Wednesday -boat day. We called into the IRCT office to collect some DG (dangerous goods) notes to send our empty diesel jerry can off on the ferry with and have it sent back full. Our first red diesel order, we are islanders now :). We then went along to the campsite shower block to learn how to change over the gas bottles for the showers as that is to be one of our Odd Jobs. That done we took the empty bottle along to the pier, did an inventory on the bottles in the cage and took a full one along to the campsite. More showers from campers mean more work (and therefore money) for us :).
We waited for the ferry to come in as we were hoping for food shopping and maybe some other parcels on it (small stuff like a whiteboard for the static, blue tack, a stapler, walking boots, socks for Ady). None of it came but we did get more dog food and the blue tack along with a parcel from Sally containing more trousers for Scarlett. She is now properly clothed for the time being :).
We helped unload the truck for others and helped load some stuff for the castle into the castle van – no idea whether it goes down well or not that we are helping lots but its sort of what we do anyway.
There was a meeting in the Village Hall to show architects plans for a bunkhouse and conversions for the Byre – hoping to encorporate a shop, tearoom, teaching space, office, showers and toilets and four self contained flats. All a long way off in the future although the bunkhouse is hoped to happen next year.
We had some lunch and spent some time in the teashop online before going to the croft. We have an emergency plan for the chickens and ducks housing of the front of the horse box for the chickens and a wheelie bin for the ducks (that sounds awful we found it online and it is a really good idea!) so we took everything out of the horse box and reloaded it again to keep the front clear to section off. That meant more stuff ended up coming back to the static (it’s getting heavier daily!) and I went back to start cooking dinner while Ady finished putting stuff in.
We had a film on while we ate and then a fairly early night all round.
Thursday Today started with showers all round – the shower in the static is pretty good, we’ve yet to calculate how much gas we’re using but water is no problem. We’re paying water rates of £6.25 a month – we offered as we are taking water from the village currently in big containers each day. Long term we’ll use water from the river so won’t have to pay but we wanted to be seen to be contributing. It gets nice and hot and is fairly powerful, the shower tray is pretty deep and has a plug so the kids are able to sit in it and almost bathe really which is good.
We walked down to the village to catch up with Mike and check times for the Shearwater cruise today and then took some lunch down to eat at the pier. The Shearwater is the boat that runs alongside the Calmac ferries and comes from Skye for tourist stops several times a week but also does stuff like take the post once a week to Soay (little island with three residents just off Skye). Mike has an arrangement to take people on the Thursday ferry across to Soay and do a wildlife tour. Free to residents 🙂 So a 3 hour trip from Rum to Soay with the Soay people rowing out to collect the mailsack and then back again. They have sighted all sorts of seabirds and marine life including minke and humpback whales, basking sharks, killer whales and various dolphins. We only saw birds today but had great views of gannets, Great skua, shearwaters, guillemots, gulls and kittiwakes, razorbills and shags. It was just beautiful out there, sun shining, water lapping at the boat and our own personal ranger giving us a commentary, showing us his books and lending us binoculars :). We’re planning to do it pretty much every week 🙂
Back at the shore we checked on Bonnie who we’d left in her crate for the first time during the day – she was fine 🙂 Then back down to the village hall again for the Residents Association Meeting where we were officially welcommed and signed our tenancy agreement – we are offical 🙂