Escaping the lure of Lewis / Harris

It had to happen sometime. As lovely as this place is, we ought to move on. Our original thoughts were to head for Orkney (for the non UK folks, these are another set of islands, off the north east coast of Scotland). Orkney is stuck out from the north easterly tip of the mainland  - the area outlined in red below:

We are sitting in Stornoway, also shown on the map, stuck out into the Atlantic.

Big decision time - where to go next? The folks that we talked to all said that the Outer Hebrides were probably more beautiful / interesting than Orkney and so we were tempted to explore more of these islands. The deal was sealed when a retired ship's captain, Morris, chatted to us and offered to show us all the best local anchorages. He kindly popped over and we had fun marking the charts and Maxsea software with all the spots that the pilot books miss out. There will be plenty to keep us amused / the anchor busy.

A last wander around the harbour come riverside come Lews castle grounds was most enjoyable, some great views and contrasting scenery to enjoy. The rock formations at low water are impressive:

We also loved the "Cobblers bench". You can see that they are a little more substantial than the average commemorative seat, being hewn from solid timber. This one was sponsored by a local shoe shop and the right hand side is a huge mock up of a cobbler's last:

They build things to "last" here....

The folks in the Stornoway Harbour office and the guys out on the pontoons have been very friendly and helpful. Check this out - we asked in the office if they had waste oil disposal facilities here. The man who had helped us berth when we arrived said yes and that as the tank was not on the harbour area, he would collect the drum from us! We said that we were happy to take it as we needed the drum back ready to take the waste from the next oil change (main engine oil is a "one 20 litre drum out, one in" activity). He said that was fine and they would take the drum, empty it and drop it back to us as well. He even arranged a time to do it..... They duly arrived and did so, this was sitting on the pontoon for us 30 minutes later:

We remain amazed and happy at how good the harbour staff have been here - how about that for service at less than a third of your mooring rates Mr MDL?


Maintenance news:

On a wet day (yes, we've had one now, most upsetting) the captain got keen and adjusted the wing engine valve clearances (2 of the 8 needed a little tweak) and gave the air filter a clean. The main engine gearbox was treated to an oil and filter change and the genset got a new air filter. All most industrious really. These were coming up as "due" - part of the routine maintenance work.

We've mentioned the gearbox oil filter before - a big ZF thing that handles seriously high pressures and so has to be the original equipment ZF part, not a cheapo Chinese pattern job. There were some pictures on here a while ago when the genset valve clearances were checked so we will not repeat the images of a topless engine - just a reminder to anyone with the Northern lights / Lugger unit to also clean out the little folded gauze filter that sits in the rocker cover under a metal flap and that traps oil etc heading for the breather / air intake. Easy to forget but equally easy to do with some brake cleaner - you also get to enjoy the smell of the stuff!