Cape Farewell Scottish Islands Expedition 2011

Balranald

eyebright and kidney vetch but it’s ladies’s vetch that thickens milk by rye and bere and cousins of corn-buntings dulse dulls in dry warmth it will shine maroon in broth as residue of other seaweed tribes filters to ragworm and in turn to dunlin

By Ian Stephen
30 July 2011, 4:13pm
Tags: poetry

The Galley Dance for breakfast

Its breakfast time aboard Song of the Whale and a number of activities are underway in the galley: the coffee machine is being loaded at the far end while in the middle someone is standing with the kettle pouring cups of tea. I’m not a fan of the porridge, which sits on the galley table... Read more ›

By Libby Straughan
30 July 2011, 3:12pm
Tags: journey

Lochmaddy

local williewaws come quietly close spinning bangles of spray delicate until the punching pressure rocks us not like a baby

By Ian Stephen
29 July 2011, 10:17pm
Tags: poetry

Narrative as one member of a wee expedition

I’ve put some kit in my rucksack. There’s a camera and a phone charged up but I don’t feel much like sorting the spaghetti of leads in and out of video cameras and recording gear. There’s also no need to take the navigation box. Someone else is doing the driving this trip. i catch the... Read more ›

By Ian Stephen
29 July 2011, 1:36pm
Tags: journey, sea

Interview with Xiaolu Guo

Novelist and Filmmaker Xiaolu Guo in conversation with follow voyager and filmmaker Fiona Cunningham-Reid: ‘For me it’s important to have a first hand feeling instead of second hand archive research. I think for artists it’s very important to see.’ Video by Fiona Cunningham-Reid.

By Xiaolu Guo
29 July 2011, 10:27am
Tags: artist, history, stories

Tiger Moth

At Canna House I showed our group the Hebridean moth collection – mostly specimens from Canna and Barra – in cabinets in the entomology room. We took turns to crowd into the little space, jostling with butterfly nets, a moth trap held together with large coloured paper clips, rows of diaries for every year from... Read more ›

By Alison Turnbull
29 July 2011, 4:45am
Tags: artist, wildlife

Corncrakes

One of the simple pleasures of living in North Uist is to stand in my garden just after midnight and listen to the loud rasping ‘crex, crex’ song, recalling a grated comb, of around 10 corncrakes that inhabit the crofts surrounding the loch where my house is situated. After long-term declines dating back to the... Read more ›

By Graeme Robertson
29 July 2011, 1:00am
Tags: adaptation, context, local knowledge, sustainability, tradition, wildlife

Barra – Memory and Landscape (Back to the Future)

As we sail into Castelbay a familiar environment gradually reveals itself. This is the island of my mother (nee. MacNeil) before she moved to Glasgow in the early 60s. And of my Grandparents and many generations before them, possibly as far back as the 13h Century. This is the island of childhood Summer holidays. I... Read more ›

By Stephen Hurrel
28 July 2011, 1:43pm
Tags: community, history, local knowledge, renewables

Output 2

By Teresa Elwes
28 July 2011, 10:30am

Mingulay, Barra, Vatersay

Mingulay Walking with Skye artist Julie Brook up the high, spongy, wildflower-thick hills behind the bothy on Mingulay: sand drift filling ruined houses of the abandoned village by the bay. Mingulay was emptied of its inhabitants over 80 years ago, but never subject to the violence and grief of the Clearances. On a clear day... Read more ›

By Ruth Little
28 July 2011, 9:36am
Tags: journey, stories, tradition

Output 1

By Teresa Elwes
28 July 2011, 9:35am
Tags: context

Time Travel

Between the glacial valleys and plateaux of the Yorkshire Dales and the purplegrey expanses of the North Yorkshire Moors, the Vale of York spreads out like a quilt: a flat, agricultural landscape where, as a child in the 1970s and 80s, I learned how to be and be in the world. I remember barley fields... Read more ›

By David Harradine
28 July 2011, 9:34am
Tags: journey

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