2011 Project365 (day162)

Date: 11 June 2011 21:21:32

Today we went on an adventure for my birthday present this year, I've been looking forward to this for months. A boat trip to the mysterious island of Ailsa Craig in the Firth of Forth. Ailsa Craig is an unhabited island - previously it had people working in the granite quarry and until 1991 there was somebody living in the lighthouse, but since 1991 the lighthouse has been uninhabited and is powered entirely by solar power (which I think is hilarious, given the local saying - if you can't see Ailsa Craig it's raining, if you can see Ailsa Craig it's going to rain). It is now an RSPB nature reserve, and is home to Britain's 3rd largest gannet colony as well as other nesting seabirds. It's basically a giant granite plug of an extinct volcano, and is a really well known sight in this bit of the west of Scotland. I had been hoping we could land for a few minutes (the RSPB discourages this, but there's nothing technically to stop you landing), but both times we went past the very rickety, not-for-the-fainthearted jetty there were a couple of boats already attached, some people were kayaking round that part of the island. However we did do a complete circumnavigation around the island and so although I can't say I've seen the far side of the moon I can say I've seen the far side of Ailsa Craig :) The far side has really high, sheer basalt columns, which is where the bulk of the seabirds were (I think in this picture the birds are mainly gannets). We saw guillemots, manx shearwaters and gannets amongst others, and towards the end we also saw some seals coming to check us (and the kayakers) out. I'm sure you'll be surprised to hear I took millions of photos. My flickr set is here. On the way back we passed a ruined abbey, Crossraguel Abbey so we stopped to take a look. I took pictures here as well, but downloading the Ailsa Craig ones took so long I've not got the Abbey ones online yet. Anyway, it was worth a look, and nice to end the day out with some culture :)