Uist Lady

UGH. We’ve got excess aluminium in our water. Uist folk used to drink lovely spring water, seasoned only with a little algae from the well or the odd beetle. People lived to a ripe old age then.
Forty or so years ago, running water in taps came along. At first, it appeared brown from the peat, wholesome, yes- but brown. And people weren’t too keen on that because it did things like turn the sheets brown and so on.
Bring on the chemicals, and things like aluminium to make our water sparkle. Now the EU dictates that our water should taste disgusting from an excess of treatment. We have got to the point of distilling ours through a machine which cleans all the guff out of 4 litres of tap water at a time. A dark brown stinking puddle is left at the bottom, and lately, I’ve noticed a crystal desposit too.
I’ve been trying to understand from Scottish Water exactly where the excess of aluminium is coming from, but the explanations remain cloudy.

These pallets of bottled water are now a common sight in the affected areas. I ask: what about all the empties? our skips won’t be able to cope. Have they thought of that?
Here is the latest article I wrote for the press about it:
NORTH UIST RESIDENTS face a further week on bottled water after excess levels of aluminium were found in their tap water.
Some 450 households are affected on the west side of the island, having been told on Wednesday to stop using tap water for drinking, preparing food and cleaning teeth.
Scottish Water says it is working round the clock to deal with the problem and has now commissioned equipment from Southern England to provide an additional treatment processing.
The equipment is due to arrive in North Uist on Monday (Oct 10) and will take several days to install.
The all-clear will only be given with the agreement of NHS Highland’s Public Health and Medicine consultant, Dr Ken Oates, and this is not expected to be before next Friday. (oct 14)
The problem is centred around the water treatment works at Bayhead.
Scottish Water says a recent serious water deterioration in raw water quality has meant that the treatment works has struggled to cope.
A spokesman said: “Raw water from the environment in places like the Western Isles can be very peaty and discoloured. Aluminium helps bind these peaty particles together, allowing us to remove them and the aluminium, leaving clear fresh water.
“On this occasion, the levels have been fluctuating and it’s because it’s proving difficult to make them settle we are taking the precautions.”
Residents say they were already aware of tanker loads of water from elsewhere on the island going up to Bayhead treatment works round the clock for some weeks.
Problems with low water pressure had also dogged the area well before Wednesday’s announcement, leaving householders unhappy with being kept in the dark for so long about the situation.
Scottish Water has now apologised to residents about the way information about the problem was disseminated, and the uneven distribution of bottled water supplies to households.
The spokesman said: “Earlier this week we were flushing poor quality water from the system to prevent it reaching the customers’ tap and this lowered the amount of water in our storage tanks, which could have resulted in low pressure or loss of supply for some customers. That is why bottled water was supplied at that time. I’m sorry if this wasn’t made clear to customers.”
He added: “ On Wednesday night, the deliveries took place at night in bad weather. In rural areas it can be difficult to identify all affected properties and I’m sorry if anyone was missed. We also sent out information to local media including radio and via our website, Facebook and Twitter to ensure the message was spread as widely and as quickly as possible. Our Customer Helpline is available 24 hours a day on 0845 601 8855 if anyone has any queries.”

Scottish Water has also moved to dampen concern among residents about the health implications of excess aluminium in the water.

The spokesman said: “It is important to stress that the water with elevated levels of aluminium has been flushed from our system to prevent it arriving at customers’ taps. The ‘do not drink or cook’ advice is purely a precaution.”

Scottish Water will hold drop-in sessions for the community will be held at Paible primary school, Bayhead between 4 and 7pm on Monday October 1O and Tuesday October 11, and in Carinish Hall on Tuesday (oct 11) between 1 and 2.30pm.

The utility will also continue to deliver bottled water direct to households and drop off pallets at Balranald Church, Carinish Old Church, Bayhead shop, Clachan Stores and Ardnasgruban post box, Grimsay.

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WHEN the US gets a hurricane, it tends to swing by our way a few days later.
Hurricane Ophelia is with us now. If I was more up on Hamlet, I’d have some witty quote at this point. What I can say is alas, poor Uist.
Ophelia had half the ferries and planes cancelled yesterday. Imagine that, marooned in the Atlantic and unable to get off your island. The hurricane puffed her cheeks and blew a force 10 with horizontal rain in every which direction.
She eased up this morning, so I dashed out for a walk. My neighbour was out too, taking the opportunity to tend his garden, but we both saw the leaden clouds approaching and cut our chat short.
Sure enough the nearest, most mean-looking cloud started to dump on me. Through squinty eyes, I saw a large bird of prey flapping over the loch. I couldn’t tell what it was, only that it had a black bar across its wingtips. It was mobbed by a couple of smaller birds.
I trudged on hoping that Mr Mac had his binoculars trained on me and would dash into the car to come and rescue me. But he didn’t. His eyes were trained on the computer, I reckoned.
It wasn’t so bad. The rain died down to a smatter and with my back to the wind I was blown home on Ophelia’s skirts.
Mr Mac said: “I was watching you and I was going to come and get you but it improved.”
His definition of ‘improved’ is rather different from mine, evidently.

