This Birding Life (18 page)

I first visited the Outer Hebrides in the mid-1980s, on a cycling holiday with my best mate Rob. We took the low road along the western side of the islands, as opposed to the more hilly eastern side – our excuse being that in those days we didn't have mountain bikes, and so had to stick to the tarmac.

My abiding memory of the trip is of the grating sound which assaulted our ears every morning, noon and night – a repetitive noise which has been compared to the sound of a steel comb being drawn across a piece of wood. It came from a small bird, about the size and shape of a Moorhen, whose scientific name,
Crex crex
, derives from its bizarre call. Known by the poet John Clare as the Landrail, these days its common name is the Corncrake.

Corncrakes are the Scarlet Pimpernel of the bird world. You seek them here, you seek them there, you seek those damned Corncrakes everywhere. But you never actually see them. I remember standing and staring at patches of vegetation for hours on end, willing the noisy bird to appear, even for a brief moment – just so I could say I had seen it.

It never did. I had to wait another six years before I finally saw a Corncrake, at the RSPB reserve at Balranald on North Uist. Even then it was hardly what you would call a classic view. Just a small, rat-like creature scurrying along the edge of a field, then disappearing from sight.

So when I returned to North Uist with a film crew earlier this year I was not all that confident. Sure, I had been told that a particularly obliging bird was performing to all and sundry – virtually dancing a jig on top of some rocks, according to one observer. It had even been filmed by one of my colleagues, who gleefully rang me up to tell me of his triumph.

Of course, when we turned up the bird had a sudden attack of stage fright, and although it continued to deliver its incessant craking call, it would not show itself, on camera or otherwise. Things were not helped by the strengthening breeze, or the fact that the vegetation in the field was even longer than usual thanks to a warm, sunny spring.

After a while, when you listen to a Corncrake you go into a kind of Zen-like trance. Every now and then there was a little movement – the bird or just a gust of wind blowing the grass? As I stood and waited, I recalled Clare's wonderful description of the bird as ‘a sort of living doubt'. Was I the victim of an overactive imagination? Did the bird exist at all? Should we just give up and go home?

And then it appeared. First a beak, then the whole head, a quick look left and right, and a scurry – and it had gone. We held our breath, waiting for the bird to show itself again, but in vain. We turned to John, our cameraman, and I raised my eyebrow in beseeching enquiry. He nodded and smiled. Not exactly a classic portrait, but as we later agreed, ‘a birder's view' – one that would be instantly familiar to anyone who has ever looked for this frustrating and elusive bird.

We set sail from the Scottish port of Oban in bright, warm sunshine. The sea was not quite as smooth as a millpond, but certainly calm enough to suggest an easy voyage to come. Our destination was the island group of St Kilda – the remotest, wildest, and most inaccessible place in Britain.

Some 50 miles or so to the north-west of the Outer Hebrides, St Kilda is best-known for being home to what naturalist Sir Julian Huxley called ‘the bird people'. They lived there for centuries, harvesting the seabirds, until they were finally evacuated in 1930. Since then, apart from visiting scientists and contractors, the islands have remained uninhabited.

On our voyage, although the sunny weather lasted, the calm, flat seas did not. Next day, our yacht
Silurian
hit the Minch, and the Minch hit back. Winds forecast at force four to five turned out to be force five to six, gusting force seven. The seas rose and fell, and the boat pitched and rolled with them – already our goal of filming on St Kilda was looking doubtful. Things became even worse when, mid-morning, presenter Bill Oddie emerged from his cabin, muttered a few well-chosen oaths against the sea, his producer and life itself, and returned groaning to his bed.

Meanwhile I was beginning to feel a little green myself, so to counter the boat's roller-coaster motion I stared firmly at the horizon. Five minutes later, what looked like a giant sardine shot out of the water, hung briefly in mid-air, and crashed back beneath the waves. ‘Whale!' was the only possible response. And indeed it was: a young Minke Whale, breaching into the air in what looked like pure enjoyment.

