I took the 20-minute crossing from the Kintyre peninsula to Gigha first thing this morning and entered a different world. Gigha is one of the most chilled places I've visited. 'Bijou' springs to mind. For about 20 years now the entire island has been owned outright by it's residents (around 150 people), who bought it from the last in a long line of landlords.
It's clear the community loves where it lives and has done a good job of welcoming and catering for the (comparatively few) visitors that make it over. I'd urge respectful visitors to come while they can: it can't possibly last.
Things to remember:
- Managed to dodge the day-long showers and toured the whole island by bike in just under an hour!
- As well as the almost omnipresent rain / mizzle / damp since, it's been unfeasibly cold and windy all day.
- Got wrapped up and walked for a couple of hours taking in a few well-information-boarded sites such as cairns, standing stones and The Fisherman's Cave (pic).
- Excellent wildlife here. Amongst the more expected birds have been common terns and redpoll. Common sandpiper and ringed plover continue to feature well.
- Fantastic otter sighting. I watched one roll about with a catch before hauling a sizeable fish ashore and eating it. I had a full 15 minutes' worth of viewing.
- Superb dolphin display, too (Bottlenose, I think). At about 8.00pm the seas calmed a bit and I saw about a dozen in a group hunting together quite slowly. On a few occasions I saw tail slaps and a few full breaches where the animals rose absolutely vertically fully out of the water, turned in mid-air, and then plummeted - again absolutely vertically - nose first back into the water. Goodness knows why, but a real privilege to see.
- My intended overnighting spot is (so far) one of those too-good-to-be-true places...
Post composed at 21:45 on Monday 23rd June from my intended overnighting spot N 55.72794°, W 05.71951° / http://maps.google.com/maps?q=loc:55.72794%2C-05.71951