The BIG Storm -- Aftermath
Harp Lessons with Wendy
The next morning I got up and put out some birdseed for the birds for the
first time. Starlings and House Sparrows were our only visitors for the seed,
but we did see blackbirds, redwings (UK versions,) and a hooded crow. The
power went back off for an hour or two that morning, but was restored. Dee
showed up with the last of our rental stuff for the car, and we waited around
for the phone installer until 1 pm, and then decided to leave a note to visit
Chrissie's house if they needed access and head on into town to get petrol
and do more errands, including sorting auto insurance for the car from Dee.
The insurance proved difficult, as the local insurers wouldn't sell short-term
policies. The library internet was still down, so we had to pay for internet
access to search for insurance.
While dealing with that, we found I had a message from Wendy - her arrival
on Lewis to teach had been moved up to Thursday (today!) instead of Friday,
so we needed to go pick her up at the airport. We went with her to Jane's
house, where the harp lessons were to take place. We met Jane, who is
instrumental in the clarsach program on Lewis, and keeps track of all the
students. I met six students that evening and observed their lessons with
Wendy, and then Wendy took us out to dinner at the wonderful Thai restaurant
in town. We brought Wendy home with us for the night, where we all collapsed
from exhaustion. Right as we were getting into bed, the power went out again.
It stayed out for another hour or two, then came back on. The next morning,
it was off again, and stayed off until mid-afternoon Friday.
Wayne stayed home in the cold house waiting for the phone installer, and I
went with Wendy to town to observe more lessons. I met all the students, but
couldn't give them my phone number because I still didn't have one! After
observing lessons all day, I came home and found the wrong person had come
out to do the phone, and they wouldn't be able to install it until next week.
While at Chrissie's one evening, we had learned that her brother Ken worked
at a local Salmon fishery. He offered to bring us home a "wee fish." We
were thrilled, and that evening we picked up the fish and tackled it - it's
by far the biggest fish I've ever gutted or worked with. We had no proper
tools - just a few dull knives from around the cottage. We managed to gut
it and cut it into 10 portions. We froze nine of these and ate the last one
for dinner -- it fed two people perfectly, and was delicious, despite my not
having anything I would normally use to cook Salmon. I now have enough fish
to last me the rest of my time here. It was quite a gift!
The final reports of the damage and winds from the storm (now called a
hurricane) clocked winds of 105 mph on the island (103 in Tolstachaolais),
and people here have been calling it the worst storm in living memory.
Schools were closed Wednesday through Friday, house/roof repairs have been
going on for a couple of weeks, and power outages have occurred here and there
for folks since the storm took place. The worst result was that a family of
five was killed on Uist, an island just South of here. They drove out onto
a washed-out bridge and were washed away. It is very sad. We feel very
fortunate to have only had to face a broken car window, and a cold and dark
house.
Being Tourists
Over the weekend, as the locals were dealing with clean-up and recovery, Wayne
and I took advantage of the improved weather (lower winds on Saturday and
Sunday morning) to take in some of our favourite sites. We visited the
tallest standing stone in Scotland, Clach an Truiseil, and Dun Eistein, the
Clan Morrison stronghold, now only a cairn on a sea stack. We also visited
Port Sto and the Butt of Lewis. On Sunday we drove out to Harris, because
we love the southern part of the island as well. (Harris is actually attached
to Lewis, but they are considered two islands because the landscape is so
different. Harris is more mountainous, and has a lovely "moonscape" type of
landscape on one side of the island, and sandy beaches along the other side.
Beautiful! We drove the "golden road," which winds through the moonscape
terrain for the entire length, and stopped at one point to hike up to a cairn
in the hills there. At the end of that drive we stopped at St. Clement's
Church, a very historical early church, before driving back up the beach side.
We also drove North to Tarbert and across the bridge to the island of Scalpay
before heading back home. By the time we reached the mountains in Harris,
the weather had turned back to high winds, and we fought the wind coming home
as we crossed the mountains.
The next day they were calling for "blizzards." The weather was strange -
grey and dark and cold, and we did get periods of sleet and snow, but nothing
really stuck. (Lewis is not known for getting much snow.) The weather
switched from clear and bright to dark and stormy, and from high winds to no
winds at all, back and forth for hours. We were staying at home, waiting for
the BT installer to put in our phone line. He arrived in the afternoon, and
got things hooked up, but he didn't bring a phone, so we still had no way to
reach the outside world. Even though we had a phone line for the computer,
we had no telephone access to the internet yet, so we couldn't even check
email. So, back to further waiting.
While waiting, we went to Leurbost for much-needed petrol, and on the way
stopped by Callanish to see it in the light dusting of snow. The snow was
mostly gone, but it was still beautiful. The lines at the store in Leurbost
were very long, probably because of the weather predictions for blizzards (by
this point schools had been cancelled for the next day due to the forecast.)
We got a light snow in the evening. We took our instruments and headed over
to my landlady's house, to play for her mother, brother, and herself. She
also lent us a phone to get us connected. It was nice to finally get back
in touch with folks, after several weeks of being totally unconnected.
Preparing for Wayne's Departure
The next morning we got up before dawn to go to Callanish to see it in the
snow. There still wasn't a lot of snow, but there was a layer of snow on the
ground, and it was quite a sight to see Callanish covered in snow in the dawn
light, and as the sun rose. The winds were still high, and sometimes gusted
way up, making it very cold and difficult to work with the camera, but I got
a few nice photos anyway. Later we went over to Carloway broch, just two
miles north of my cottage. This is another of our favourite sights on Lewis,
and we wanted to see it before Wayne left for home. After a trip to Stornoway
for a few things, we headed home to get Wayne packed and ready to leave.
Neither of us was anxious for him to go.
We had booked the flight from Stornoway to Glasgow because Wayne seemed to
have a cold and it seemed that a quicker journey would be better than the
all-day trip via ferry, bus, and train. So, we had a relaxing morning
spending time together before he had to meet his plane in the afternoon. We
arrived at the airport to find the flight had been cancelled. This left us
in a bit of trouble, as his flight home was the following morning at 11 am,
and there was no way to get to Glasgow by then without a plane. There was
only one plane that would make it - the next scheduled flight to Inverness.
Then he would have to catch a train to Glasgow and a couple of taxis to make
his flight. So much for easy and relaxing... Further complicating things
was the fact that the flight might not go at all - they were waiting to see
if the plane took off from Inverness to see if they would fly back.
The flight did come, and Wayne had a complicated trip back, but did make it
to Glasgow. His flights the next day were a bit delayed, and the online
services weren't reporting on the second flight arrival, so I had no idea
when he got in safely, and stayed a bit worried about him until he called me
at 2 am to let me know all was well. Even the harp survived the trip fine!
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