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Three Texel Cross rams have appeared in the field next to us, no doubt to fatten up ready for the forthcoming tupping season. ( An entertaining yet dismaying event on our calendar, see blogs passim)
Texel are a strange-looking wrinkle-snouted ovine that have gained in popularity on these islands in recent years.
This morning, I found two of them rubbing heads together affectionately. Then one, the biggest and a real brute of a thing, suddenly stuck his head up, as if to say ‘Hang on. I’m a ram. I’ve got HUGE bollocks. I shouldn’t be doing this.’
He developed a mean look on his already mean-looking face and lumbered a few feet backwards to square up to his rival, head down, ready to butt. CHAAAaarge! But halfway through the charge he seemed to forget that he was full of testosterone and instead ended up ambling forward and affectionately rubbing heads again.
The two of them continued to niggle each other with kicks, feeble charges, and ear-nibbling. They embroiled the third one in their pathetic attempts at machismo. He proved just as challenged in the ‘hooves at dawn’ department, and they all ended up rubbing heads and nibbling each other’s ears.
I’m not sure that this ‘wafty willie’ behaviour as Mr Mac calls it bodes well for tupping, but they may surprise me yet.
I took this pic from an upstairs window so apologies for the clothes pole being in the way.

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Work has begun to preserve North Uist’s Teampull Na Trionaid.
The 14th century building is showing its age rather badly. Thanks to a group of determined local people, specialist masonry contractors Laing have arrived to shore it up.
First clear the site:

Next week, limestone pointing will begin.
The clearing has thrown up some items of interest to Becky, our local archaeologist. Sandstone bits, some carved. There’s no sandstone on Uist, so these present a whole new set of questions about the Teampull site.

Here’s one of many articles I’ve written about the project:

Community efforts to conserve a monument of national importance in North Uist could be held up as ‘an inspiration and model’ for other community monument initiatives in the Western Isles, according to Historic Scotland.
The agency’s Northwest Inspector of Ancient Monuments, Dr John Raven spoke to delegates of the Hebridean Archaeological Forum which is meeting this week in the Uists, on a visit to the ruins of Teampull Na Trionaid (Trinity Temple) at Carinish, North Uist, a seminary and centre of pilgrimage thought to date back to the 13th century.
The scheduled ancient monument is second in importance in the islands to the ancient seminary in Howmore, South Uist, and is one of few churches in Scotland to have survived the Reformation.
The building, which was in use until the 17th century is now in a precarious state of decay and disrepair, prompting community members to form the Teampull Na Trionaid Conservation Association to seek funds of more than £200,000 to carry out essential work to slow down the building’s deterioration and create access tracks and interpretation panels.
The association has already had a comprehensive scheme of works drawn up for consolidating and lime-mortaring the walls, and is waiting to hear the results of an application to SRDP Rural Priorities programme for £194,000 to carry out the work.
Historic Scotland has voiced its strong support for the initiative from the start. Dr Raven said: “Over the last twenty years various monument consolidation initiatives have been set up in the islands which for various reasons did not get anywhere, so for the association to get this far is fantastic in itself. The next stage is to get the building consolidated, and when that happens, the association will be able to demonstrate that such initiatives are possible and how they can be realised.”
Dr Raven, who wrote his PhD on the ecclesiastical history of the Uists, added that last winter’s severe cold has affected the wall heads of the temple, causing them to lean even more precariously. He said: “It is more urgent than ever. The monument is almost being held up by the rubble around it.”
Teampull Na Trionaid Conservation Association secretary Margaret MacQuarrie said: “We have fantastic local support for the project.
“The Comhairle has said the project meets the aims of the Local Development Plan, and visits to the site are in demand by locals, community groups, schools and tourism groups including VisitScotland. We are waiting to hear the results of our funding application and hope that the work can begin next spring.”

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There was a paint shop in the Spanish town where we used to live whose name was emblazoned huge on the wall: Fanny Color. How English speakers all sniggered as they passed the store on the way to the beach! And how I regret not half-inching the signage, because it’s just what’s needed for the field in front of our house.
Now that North Uist has thawed out, the tupping has resumed. ‘Is it not over yet?’ I exclaimed on returning from our break on the mainland.
No, if anything it’s got more exciting. It’s as if the entire Impressionist movement has reincarnated as sheep decorators.
Blue Chest- see blog passim- though still running with the ewes, has been supplanted by Red Chest, an evil-looking beast, and Yellow Chest, an indeterminate brown thing.The resulting Fanny Colors are totally Gaugin, with a splodge of Matisse and a daub of Seurat. Van Gogh’s not far away in the mix.
‘I have never seen such a presposterous palette on a sheep,’ I remark of one passing our window which is spodged all over with blue, red, yellow and of course mud.
Mr Mac, not known for his love of woolly maggots as Scottish conservationists call them, said, ‘God knows what they’ll produce in the spring. Things with feathers probably.’ He says these things absently, without looking up from his paper.
Red Chest has a nasty habit of going up to a ewe, sniffing her rear end, and if the scent is not pleasing, delivering her a nasty kick. He’s a Texel, extremely ugly and has a disgusting gutteral bleat.
Sometimes he and Blue Chest will converge on the same ewe and have a little jostle to themselves before forgetting what it was they were supposed to be fighting about and wandering off to tear at the grass for a while. Yellow Chest is prone to baring his teeth around a girl, then pushing off with no action.
Judging by the Fanny Colors they have been a little busy. But there are still plenty of bums which remain a virginal mud colour. Get on with it boys! And then leave the girls alone, you big bullies.

