yell tae rah moon

A breakfast all made for me, well eggs tomato and mushroom with toast and a cafetiere of coffee set me up fair braw, I was off for nine am I had a look at my OS Landranger map? if I done what was at the south end of yell I could then have totally completed, a MAP ! the Landranger scaled maps cover the whole of the uk- OS Landranger maps at 1:50 000 scale show all the main landscape features - roads, settlements, terrain and points of interest. This covers the whole of Great Britain in a 204-map set, which includes the British Mainland, Scottish Islands and Isle of Man, maps numbered 1 2 3&4 (they are numbered from the north) is the Shetland isles, if I manage to do the southern trig points on yell? then I would have completed map number 3 the biggest of these four maps!

The weather was a wee bit windy cold and lots of snow and ice, the first trig was easily found straight up a steep hill and straight back down, next on my agenda was something a wee bit different that I technically didn’t have to do, right down near the mainland ferry terminal is a trig point style called a curry stool, these are not marked on the OS maps they are extremely rare and not being a pillar type, I could technically get away with not doing it? I wanted to see it and set off, because these curry stools are flat concrete plinth’s you cannot see them on your horizon as you approach the area, I just headed for the high ground and had a rake around! There was snow on the ground. I found a wee bolt and thought is that it? A bit disappointing,

I had seen pictures of substantial concrete star like structures, I took a photo anyway but thought I had best have a look at the potentially slightly higher ground a distance to the left, sure enough there it was I cleared the snow and had a sit down on ma curry stool! (sounds a bit gnarf gnarf)

I was glad to have seen it and glad I could make a mark on that map to say I had been there, as an added bonus on the way back to the car I went along the shore there was a pebble causeway between the sea and a tiny lochan, I was walking on it and an otter ran across the frozen fresh water lochan over the pebble causeway in front of me and dived into the sea,

Next trig was a cliff top scenic walk with nice views of about as rugged a coastline as you can get, then it was time for the otterwick trig point this was the biggest bit of work of the day, the conditions were really bad for this attempt as the snow and ice covering the approach towards the hill ridge was like an alpine crevasse scene I had to weave round over up and down high ground and make sure of every footstep avoid snow drifts and trust nothing that didn’t have vegetation poking through the snow, I cant describe it any other way than SHIT one day I will look at my route on my GPS to see how much weaving I actually done it must look like mr messy out the mr men on my route profile that day! Its stressful and frustrating also stopping every couple of meters thinking right which way now? Eventually I got up onto the ridge and made my way to the trig point, then had the same shitty journey back on a different zig zag this time or was it a zag zig this time?

Next was the wee easy hitter behind Duncan T`s favourite shop, hill of queyon at south aywick a real easy hitter, when I got to this trig point I was grinning ear to ear fair chuffed with myself I spoke to the trig, yes I am now starting to speak to myself and inanimate objects its perfectly normal for loners to do this, I was on the island of yell and about to set the camera timer for the photo of me on the trig that I am now in a habit of doing, I decided I should give a yell not a peerie wee yell not a mid yell but a muckle shouting at the moon yell for my achievement! As the photo timer counted down and I jumped up on to the trig, I yelled at the top of my voice yah feckin dancer, nobody would have heard it though as the wind was about thirty mile an hour and I was on a hill top WoooooHooo, Dunc had text me asking how I had got on? I told him I was at otterwick he said visit Marys shop so I did, what an absolute gem of a community shop it has got everything Marys daughter made me a takeaway coffee, while I looked at the stuff there was even a decent book selection! I bought my favourite chocolate (Bournville old Jamaica) a take away coffee two bottles of beer and three postcards all very reasonably priced with some good banter with the shop staff, you don’t get that at Aldi!

What an absolutely quality day I had done four trig points and a curry stool, but much more importantly I had now wiped-out OS map number three, I had a count later on this was thirty trig points scattered over mostly the mainland but also papa stour and these yell ones

Back to the b&b for dinner rob had a beer out ready for me, the thing about B&Bs is the personal touch you become a part of their extended family for a few days, air B&B site is bad for places like this bad for communities also I read an article about a young couple from the western isles that couldn’t find a home to buy because rich southern people had bought all the property up and were doing air b&b holiday lets while the local folk couldn’t find homes? I don’t think that’s happening here as there seems to be loads of abandoned cottages that could easily be done up as good homes, After dinner I filled out my logs and blogs and folded up that map for the last time (on Shetland anyway) I will send it home and maybe frame it one day,