Teddytoarctic2025.blogspot.com

 A lot of adverse winds. We worked our way down the Atlantic side of the Isle of Lewis. Then to Harris Sound which lets us into the Sea of Hebrides: at Leverburgh, the ferry port there, a fisherman advised us to move to a better harbour because of an imminent storm. We promptly hared off to Lochmaddy, North Uist, to a quay where we could step out & go to the village. The storm blew through for two days: many broken branches & a few trees down.                                Mimulus, aka monkey flower.  Down the inner coast of N Uist, to inside of Floddeymore island. A wild place. Lots of deer. Clusters of great blue herons, among which were a Golden Eagle. It seemed that the eagle and the herons kept each other company.  The next day, to Lochboisdale harbour, South Uist. A few days waiting for a weather window to run south to Tory Island, 120 NM.  With the window we passed between...

Seems each movement in my life is thematic. My passport struggles resolve before Nick's and while Nick is in boat arrest, I hitchhike to see Iceland's giant glacier. On the way, two or three cars stop to say that they have no room for me. Who does that? Holy cow,   I am not only tiny in front of  the glacier, I am small in the warmth of these Icelanders. The continuing of the gifts. So we're sailing from Djupivogur (which I now can pronounce, btw.) and lo and behold, a giant vessel births a tiny boat filled with official looking 30 year-olds sporting uniformed dry suits. I am at the helm and while smiling quizzically at Nick, I head into the wind so we can be boarded by the Icelandic Coast Guard. An hour later and after much confession and explanation, they release us after determining it is indeed Nick's choice to either go to jail, pay the fine, or go to court. Curiously and after being interviewed/interrogated/quizzed by one young officer, he declares, "so you a...

   Jonina, Jon's wife, gifted Michael one of her home made sweaters. Last year she gave me one too. Here we are, in full royal panoply.     We left Iceland & promptly got stopped off Papey Island by the Iceland Coast Guard who wanted to know every which way from Sunday all about my passport lapse & related issues. Eventually they let us go, and we raced off south into the growing darkness.    Many lost songbirds on the way south. Most flew on from us, but one stayed on board and died in the cabin at the base of the main mast. Fin whales. Pilot whales. Dolphins. Skuas. Stormy petrels. Manx shearwaters. Great shearwater. Gannets. Puffins. The occasional freighter making its way to the New World, or from. Thunderheads, overcasts, blues. The Aurora Borealis and the North Star. The pelagic world.     Not far from St Kilda the winds headed us, a friend sent me by satellite text an adverse weather report, and we bore off east for the Is...