Tuesday 24/08/04

Have breakfast at 8 am, then take my time in preparing for my relocation to Stornoway. The bus takes me there in an hour, arriving in SY at lunchtime. The TIC have great difficulty, once more, in getting me a B&B, but in the end I'm sent back to the same place I was in last week. Having dumped my stuff there, I return to the town centre to jump on the 1 pm bus to Ness. Fifty minutes later, the driver lets me off at a crossroads in the village of Eoropaidh / Eoropie, the northernmost township in Lewis. It's a cool, blustery day. When marching up the road to the lighthouse, I look back over the area. A watertower to my left, and a long stretch of demure dwellings stretching over the horizon. Peatstacks adorn 2 out of every 3 hourses here. And it's so bleak, not a tree in sight. About half a mile up the road, a cove opens up unexpectedly to my right. The map tells me it's called Port Stoth. A steep track plunges down and you have to be careful lower down. Algae grow on the concrete slipway, making it very slippery indeed. A family is admiring the scenery and I take a picture of and for them. I presently return to the road at the top. A barn stands on the northern cliff. The road veers northwest towards the lighthouse. The rock formatioins that protrude out of the grass, and the stacks rising 120 feet out of the sea are the oldest rocks on the surface of the earth. Lewisian gneiss is 3,000 million years old. I have something to eat out of the reach of the wind. Then I proceed round the coast, which rises abruptly out of the sea. A cross at the cliff edge marks the spot where someone fell to his death in 1954. I veer inland, climb over some stiles and proceed over a landscape of lazybeds until I come out just west of Eoropie village. After a break on a hillock amidst frisky lambs, I climb over the gate and walk through Eoropie to the crossroads. The 3.30 bus comes quickly. I join it as it makes its way to Lionel School to pick up primary and lower secondary pupils. They are subsequently deposited in various villages along the road to Barvas. Return to Stornoway before 5. Have supper at the Crown Hotel.