Skomer and the Puffins (and a few other birds too of course)

Well, Skomer didn't disappoint us. The usual hoard of puffins and other birds were about and busy collecting food for their young, circling the south haven anchorage, paddling about on the water, making lots of noise and generally pooing all over the boat. Worth it though.....

In case you thought we were a little close to the rocks in the last post, here is the view astern of us:

The island that you can see is Skokholm by the way. Hope you feel educated and amused by that little gem of knowledge?

The south haven is a lovely spot - we were a little upset that we had to share it on the first night with a  couple of yachts that arrived after us:

Night 2 was all alone though. Much nicer.

OK, enough of the boat picture stuff we hear you cry, where are the puffins? This year there seemed even more than usual in residence, not to mention the Manx Shearwaters (they say that half the world's population of those come to breed on Skomer!) razorbills etc etc. Sorry everyone, but the puffins are just cuter and more fun to watch. One was showing off to his mates:

They didn't seem impressed at all.

In case you think that this puffin thing is overdone, here is just a small area of the haven to give you an idea of the numbers involved:

Yes, that was not photoshopped. Of course, they are pretty timid and so even just drifting around in the RIB trying to photograph them, they soon get nervous and paddle, fly or swim away as you can see:

We spent many happy hours enjoying their antics. Whilst out taking these rather too distant bird photographs, a yacht came in to anchor:

The folks on board hailed us and we learned that they were from Neyland Marina, that they had been for a tour around Sweet Hope the Nordhavn 64 that was at the Southampton boat show, that they had met Neil the Nordhavn Europe Director and had mentioned that they had seen a baby Nordhavn in Neyland before. Through Neil they heard about this rambling blog and had read it and also seen us approaching Skomer on AIS. Wow. In fact, Matthew, the son,  even commented on the Dartmouth battery price fun. Feeling vaguely famous we chatted for a while before they had to return to Neyland. You will meet them again so, remember Cheryl, Ian and Matthew from C-spirit. A test will of course follow.

Skomer is just a perfect spot. Apart from the friendly locals, birdlife and sun, the area is so beautiful too, plenty of rock formations and patterns to admire:





One of those "hard to leave" spots (unless the wind turns southerly of course when you are very exposed). Mind you, the odd bit of rock is a little discoloured thanks to the birdlife:

Didn't get close enough to check out the smell though. Not all the rocks have been whitened that way and the birds saved some of their waste products for our foredeck, boat deck, RIB, bimini cover etc etc. So kind of them.