Seatrek to St Kilda

St Kilda is one of very few places on our planet awarded Dual World Heritage status for both its natural and cultural significance. Already acknowledged for its beauty and special ecology, St Kilda was also recognised in 2005 for its cultural record of a lost crofting community, living on what has been described as “the edge of the world”.

Despite its location, 40 miles into the Atlantic Ocean to the west of the Western Isles, there has been a long history of habitation, with evidence of Bronze Age activity from four to five thousand years ago, and 2000 year old remnants from the Iron Age also. In more recent times it was owned by the Macleods of Dunvegan. And by the mid-nineteenth century the outside world was beginning to make itself felt more obviously. The first tourists began arriving on regular summer cruises towards the end of the century, attracted by the island’s other-worldly appeal. The decline of the local population was rapid after that. The last inhabitants were finally evacuated in 1930. They left behind them an empty village, as a haunting legacy of a lost way of life.

There may no longer be a permanent human population on St Kilda, but the tourist interest persists. And now you can go there and back in a day from Loch Miavaig on the west coast of Lewis. Seatrek is a small company, run by local man Murray Macleod from Uig. It offers a range of services to tourists. Although Murray has only a small team they also make an important contribution to the local community, as letters from local schoolchildren show. Seatrek uses rigid inflatable boats, or RIBs, for short fast trips. The bigger boat is used for longer trips, such as a journey to St Kilda and back.

Today Murray has a party of Uist residents, so the trip actually started out from Berneray harbour. As they speed towards the main island Hirta, Boreray and the stacks can be seen to one side. As they get closer into the bay the island’s unique physical character quickly makes an impression on them. The cameras are soon in operation.

The National Trust for Scotland looks after St Kilda on a daily basis, with help from the Ministry of Defence. Strict rules are enforced about what visitors may bring with them onto the island, in order to protect the unique ecology. But visitors are free to wander within the village’s boundary wall.

The church was built in the early nineteenth century. And the school dates from 1884. One of the old houses has been converted into a museum so that visitors can get an impression of what life must have been like for the original inhabitants. But the cultural heritage is only one part of these islands’ charms.

The next step for the visitors is to take the boat from Hirta to Boreray, and get a taste of the extraordinary natural heritage here too. The visitors are welcomed to Boreray by a rainbow. Then the weather clears to reveal the neighbouring stacks. And gannets and other seabirds appear to greet them. Murray takes the boat up close to get a better view.

These islands are home to half a million breeding seabirds. This figure includes the world’s largest northern gannet population of over 60,000 breeding pairs. There are also great numbers of puffin, fulmar, shag, and skua, but it’s the gannets that seem to blacken the skies here.

The view back to Hirta provides another photo opportunity for the visitors. Soon it will be time to start the return journey, but they’re keen to get some last pictures before they go. Then Murray takes them back from Boreray for a final view of Hirta.

And then, all too soon, it’s time to leave and head back home. Although over almost as soon as it’s begun, it seems unlikely that this trip is one that any of these visitors will easily forget.