A Midnight Hike

Monday 29th May into Tuesday 30th.

We really enjoyed our trip to Mousa last Friday and decided to sign up for the night trip to see Storm Petrels, small birds that feed 300 km out to sea to avoid predators. Part of their defence is to delay returning to shore until last light. They roost in piles of stones, rocky beaches, dry stone walls and most of all in the stonework of Mousa Broch.
Watching the Petrels return to Mousa is considered one of the truly extraordinary sights on Shetland.
We left Lerwick in almost broad daylight at 21.30 and drove south to the landing stage for the Mousa boat. There are plenty of people already waiting and Darren (who we mistakenly called Brendan on Friday) is preparing the boat. Today he is definitely the mate as his dad, Rodney, is running the show. After the obligatory safety brief we set out across the Sound of Mousa. It is overcast but not too breezy and the sea is calm. Departure is at 22.30 prompt and our party is around thirty people.
Torches are issued but we are recommended not to use them unless essential as it will ruin our night vision and scare the birds. We head out over the moor to the Broch, pausing at the seat that Rodney built to mark the 60° North line of latitude on the island for a short talk about the history of the island. He explains that this is to kill a bit of time as is still too light for the birds.
It is darker by the time we reach the Broch and we stand in front of it as Rodney tells us about the life cycle of the Storm Petrel which spends winter in South Africa and summers on the coasts of North West Europe. As he talks we start to see dark shapes flitting in to gaps in the stones. The light is too poor to catch these on a photo but there must have been hundreds of birds heading in. They seemed totally unphased by the crowd, flying in between us with acrobatic ease. There is a background noise like the whirring of a small electric appliance that is the birds happy in their stoney refuges. Because I couldn't get a real photo, here is a picture of a Storm Petrel from R's bird book.
We spend an hour watching, entranced, before walking back to the jetty and taking the boat back to Mainland. By the time we get back to the apartment it is 01.20. A late night but well worth it.



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