Friday 24/06/05

Another cloudy day, with some drizzle. Forgot to mention last Friday about the two very pretty Swiss girls who were touring Scotland prior to launching their professional careers. The salmon are running in the island's rivers at the moment, subject to heavy rain. We've had some rain in recent days, but no huge amounts. An American lady arrives in the evening with her teenage daughters (15 and 19) in tow. She is over to visit relatives in Laxdale / Lacasdail. Heard a story of a relative of mrs B's who went across to St Kilda one day. He had a companion with him who started to panic when the weather turned nasty. Six hours into the trip, there wasn't a sign of the islands, and the companion was wailing: "We've missed St Kilda, we're lost". "Ach, shut your mouth and tend to the boat", was the snappy reply, and the relative went down to plot a course for Barra Head. As he was working on that, a shout came from above deck. "We're there! If we hadn't seen it, we would have knocked St Kilda clean in half!" The storyteller has to go shortly afterwards, because his sheep are out of their field, and straying down the road in Lower Sandwick.