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Well thats a little intimidating....and exciting....to be the first to post a blog on the Kerrera page. I only discovered this site last night....sitting up at midnight wondering if the roof was going to blow off, or a sheep was going to fly through the window....anyway neither happened....but then i'm told tonight will be worse....well we are about to sit down and watch The Maggie.....just arrived today in the post from those lovely people at Amazon.....so this is it.....a somewhat non eventful start to Kerrera's blogging life....but all the best things improve with age.....well maybe not all! See you sooon, best wishes from the Curious Crab

Before I came to live here I had a fair degree of experience with the Water of Life, especially that which springs forth in bottles from Islay and Speyside ...but I was less experienced in the Life of Water. I knew it would be wet, but I never guessed it could be this wholeheartedly soaking on such a relentless basis....everyday new springs, burns, waterfalls appear all around us, and the water table now seems to be cheerfully residing about an inch and a half above general ground level. This isn't really a grumble as such, what would be the point in that!....more of an observation. I'm actually amazed on a daily basis that the sky can hold this much water, and can't even begin to understand how it all gets up there in the first place. Maybe someone can educate me on that one. I just cannot accept that evaporation and condensation can provide the answer....surely the clouds are cheating and have started employing enormous new hi-tech suction pumps somewhere over the Atlantic when they are sure no one is looking, drawing up millions of gallons of previously innocent seawater ready to unceremoniously offload it when they reach us here on the wild west coast.

One thing I have gained from this weather is a new found respect for sheep. I have until now always harboured a belief that sheep were pretty stupid, and of little general interest.However I have come to the conclusion recently that any animal that can live day in day out through this daily deluge and never-ending wind, without any form of additional food or shelter, let alone Gortex waterproofs or hot water bottles deserves my grudging admiration. They are far tougher than any old boots I have come across.

Kerrera news, as you may know, the island's ferry.....the Gylen Lady....the very boat pictured in the thumbnail for Island blogging was the most significant Kerrera casualty of last week's storm. A great rusting lump of an old diving pontoon that was moored out in the sound broke free of its seemingly insufficient moorings and came flying over the island slipway crashing into the ferry and in turn breaking its moorings. "The Lady" then made her way rapidly along the sound before being carried by the waves and high tide way up onto the grass above the beach near Ardentrive at the North end, where she is now sitting comfortably, some distance from the water...and we all miss her. It seems that her hull is not badly damaged, but new engines have had to be ordered. Duncan the ferryman is hoping to refloat her.....somehow....on Friday. How and with what... will be revealed in the next exciting episode.....

The Lady that was beached is back on the water where she belongs!

Last Friday showed me what 8 men can accomplish with just a few lumps of wood, odd lengths of rope, plenty of determintaion, ingenuity.....and a Manitou fork lift!



When we arrived at the beach at Ardentrive with a our lumps of wood, some rope, and a two ton trolley jack, I must admit I had severe doubts that we would be making any impact on the Lady as she lay perched on the grass, at least 30 feet from the high water mark. I'd been told that we were getting assistance from a tractor and a forklift, but my mental image of a forklift is one of those little orange buggies used in factories and supermarkets to shift crates of baked beans, and I couldn't see how one of those was going to make it onto the beach in the first place, let alone have any effect on many tons of well beached ferry. It seemed to me that the Lady's brief holiday was set to last a little longer....but I was wrong!

Sorry for having leaving you high and dry on the Ferry recue saga....but I didn't have time to finish the story....

We started to try and raise the boat with the trolley jack...enough to get the assorted pieces of wood and telegraph pole underneath, but she would not budge an inch....and without the arrival of the tractor and forklift, things looked a bit hopeless, even with a full Rugby pack of Kerrera's finest....however soon we heard a distant roar, and it sounded like help was at hand, and after a slight delay to clear a fallen tree from the track ....The Manitou and Massy Ferguson cavalry appeared on the horizon. Pretty quickly my doubts about the forklift were resolved because it was very clear this was not your ordinary baked bean stacker....and in a very short time we had the wood in place and the ropes on ready for the first pull.



At first there was nothing, and then a rope snapped....some worried faces, but after some rapid re-roping and repositioning of the cavalry the tug of war resumed....and the Lady moved...inches at first and then feet...only to get stuck again on the next patch of turf.....

Well being concise has never been my strong point!

Back on the beach, nothing it seems could stand in the way of Duncan's masterplan, and he would not take "no" for an answer from the reluctant wandering Lady....

And after some sideways nudging from the Manitou, replacing of the rollers, some rapid redeploying of available horse power : The Manitou was sent to the back to push rather than pull, the Lady finally saw sense and headed fairly smoothly and almost gracefully right back into the water where she belongs...




All that was left was to head up to Ardentrive for some very gratefully received drinks and sandwiches, and to wait for the incoming tide to do the rest. An hour or so later we came back out in time to see the Lady being towed off into the sound, and new moorings ready to be fitted with her new engines, and hopefully back to her day job very soon!

It was by this time a beautiful sunny morning, so different from the storm that had the put the Lady on the beach in the first place and I have a feeling that all those present enjoyed the challenge. The way everyone worked together, from the North and South of the island to get the boat back in the water was a tribute to the community spirit that it most definitely alive and well on this amazing little island,
and reminded me how lucky I am to live here....