Bass Rock

Not all of us are sufficiently patient, however.

As we passed the Bass Rock on our way to Fife, a Mr Dalrymple and his friend jumped overboard and swam for shore.

Our captain assures me that these hotheads will be hunted down and prosecuted, for they have been paid two weeks' wages in advance.

I'm proud and relieved to say that their example was scoffed at by everyone else on board.

Of all the gulls that frequent the British coasts, this, the well-known Larus argentatus, i.e. silver-winged, is certainly the most common and widely dispersed.

It is no exaggeration to say that the herring gull may be met with on every part of the British coasts, from the Orkney and Shetland Islands on the north to Cornwall and the Scilly Islands in the south, from the Blaskets in the wild west of Ireland to the mouth of the Thames and the Bass Rock in the east.

It is the gull par excellence associated in the popular mind with the seashore, the sea gull of the visitor to marine resorts, ubiquitous, well-known from the Land's End to John O'Groats.

For its size, it is certainly the tamest and least suspecting gull found on British waters.

With the exception of the south and east coast of England, where it is only sparingly and locally distributed, the puffin from Flamborough northwards is widely and generally dispersed.

In some places, its numbers are almost incredible, as, for instance, at Lundy Island, the Farne Islands, on some of the Hebrides, and St. Kilda.

There is a very interesting colony of puffins established amongst the walls of the ancient fortress on the Bass Rock, but so far as my experience goes, the colony on St. Kilda stands unrivaled and, at a very moderate computation, must consist of many millions of birds.

The puffin most probably pairs for life, and returns time out of mind to certain familiar spots to rear its offspring.

So you're going through the car park, and then inevitably the clubhouse ends, and then you get your first glimpse of the, uh, of the course.

And the first impression is a pretty flat first 18th hole, which then, um, goes to an extreme kind of climb up to the first green and 18th tee, and there's rocky outcrops, and you basically go from sea level into the heavens immediately, and you can just about see down the coast with all the outcrops, with the, all the rocks and the waves crashing on the beach and it, and you can see the Bass Rock, um-

Yeah

... from the whole course.

And I think, I don't know if Winterfield would take this claim, but off the top of my head, I think it must be the course with the best views of the Bass Rock.

It's ex-

Oh, I think it must be

... it's extremely close to it, to the point that Matt got some images of the Bass Rock and you can actually see the birds sat on the rock, which is why it was white that day.

The sort of chief local kindreds, the Black Douglases and the Red Douglases kind of team up and smash this army to bits.

I mean, James initially flees onto Bass Rock, which is a big lump of rock out in the Firth of Forth.

There is a castle there.

He's not sort of sitting out on the bare rock or anything, but it's a pretty kind of hairy time for them.

The water, indeed, was more like a large lake, such as the Chiemsee in Bavaria, dotted with its islands, than an inlet of the sea.

On we steamed, passing Leith, Portobello, North Berwick, with the Bass Rock and the coast of Fife, and, as evening drew on, May Island and Bell Rock.

it was indeed a lovely night the sky lit up with the deep warm glow of the departing sun cast a rosy hue over the whole expanse of water a night indeed so perfect we all agreed it was worth coming to see to witness and enjoy the human mind is however versatile and before morning we had cause to change our ideas and several of us already wished ourselves again at home on entering the moray firth the evening calm of the untroubled sea was exchanged for rough billows and hour by hour we became more and more miserable each alike in turn paying our tribute to neptune and truly realizing the difference between a voyage in prospect and one in stern reality my brother mr gordon the captain and two other passengers were the sole occupants of the saloon at breakfast at luncheon the latter couple were also absent and more people than ourselves bewailed their misery and wished themselves back ashore the rolling of the steamer was tremendous it pitched and tossed to such an extent that our bags and other things in our cabin were tumbled about in every direction despite the discomfort we struggled on deck about twelve o'clock hoping the air would revive us and in half an hour felt quite other persons the worst of a rough sea is that when one is feeling sick and air is most needed one is obliged to shut the port-holes and only imbibe that which comes from the saloon a mixture of fumes by no means invigorating i had always prided myself on being a good sailor when on yachting excursions and short sea voyages but that moray firth undeceived me in this respect my misery however soon wore off and save on this occasion and one day on our return voyage even in the rough days we encountered in the northern atlantic my peace of mind was not further disturbed this first day was indeed a miserable initiation into the hitherto unknown horrors of the sea and no greater contrast could be possible than the calm of the night before and that wretched sunday it rained and blew great guns all day long and by six p m the weather culminated in a severe gale with the glass steadily falling followed by a heavy thunderstorm with vivid forked lightning so furious indeed was the storm that after passing duncan's behead and john o groat's house our captain turned back and ran his vessel into sinclair bay riding at anchor there for the night not being willing in the face of such weather to attempt the pentland firth the bay was calm and the gentle movement of the waves was like the rocking of an arm-chair after the shaking and rolling we had experienced we all enjoyed our dinner in peace whilst the warmth of the cabin was a pleasant change from the searching cold on deck which despite furs and rugs had pierced us through and through before we retired for the night two other vessels had likewise put into the bay for safety from the elements and here we were compelled to remain for forty-two hours while the storm still raged outside captain robertson was a sensible man when we asked him why he had put into sinclair bay he said he considered it wiser to lay to for a few hours and make up the time afterward rather than push on through such a gale burning coal and only making a knot or two an hour perhaps not even that straining the ship with her screw continually out of the water making every one miserable and gaining nothing to this we all agreed so in quiet waters we passed a comfortable night and consequently all the passengers put in an appearance next morning at breakfast As dirty weather was still reported ahead, we also spent Monday, a bank holiday, in the bay.

Alongside of us lay a large steamer, which had tried the Pentland Firth in the morning, but after five unsuccessful hours had been obliged to put back.

Of all the gulls that frequent the British coasts, this, the well-known Larus argentatus, i.e. silver-winged, is certainly the most common and widely dispersed.

It is no exaggeration to say that the herring gull may be met with on every part of the British coasts, from the Orkney and Shetland Islands on the north, to Cornwall and the Scilly Islands in the south, from the Blaskets in the wild west of Ireland, to the mouth of the Thames and the Bass Rock in the east.

It is the gull par excellence associated in the popular mind with the seashore, the sea gull of the visitor to marine resorts, ubiquitous, well-known from the Land's End to John O'Groats.

For its size, it is certainly the tamest and least suspecting gull found on British waters.

With the exception of the south and east coast of England, where it is only sparingly and locally distributed, the puffin from Flamborough northwards is widely and generally dispersed.

In some places, its numbers are almost incredible, as, for instance, at Lundy Island, the Farn Islands, on some of the Hebrides, and St. Kilda.

There is a very interesting colony of puffins established amongst the walls of the ancient fortress on the Bass Rock, but so far as my experience goes, the colony on St. Kilda stands unrivaled and, at a very moderate computation, must consist of many millions of birds.

The puffin most probably pairs for life and returns time out of mind to certain familiar spots to rear its offspring.

Yes.

And we got a, a little, a, we went on a little boat trip to go around Bass Rock-

Mm-hmm

... to see puffins and gannets-

Yeah, really badly.

Particularly then, look, the, the place you see the worst was Bass Rock, for example.

Yeah.

Mm.

Bass Rock, you could see like almost half the rock was just completely empty.

But the great thing with gannets is how quickly they can actually recover, because they are not like puffins, where they rely on one food source, like sand eels.

Gannets are at least more gen- general feeders, so they can, yeah, they will- ... do much better in the long term.

Yeah.