The gannets of Stac an Armin.

 The Cuma slowed as we approached the north end of Boreray. We were silenced by this view between Boreray and Stac an Armin. Stc Lee is partly hidden by the dark cliffs of Boreray, Hitra is in the distance with Stac Soay and Stac Biorach between it and Soay, then Stac an Armin.

Telephoto shot of Soay.

At 196m high, Stac an Armin is the highest sea stac in the British Isles. The St Kildans harvested seabird each summer. They built 80 cleits and a bothy on the rock. Three men and eight boys spent 9 months on Stac an Armin from  about 15 August 1727 until 13 May 1728 when they were rescued by a boat from the Outer Hebrides. Smallpox had broken out on Hirta after they had been dropped off and there were not enough adult survivors to man a boat to recover them.

Nearby Stac Lee is the second highest stac at  172m.

Stac an Armin from the NW. The last great auk in the British isles was killed here in July 1840. It was caught by three St Kildans and held captive for three days before they beat it to death because they thought it was a witch.

 The air was filled by a blizzard of croaking gannets. These islands are one of the biggest sea bird colonies in Europe.

They are incredibly graceful in flight...

...and have a wingspan of 2m.

The Cuma now swung round the south of Stac an Armin. The islanders leaped ashore from their boats at the white water below the highest point.

Track of the Cuma,

Crossing to St Kilda, the islands at the edge of the World.

The morning of Sunday 12th June dawned fair and after an extensive Cuma breakfast, we took some air upon the deck to allow our stomachs to settle. Ken explained to the others how he had managed to hold on to the toast rack with the very last slice of toast!

Murdani listened intently to the weather forecast. It was not looking good at the end of the week and the wind this evening was forecast to get up to 19-25mph from the NE but drop on Monday before getting up again from the SW on Tuesday. Murdani decided to go for it. He was confident that Village Bay would provide a sheltered anchorage in a NE wind. The anchor was weighed and look how carefully the chain is cleaned of mud.

Soon we were heading for the Atlantic from within the confines of a narrow sea loch without an open horizon.

 The island of Scarp, with its dazzling white sand beach, was our gateway to the open ocean.

 Gordon was delighted we were heading WSW to St Kilda. The crossing from Scarp to Hirta is 87km! The empty Atlantic horizon stretched in front of us without a hint of the islands at the edge of the World.

Behind us, the west coast of Lewis fell away as the Cuma's bow rose to the Atlantic swells.

We chatted excitedly on the long crossing. Donald Thomson led the first return trip to by sea kayak to St Kilda 20 years ago in 1991. He modestly answered our many questions about such a bold trip. It turns out that Donald has made return trips to all the Scottish islands apart from one!

At first we could hardly distinguish St Kilda from the clouds but gradually the dramatic cliffs took form as they rose above the horizon. We then realized that these were the highest sea cliffs in the British Isles, big enough to generate their own weather system! From the left we saw Dun, Hirta, Soay, Boreray and Stac an Armin. We were humbled that our ancestors made this crossing and colonised the islands 4,000 years ago!

Our final approach would take us round the north of Boreray and Stac an Armin.

St Kilda preview!

Looking back to Stac Lee, Stac an Armin and Boreray while en route to Hirta.

Tony and I had planned a week to St Kilda with Murty and Murdani on the MV Cuma at the beginning of June. We were both well pissed off when the University changed the dates of the exam season and we couldn't go. I was then completely gobsmacked when Gordon Brown phoned up and asked if I would like to go on a trip to St Kilda the following week, as he was filming some sequences for his second sea kayaking DVD with Simon Willis. It took me all of 0.3 secs to say yes. There was Gordon, Morag, Simon, Liz, Donald (who led the first return trip to St Kilda by kayak from the Outer Hebrides), Anne, Ken, Callum, Janice, Sue, Ian and myself. Murdani was joined by Gary and Louise on the Cuma.

