Well here I am on day three of my short trip to the islands and I am sitting in the lounge of the Isles Of Barra Hotel, thinking back to the many times I stayed here whilst on the many island tours I once took.
I left Oban yesterday on my re-scheduled ferry trip at 14.00 heading to Loch Boisdale on South Uist. My morning in Oban was spent re-acquainting myself with a place I have visited many times in the past during my touring days, and indulging in some of the best sea food on the planet at one of the dockside stalls.
The trip north westward was uneventful but a wee bit on the rough side, landing, however about 15 minutes early in Loch Boisdale, followed by a short drive to the Polochar hotel on the Southerly coast of South Uist.
Nice hotel rooms, not large but adequate and the food pretty good.
This morning, a short drive to the ferry on the island of Eriskay, accessed by the relatively recently built, causeway. Followed by a pretty rough crossing and a drive through Castlebay and on to the Isles of Barra hotel.
Sitting here looking out on probably one of the prettiest beaches one can imagine, and thinking back to the trips I did to the islands some quarter of a century ago and it came back to me, an experience no tour driver would ever wish to happen.
I think it was around 1997 when I did the tour from hell.
This was a set of tours I caried out for a company called Clansman Monarch, and consisted of meeting a disparate group of people at the bus station in St Andrews square, Edinburgh, and taking them on a driver guided tour which took in the whole archipelago of islands named the Outer Hebrides, and included Lewis, Haris, Bernary, North Uist, Benbecula, South Uist, Barra and Vatersay.
These people came from all parts of the world and first met up at the pick up point in St Andrews Square.
On this particular tour, we headed west having an overnight in Balmacara ( I think, as the first night changed from time to time) The next day we headed over to Skye and to the west of the island to the Museum of Highland Life, near the ferry terminal of Uig.
Up to this point, everything was going according to plan, but that was about to change. As luck would have it, it started to rain and it was torrential. I got the group into the museum and was about to have a cup of coffee when one of the museum attendants came in and told me that my coach had a puncture.
With a ferry to catch, a puncture is the last thing to be put on an itinerary.
To make matters worst there was a virtual river running under the coach from the down pour which was continuing. I had to crawl under the coach to place the jack in a suitable place and get the tyre changed. You can image the state I was in after that.
We managed to get to the terminal just in time to catch the ferry heading for Tarbet on Harris with a drive thereafter to Stornoway., where I then had to search for a garage who could repair the tire, eventually managing to get an inside tire from a JCB to suit the purpose.
The next two days were spent going around the places of interest on Lewis, such as the Butt of Lewis, the Callanish standing stones and the broch at Dun Carloway.
The following day was supposed to consist of a trip all the way down the islands with a ferry from Leverbourgh to Bernary and North Uist, and another ferry from Loch Boisdale to Castlebay on Barra.
We reached Leverbourgh to find that the ferry had been delayed and at that time there were no facilities at the pier, not even a representative from Caledonian Mc Brain. I therefore had to make contact with the ferry company head office, and the agents who had booked us. The rest of that day was a long story of shuttling both my group and the people who were waiting on the ferry back and forth to and from the café which was a mile from the pier to get food which I had persuaded Caladonian Mc Brain to pay for.
However, eventually it became clear that the ferry was not able to continue service and so we had to travel back to Tarbet to take a ferry from there to Skye and from there to North Uist.
By this time it was apparent that we had missed the ferry from South Uist to Barra and there was not another one for several days. The agents arranged a hotel on North Uist which we arrived at about 2 in the morning.
The hotel owner ( who happened to be a lord and owned half the island) happened to be in residence and he and the chef had stayed up all night waiting to check us in. unfortunately, they had been drinking all night and by the time we arrived they were in no condition to even carry a case in, so I told them to stay where they were ( in the bar ) give me the keys and I would get the people to their rooms and the most important thing, to make sure there was a pint of Tenants waiting for me when I had seen to the passengers.
I tell you, that was the best pint I had tasted for many a year.
So, the next problem was how to get to Barra. Now I knew there was a very small boat went from Ludag in the extreme south of South Uist and I asked the agent to see if there was a possibility of getting us booked on it as foot passengers and I would go in to the ferry terminal at Lochboisdale and try to persuade the guys there to drop us at Ludag, take the coach back to Lochboisdale and put it on the ferry in a couple of days where it was going to Castlebay on Barra. We would then get on the ferry heading to Oban, and everyone would live happily ever after.
The Caledonian McBrayn guys agreed and we were dropped off at Ludag which consisted of a peir, nothing else. The coach was then taken back to Lochboisdale and we waited on the passenger ferry picking bus up, and waited, and waited.
Eventually, it showed up about an hour and a half late, you can imagine how relieved I was to see it.
The boat had to divert to Erisky to pick some passengers up and when they boarded it was apparent the they were the worse for drink, being on their way to the Barra Fesh ( musical festival) which was on that weekend.
When we arrived on Barra Hector Mc Neil was there with one of his buses which I had arranged to borrow for the days on Barra and we continued the tour as if nothing had happened. When it came to the day to leave and board the ferry I was glad to see that the coach was there was there waiting for us on the ferry.
After the trip I received a post card from an Australian guy who had been on the trip, it read: “Hi Bob thanks for the adventure trip”
Bob Costello 