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Yesterday the rains were torrential all day, making it miserable for the visiting archaeologists attending HAF 2010.
But they made their way to Teampull Na Trionaid, a 700 year old seminary and place of pilgrimage of national importance, and stood under the bucketing heavens to listen to Dr John Raven of Historic Scotland talking about the building.

Dr Raven included research on the building in his PhD on the ecclesiastical landscape of the Uists. He’s also very much behind local residents’ drive to carry out remedial work to halt the inexorable deterioration of the building. They need £200,000 to prop it up and lime-mortar it.

Yesterday evening Nunton Steadings was packed for an evening themed around the Udal, an incredible site on North Uists’s northwest coast. It was excavated over 23 seasons by Iain Crawford, teams of archaeologists and students, and many local people. They found habitations from the Neolithic to 1700 AD. But the findings remain unpublished and the finds themselves are in mothballs. This rankles with local people who invested much of their time and effort into the dig, only to have the book of their history not only slammed shut, but devoid of any text.
Sandi Humphrey, a local lady from Sollas, stood up and told the assembled multitude which included many archaeologists who had worked on the dig, how betrayed locals feel about the way they have been treated. There was interesting news by way of response from Beverley Ballin Smith, of Glasgow University. She says she now has all the Udal finds in her possession and wants to seek money for a ten year project to complete the research work. And she wants the finds returned to our community, asking us to start getting plans for a suitable building together now, in preparation.
The road to this will be complicated, long, hard and very rocky. As Beverley said: “All we need is money.” Around £2 million and counting.
Here are local volunteers clearing away the 40 year old rotting and hazardous remains of Iain Crawford’s caravan and the greenhouse he put up against the side of it for finds processing (known fondly as the Crystal Palace.)

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I’m leaving the Outer Hebrides to head for the Inner Hebrides on a two day foodie tour of Skye in my capacity as PR consultant to the Scottish Crofting Federation. This promises to be a treat.
I’m hoping for a better crossing than last Friday’s sailing to Lochmaddy from Skye, in something of a hoolie during which absolutely everyone including the crew was ill.
Then I’m heading to Perthshire for a few days. When I return, I’ll be catching up with Lynne Hoy and her sister Nancy Ririe from the US who are coming to North Uist to plot and record Clachan Sands cemetery. Why, you may ask?
It’s a rather lovely story and I’ll tell you about it in a few days.

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I’m off to the Black Isle Show tomorrow- if you’re passing I139 on Thursday come and say hello. There might even be a bit of mutton pie to sample as we’re doing crofter’s pie tastings as a bit of informal product research…more follows!
Meanwhile, join me and 30 others on a beautiful walk to the tidal island of Vallay a few days ago:

I think you’ll agree Vallay is absolutely magical. There’s an exhibition about it in Taigh Chearsabhagh until January, well worth the visit, if you’re in these parts.

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This week saw the South Uist and Benbecula Agricultural Society’s annual show at Iochdar. The weather wasn’t up to much, but at least it didn’t rain. Cattle were back at the show after a two year absence, and the show had a good buzz this year. Next year the show will move from its traditional Wednesday after Games week to the Saturday after the North Uist Games, by the way, thus helping crofters who can’t get time off their other jobs, and also adding to a great week for visitors coming for Games and the Young Piper of the Year competition.

Supreme cattle champion was this babe just three months old. She was too shy to get any closer.Her breeder is Iain Francis Morrison of Gerinish.

Supreme sheep champions were these wedder lambs from John Maclean of Garrynamonie.



You’ll find all the results on a new page on the left hand side.

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stop press: I’ve now posted the results of the games on a new page on the left hand side

The South and North Uist Highland Games take place in the same week, separated by one day, during which Highlands and Islands Young Piper of the Year competition takes place in Benbecula.
They are sociable days, calendar days when you are sure to meet old friends and people you haven’t seen perhaps for the last year.
Here is the week in pictures:
The South Uist Games took place in overcast, windy conditions.



Young Piper of the Year was James D MacKenzie, of Back, Lewis.

Connor Sinclair from Crieff is under-15 champion, and definitely one to watch::

The North Uist Games. Ranald Fraser of Lewis swept the board in field events:



The start of the hill race, which was won by a Glaswegian holiday maker. That’s the nice thing about the games, anyone can join in. Islanders don’t mind if mainlanders beat them-well, not that much.

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