Hard to sum up today in one photograph. This is St Kilda, a group of small islands and sea stacs 40 miles west of the Outer Hebrides in the North Atlantic.
James Fisher, a naturalist, wrote in 1947:
'Whatever he studies, the future observer of St Kilda will be haunted the rest of his life by the place, and tantalised by the impossibility of describing it, to those who have not seen it.'
We booked the boat trip ages ago, but it's dependent on the weather conditions for the journey and landing here. We were lucky today, we got a text message at 6am this morning to tell us we were definitely going! We came on one of the two tiny boats you can see anchored in the harbour.
We had 4 hours here so we decided to walk up to the highest point, 376 metres above sea level, to see the view. The summit was shrouded in cloud so we didn't go right to the top, it was too dangerous in the mist because it's a sheer drop on the other side to the sea.
People lived here until the 1930s, their diet consisted mainly of birds, they stored the fish oil and feathers from the birds to pay the rent to the landlord who sent his representative here once a year to collect the goods.
There are small stone shelters all over the island, you can see them dotted all over the hill in the photo, these were used to store the goods and to store food for the winter months.
Eventually the population dwindled and the remaining inhabitants were evacuated in the 1930s but the remains of the buildings in their village are all still here.
Some people emigrated to Australia and settled in an area near Melbourne which they called St Kilda.
The Ministry of Defence has a radar tracking station here so there are people based on the island all year round, to monitor and maintain the equipment. It's quite odd to see all the masts and radar equipment on the hill in such a remote location.
The islands are one of a few places in the world that have mixed World Heritage status, for their cultural and natural importance.
When we left the main island we sailed around the sea stacs, they're the largest in Britain and home to thousands of sea birds. The boat was rather rocky though so quite hard to take pictures! Lots of puffins, guillemots, razorbills and the largest colony of gannets in the world.
Lots more info about St Kilda on this link if you're interested
http://www.kilda.org.uk/Default.htm#.WVTNsRMrJE4
