Little Things

It was a good day today. It rained for a fair bit of it, especially hard for the 2 hours when the visitors were on, it blew a lazy East wind (lazy because it goes through you not round you) and I had lots of grubby jobs to do like cleaning the filters on the rainwater tanks of all the accumulated bird poo and detritus but it was still a good day. On the Isle of May there are often lots of little things stitched together that go to make a fine day, poor weather or not. So here is a list of mine today:
- the female eiders serenely sitting on clutches of eggs across the island in the rain, over 1000 of them with pearls of rain rolling off them, a brown bird that is arguably one of the most beautiful on the island,

- the first swift of the year buffeting its way through the showers determinedly moving north,
- a male peregrine hanging in the wind directly above me effortless slipping between the gusts spying out its next prey,

- the May Princess making it in despite a big swell, well done skipper James,
- the 62 passengers determined to enjoy the island even though the heavens opened as they landed and stopped as they went out of the harbour, thanks to Chris from Langbank for leading the way and wearing a carrier bag against the weather for the whole of the visit,

- Rinchen, a volunteer here making an excellent touch table to go in the visitor centre out of scrap wood found around the outbuildings,
- Sarah B (seabird parasite researcher) making the most fabulous tea with biscuit/cake things for pudding,
- it being a stunning puffin day, first thing in the morning it was like a roof of wings with thousands and thousands of them whirling around our heads,


Good huh !