The company on this trip was real fun and considerate. I was troubled by some bad knee pain on this trip but the thoughtful help with handling of the kayaks and with launching and recovery was really appreciated. When I last visited St Kilda, I didn't venture far from the village as my knee was recurrently dislocating. This time, my knee was totally stable after the operation and I went a walk with the others round the island. All went well until we started to come back downhill. That proved very painful and I fell a long way behind the others. However, Gordon stayed behind with me and we had a great chat. One thing is for sure, I would never have been able to attempt a trip like this without considerable help from other people. Thank you all! :o)

The thrift is still flowering on top of the cleits.

Village street, Hirta.

 Soay ram, Hirta.

 Bonxie attack Conachair, Hirta. Our near permanent smug mode was temporarily disengaged.

Glen Bay, An Campar and Soay from Mullach Mor, Hirta.

Dun from Ruabhal, Hirta.

West coast of Hirta.

Stac Biorach and Stac Soay in the Soay Hirta gap.

Lunch stop off SE coast of Soay.

Entering the arch through Stac Soay.

The 8km crossing to Boreray is assisted by a useful little transit called Stac Lee.

Rounding Stac Lee.

The Cuma and Stac an Armin.

 The great cave on the west of Boreray.

Looking back at Stac Lee Hirta and Soay from the north end of Boreray.

Rounding the north end of Boreray.

The east coast of Boreray.

Been there! How lucky we were!

Farewell to St Kilda

Cuma now made her way down the east coast of Boreray. As we entered the shade of her high cliffs, a chill descended on our mood. We knew we were shortly to return to Harris and leave the enchanted archipelago of St Kilda in the middle of the dreaming ocean.


In reality, the St Kildans lived brutally tough lives there was little romance about their survival or their eventual evacuation. The whole island history has been viewed through the rose tinted spectacles of Victorian tourists. Because the islanders were the remotest community in the British Isles and their economy was based on shared labour without money,they were seen as a utopian curiosity. As a result, their decline and fall was well documented but any seakayaker who has spent time exploring the Scottish coastline will have found dozens of other abandoned settlements. Their residents have no history, no names, no photographs and no rows of books on library shelves dedicated to their lives and times. The only testaments to their existence are a few piles of moss covered stones.

Both my wife and I, who are urban Scots, have ancestors who lived in the isles. My mother's family abandoned their croft on a Scottish island and came to Glasgow in the 1860's, before the stone cottages on St Kilda were built and 70 years before it was evacuated! The reason the St Kildan's survived so long, was the birds. The harvest of the sea fowl made the St Kildan's lives easier than those of many of their peers on the Hebrides and remote mainland coasts.


Cuma now turned her bow towards Harris and slowly...


... the jagged cliffs and peaks of the St Kildan archipelago...


... slipped away below the western horizon.

We could, of course, choose to return any summer and I am sure we will. For most of the St Kildans, who were evacuated on that day in 1930, it was to be different. Theirs' was a final farewell, as the peaks of their island home were swallowed by the empty flatness of the Atlantic Ocean.


Soon the only evidence, of this land at the edge of the World, were the gannets. They all flew in the same direction, back towards distant rocky ledges and their hungry chicks.

03/06/2008 pm

Stac an Armin

Cuma made her way north up the west coast of Boreray and we came to the giant Stac an Armin, at 196m, the tallest of all the British sea stacks.


Stac an Armin is the norther outlier of the St Kildan archipelago looked SW to distant Levenish, Stac Lee and Hirta.


The St Kildans built about 80 cleitean on Stac an Armin.


After rounding the north end of Stac an Armin Cuma made her way SE down the east coast.


The Cuma kept well clear of the rocky channel between Boreray and Stac an Armin. We got a good view of Stac Lee, Hirta and Soay through the gap.


Leaving Stac an Armin in our wake, we looked in awe at the great horns of rock on north cliffs of Boreray. Our visit to the archipelago was soon coming to an end.

03/06/2009 pm