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Approaching Stac Lee, every ledge appears to have a thick layer of snow and the sky above seems to be full of swirling snow flakes.
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As you get closer, you are confronted by one of the natural wonders of the World. The island is completely covered in noisy gannets. A fifth of the World's northern gannets breed on these isolated blades of rock.
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Gannets are large birds with forward facing eyes. They dive from about 50m above the water and can plunge deep under the surface with folded wings in search of fish.
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From the side, Stac Lee can be seen to be a thin blade of rock, 172m high. It is remarkable that a party of St Kildans survived here for 9 months (through a winter). They were marooned because a small pox outbreak on Hirta prevented their fellow islanders from picking them up after a bird hunting expedition. Soay is on the horizon.
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Looking from the far side of Stac Lee, back towards Dun and Hirta.
03/06/2009