years, which is half his life.
  • He was captain of the ferry but has now given that up and is an ordinary crew member. He still gets captain’s pay but with none of the responsibility.
  • The current captain (Kevin?) worked with him for 24 years before getting the captaincy.
  • Kevin (?) and some other islanders are the great grandchildren of the former laird Ian B. Stoughton Holbourn, whose book I’m reading at the moment. How horrified he would have been to find his descendands being ordinary crofters and ferrymen.
  • The current primary teacher is leaving after 5 years in the job.
  • The new teacher is a woman in her 50s and has a grown up family. She was previously working in Dubai.
  • Brian is a school governor.
  • The nurse is also giving up her job. Although it comes with a salary of £45k and she rarely has to do anything, she’s finding it boring as she was used to working in a busy A&E ward before. She and her husband are staying on Foula and have a croft.
  • People on Foula are pretty healthy and don’t tend to get ill. Instead they have rather dramatic accidents like rolling their vehicles over up on the tops.
  • Brian has rolled his 4WD twice. The passenger door had a big gap at the top where it had been bent. It had been his wife’s car, but she’s made him swap and give her his, after he damaged hers.
  • Rent for the croft (and I think for the house) is £8 a year. The landlords tried to put it up recently, but didn’t succeed.
  • You can buy your croft and house for ten times the annual rent, but if you buy you’re not eligible for grants. So people tend to get all the grants, do their place up and then buy it.
  • Brian hasn’t bought his yet, but is now thinking about it as his son has decided to stay on Foula.

He probably told me more, but that’s all I remember.

Once back at my tent I cooked and then spent the rest of the evening reading. Later in the evening a man drew up in his van outside my tent and asked if I wanted any fresh fish. I politely declined. The mist had really drawn in again by this time.

wild camp

During my walk I took photos of some of the many abandoned cars. As there’s no way of scrapping them, when they finally die they are just left to rot. Some of them are used for storage and are filled with bags of animal feed and tins of paint. Most people don’t bother with things like MOTs, road tax or insurance.

old crane abandoned car

Foula

A journey to an island shrouded in mist.

I seem to be getting to more and more remote British islands, but my ultimate goal is St Kilda. This is a small collection of islands (how many does it need to be to count as an archipelago?) way off the west coast of Scotland. It was abandoned by its remaining inhabitants back in the 1930s as they could no longer sustain their way of life there. It’s now owned by the National Trust for Scotland and is extremely tricky and expensive to get to.

The nearest I’ve managed to get so far is Foula, another remote island off the west coast of Scotland. This has come close to being abandoned in the past, but currently has a population of about 30 and seems to be surviving quite well. Foula is the island used to represent St Kilda in old films about the last days on the island.

The journey to Foula is either by a small mailboat or a tiny plane. The island is known for its fog and so the plane is often cancelled. The boat can also be cancelled due to bad weather and so although I was only intending going to Foula for 2 nights, it could have turned out to be longer. The man in the shop in Walls, where I departed from, warned me about this and so I packed a few extra days’ food supplies.

I left my car and walked round to the ferry terminal in plenty of time for the 1.30pm departure. However, we didn’t leave until about an hour later as the captain had got stuck in fog on his way from Brae. The journey was expected to take about 2.5 hrs which was fairly accurate. There were a few other passengers on the boat as well as a crew of four. The other passengers consisted of a family of four who were on their way to visit the man’s sister who’d moved to Foula a year or two before. They’d been booked to fly, but the plane had been cancelled because of the fog.

Foula appearing in the mist

The journey was good, the sea was so calm, no waves at all, though there was quite a big swell. I stood out on deck the whole time hoping to see whales but wasn’t lucky. As we got nearer to Foula it started to rain a bit and the weather really closed in. When we first came in sight of Foula it was as a vague shadow in the mist and it was only when we were almost there that I was sure that it was land I was seeing and not just a trick of the light.

We docked and had to climb up a ladder on the side of the pier. Luggage, post and shopping deliveries were piled into a crate and lifted out with a crane. Whilst waiting I watched a couple of seals playing about in the harbour. Then I walked about a mile along the road to the airport where I’d decided to camp. The fog was so dense that although it wasn’t far and the airport is in plain sight of the road I still had to get my map and compass out and navigate my way to it. I couldn’t see it until I was actually there.

My tent is to the left. Abandoned cars to the right.

There was one fire station building and a tiny waiting room with a toilet and wash basin with cold water. A few abandoned cars were parked in the car park alongside the runway. I wandered around for a while over the boggy ground trying to find a slightly less boggy bit on which to pitch my tent. There only seemed to be one bit and that was quite close to the runway. I was no closer than the cars though, and it wouldn’t have been the worst thing in the world if I had to move my tent next morning before the first plane arrived.

Lots of curious sheep watched me pitching my tent. They were all over the runway – I don’t know what happens when a plane is due? – does someone have to chase them away? Once my tent was pitched I sat on stone seat and finished my flask of coffee. It was a mild evening and was lovely to be sitting there so alone in the mist, staring at the sheep who were staring right back at me. Apart from the odd ‘baa’ it was completely silent.  

After a while the mist seemed to be lifting a little so I walked to the far end of the road and back. It was really eerie walking along and seeing shapes looming in the mist. Not knowing if they were houses, sheep or abandoned cars until I was quite close. I could hear a few sounds of life, but saw no-one. On the way back to my tent the mist lifted even more and it started to rain. I gave up my walk as it was getting a bit late anyway, and hibernated in my tent for the rest of the evening.