Wednesday 21/06/06 - p.m.

After lunchtime, the showers that showed on the Atlantic radar move across the island. The heavy weather is wreaking havoc around Barra. A number of yachts engaged in a race get into difficulty and call on the Coastguard for assistance. One yacht lost its sail and had to be towed into Castlebay by the lifeboat. Another yacht ran aground at Vatersay, just to the south. And people who were ringing birds on Dun, south of St Kilda, had to be airlifted to mainland St Kilda. Their tents were blown away in the gales and had been without much food or water for two days. It was impossible for the lifeboat to approach Dun. What??? The lifeboat CAN'T go somewhere??? Wow!!! The cancellation of the Small Isles ferry out of Mallaig means that the reburial of John Lorne Campbell on Canna has had to be postponed. JLC was the proprietor of Canna between 1938 and 1996. He was buried in Italy, but to prevent his remains being interred in a communal grave, the National Trust for Scotland had arranged this re-internment on Canna. His wife, Margaret Fay-Shaw, who died in 2004, is buried in South Uist. Back in 1924, she went on a cycling holiday there. Weather continuing very changeable. Mrs B's cooker is fixed, but the wall behind it is unsuitable for public viewing. It's the solstice, but nobody here will be able to see anything of the sun.