Both boat and camera crews mobilised immediately: the former recording details of the sighting for the Hebridean Whale and Dolphin
Trust; the latter capturing the moment on video. Three more jumps, and the whale disappeared beneath the waves for the last time. It was a great cure for seasickness.

But a couple of hours later, things really took a turn for the worse. I awoke from a nap to discover that, because of rough weather, we had diverted eastwards to the Isle of Skye. As Bill so succinctly put it: ‘Twenty-four hours sailing and we're still on the flippin' mainland!'

More to the point, we were still at least a day's sailing from our destination. After a good night's sleep, we held a summit meeting to discuss the contingency plan, which involved cutting short our trip and pottering around the Inner Hebrides instead. At this point, our skipper Alan intervened. In a calm, measured Irish brogue he pointed out that the weather forecast was improving, the seas were calming down, and we had a real chance to fulfil our quest. Like Cortez's men, we stared at each other with a wild surmise, and made the decision: we would give it a go.

The journey across to North Uist was uneventful, the Sound of Harris calm, and the weather perfect. After dinner, we retired to our cabins, leaving the crew to sail through the night in shifts. I awoke at 5 a.m., struggled out on deck and found myself enveloped in dense mist. According to the ship's instruments we were only a mile or two from our destination, but all I could see was the bow of the boat. I was reminded of the pioneering explorer Martin Martin, who in 1697 sailed right past St Kilda before realising his mistake, and turning round just in time.

Then, as I stared into the fog, it appeared. A vast, grey cliff face, and thousands of swirling seabirds, looming out of the mist above me. After 60 hours sailing, we had finally arrived at the fabled islands of St Kilda. The journey was over, and the real adventure was about to begin.

It had always been my ambition to visit St Kilda – surely the most inaccessible and wildest place in Britain. So when, after two and a half days sailing, we finally arrived, I was prepared for disappointment – surely the reality could not live up to my imagination. But I was wrong. St Kilda really is the most incredible place I have ever been.

As our yacht dropped anchor in Village Bay, the fog cleared, and Kilda revealed itself at last – vast cliffs and rocky stacks looming over our tiny boat. And there, high on the hillside overlooking the bay, I saw the legacy of its former inhabitants.

For hundreds, possibly thousands of years until their final evacuation in 1930, the islanders lived almost entirely on seabirds: Gannets, Fulmars and Puffins. Having captured them by scaling the cliffs and clambering up steep stacks, they dried them in stone cairns known as ‘cleits'. Today, these massive structures are one of the most striking features of the St Kilda landscape – a Scottish version of the famous Easter Island statues.

Our first day on the island turned unexpectedly fine and sunny. We lost no time in filming the scenery and its wildlife: even getting attacked by a pair of Arctic Skuas, which also harassed one of the island's three specialities, the Soay sheep. Lower down, the cleits and dry stone walls are host to St Kilda's two other unique creatures: the island races of the wren and field mouse. Both are larger than their mainland cousins, and the wren is noticeably darker and greyer. The wrens live up to their scientific name of ‘troglodytes', nesting in cracks and crevices. The field mice prefer the houses, emerging at dusk each evening to search the path for morsels of food.

Later on, as I walked along ‘Main Street' at dusk, I felt as though I was walking back in time. It may be over 70 years since the people of
St Kilda finally abandoned the island, but at times like this it can almost feel as if they have left their ghosts behind.

I tried to imagine what it must have been like to have lived, as generations of islanders did, on the very edge of the world. What did they think when cruise ships full of sightseeing Victorians came sailing into their little harbour? Did they resent being the objects of tourist curiosity, much as a remote tribe in the Amazon rainforest might do today? And how did they feel as they boarded the evacuation boat in August 1930, and left their home behind for the very last time?

Next morning, we set sail for home. As we left, I stared at the retreating landmass until it finally vanished into the mist. I felt mixed emotions: a sense of awe, privilege and wonder, as well as sadness that I may never see St Kilda again. But even if I never go back, I will always have the memories of visiting one of the most incredible places, not just in Britain, but in the world.