Wednesday 24th May 2017

And again we get up to travel to Portree for the wildlife tour, and pretty sure we had the right day this time. But when we threw open the curtains, we found the mainland and sound gone, replaced by a curtain of fog. It looked set in for the day.

We have breakfast and get ready for the 40 minute drive to Portree, leaving some extra time for the bad weather and maybe getting stuck behind a truck or bus. But, we had an easy ride, and in half an hour are cruising down the hill into Portree, and the fog had begun to lift.

Out in the harbour, a cruise ship is moored in the bay, and already the passengers are filling the town, and wandering around like zombies. Best of all is the line of people lined up at the taxi rank, the chance there is more than one cab in the town seemed remote. It is possible they’re still waiting now.

I walk to the post office to post Mum’s birthday card, its on Saturday when we are traveling home. Anyway, will show we had not forgotten.

At quarter to ten we meet in the car park beside the tour bus. Mini bus, along with 5 other passengers and our guide, who describes that with wildlife nothing is guaranteed, so we might see nothing.

And so began the great hunt for otters. There animals are numerous, but secretive, and are viewed on Skye, at least by us, from across a loch. Or hopefully will be. We go from plan a, to plan b, to plan c. Driving from location to location, scouring the water and shoreline for an otter or two.

None of the locations were unpleasant, but a couple were beside the main road, so it seemed odd to be looking for otters by walking down the verge beside thundering trucks and buses.

The final site, Andy, the guide, finally sees one across the loch. He gets his scope out so we could all see it, on some rocks about 100m away, eating a large fish. I try to get shots, but until I process then I won’t know if I got it.

It was lunchtime, so we drive over to the first of the eagle spots, and tuck into rolls and carrot cake.

But the mist had dropped down, meaning that we could see only about 100m up the hills and mountains, and so all the crags the eagles rest on were out of sight. I did see and snap a Twite, a small brown bird, which is rare. And that turned out to be the highlight of the day.

We go from place to place, and as we went west things just got worse and worse. The site that always delivers a sighting, outside the Talisker distillery, also failed to provide either golden or sea eagles.

Two more locations back near portree, but apart from a couple of common seals near to shore, we see nothing.

At half five we are back at the car, and one of the other people on the tour, a John Cleese lookalike gives me a mason handshake. I wasn’t sure what I should do, if anything to be honest.

So I say nothing and we walk to the car and make ready to leave..

Along the main road, the fog had lifted higher, meaning we could have looked for more eagles, but we were eagled out. We stop at the Co-Op for supplies, and return home to have a beer, some pringles, a Ripple and a brew. It was that kind of day.

Tony and I egg and breadcrumb aubergine, then I fry the slices up, so at eight we sit down to a late dinner, and despite the snack we had when we came in, we ate well.

Instead of computing, there was football to watch, Man Utd v Ajax in Europe, and United won. Sigh. Maybe Jose will smile and stop complaining now?