Quiet
June 14, 2008 | Leave a Comment |
It’s been quiet here for a while now. Due to several reasons. First we’re quite busy. Work on the shed continues and block work is nearly done now. Weather continues to be good, and every hour is spent outside so the shed will be ready before the bad weather is back upon us again. Second we had a batch of four Dutch guests which needed attention, so the house was quite full of life.
And there’s football of course… Last night was a true feast when we butchered the French. It’s been a while since their national team had a good trashing (I read somewhere that it was in the late 50’s but correct me if I’m wrong). Anyway, it was good fun nonetheless and 16 Skinidin cheered loudly for the Dutch team. It was a tense match and at times we were lucky, but then again… luck can be enforced and I think that’s what the Dutch team did.
Enough on football. We can now sit back and wait for the quarter finals.
Last, we had a bad disturbance in the force… the internet force that is. A fault taking for as long as 2 nights kept us away from anything internet. First we thought it had to do with the laying of cables but the moment the phone went dead I decided to pop over to our neighbors to see whether they had the same problems. They didn’t so we called BT to see whether they could help. Within 2 hours an engineer from Dunvegan was at the pole checking the wires. It appeared that the internals of a little grey box up in the pole which actually connects the wire from the exchange to our phone cable were completely disintegrated due to rain and salt air. The box was replaced and the problem was sorted.
By the way, the engineer did confirm that the Glendale exchange was upgraded and now supports up to 8Mb speeds! We’re not getting that as we live too far from the exchange, but still a 2.2Kb is not bad compared to the 0.5Kb we were used to. So the speed upgrade had nothing to do with the cabling which is going on.
Faster?
February 17, 2008 | Leave a Comment |
While browsing the local newspaper today, I stumbled upon an item on current efforts by BT to upgrade certain exchanges on the island for support of broadband internet connections. The article mentioned the Glendale exchange as well. This is good news. Unfortunately the article did not mention whether the upgrade would also bring faster connections. I suspect it’s only an upgrade to support more connections…..
White (ish) table
January 10, 2008 | 2 Comments |
Yesterday we had a tiny patch of snow on Healabhal Mhor, the Gaelic name of one of MacLeod’s Tables. Not very impressive, I agree. I think this is probably as snowy as it gets…
Severe gales
January 9, 2008 | Leave a Comment |
This morning the Skye bridge is closed for high sided vehicles. There’s a storm passing with gales up to 70 mph, which is considerable. The real bad parts appear to be a little bit more south in the Fort William area. Things will ease down during the start of the afternoon.
Coverage
January 6, 2008 | Leave a Comment |
Apparently a reliable broadband connection is still scarce in some parts of Scotland. I’ve already seen letters to the editor of The West Highland Free Press complaining about the lack of a suitable connection here on Skye. Without a doubt, the internet is a very important medium, especially for rural communities like Skye. Having a broadband connection allows you to do things more easily: buy things you can generally only buy at large shopping outlets or communicate with friends and relatives, to name just a few.
Read more
Radio Ga Ga
December 12, 2007 | Leave a Comment |
While browsing my old Skye web links, I came across a link to the site of CuillinFM, the local radio broadcasting station. And shame on me, I’ve never ever listened to them. The reason is that we do not have a radio here, I stream all music content over the network in the house, so I clicked around the site to see whether they broadcast their programs over the internet.
I found a link (on the far right of the menu banner) which said “webstream” - bingo, just what I was looking for! - and I was already prepared to enjoy a bit of local radio. Unfortunately the webstream isn’t active yet. They’re still negotiating… Once they have that going, I will definitely tune in to CuillinFM…
Wind farm
December 9, 2007 | Leave a Comment |
The Ben Aketil Wind farm appears to be up and running. When we drive towards Portree, just before passing through Edinbane, you get a good look at the whole setup. I personally think the windmills don’t look bad in the landscape. They have an air of elegance over them, especially when they’re working.
It also appears that the community offering for buying shares in the farm is a success, although I also read in this weeks issue a letter to the editor of the West Highland Free Press, in which the setup of the farm was considered as not going far enough. The writer of the letter stipulated that this wind farm should have been owned by the Skye community and that its proceedings should have benefited the Skye community primarily, e.g. buy the produced energy directly from the farm at a discount. In the current setup, the energy produced by the farm is sold to the National Grid and the wind farm is just an “investment opportunity”. I thought the letter had some strong points.
The airstrip
December 2, 2007 | Leave a Comment |
While browsing the local newspaper, an item on the Ashaig airstrip caught my eye. Ashaig has the only available airstrip on the island however the last regular passenger flight service was in 1988. Now a number of improvement plans have been identified to bring the strip back to life. The plans vary from £11 million to £24 million to execute. According to the article, it was unlikely that air services to Skye will be introduced before 2012 - 2017.
We used the airstrip once, flying a Piper Saratoga from Holland to Skye. The local services are indeed very primitive and the tarmac of the runway is in very poor condition: holes everywhere, lettering and arrows hardly visible and the runway generally very bumpy. The flight to Skye was great with a custom clearance at Coventry airport. Especially spectacular was the approach to Skye: Cuillin in the afternoon sunshine, sparkling blue water and clear skies.
The return trip was pretty horrendous with very strong winds and rain. It was good that we had secured the plane with the concrete blocks which were available at the shed of the airstrip, otherwise the plane might have been blown away. Also, Scottish ATC let us fly above the clouds so once taken off, we were cleared from the bad weather.
Check out the Skye Map and drag the map so you have Broadford, just past the Skye bridge, in sight. The airstrip is just east of Broadford. I also dug up some pictures from that trip…
By bus
December 1, 2007 | Leave a Comment |
If you want to go to Inverness Airport from where we live, you have a number of options. First of course, your own car. This takes about 2 hours and 45 minutes, if you’re a fast driver. And slightly more than half a tank of diesel to get there and back again (roughly £25.00 worth of fuel).
Another option is the bus. For about £6.00 (internet booking rate, you pay £16.00 at the bus station!) the bus takes you from the Square in Portree to the center of Inverness. From there you take the bus to the Airport which costs about £3.00. The bus trip to Inverness city center takes about 3 hours. So both time wise and cost wise, it’s a very reasonable alternative to traveling by car.
Another option would be the train from Kyle of Lochalsh, but we haven’t tried that yet…
Peatbog Faeries
November 20, 2007 | Leave a Comment |
Today I got hold of the latest CD of the Peatbog Faeries titled “What Men Deserve To Lose”. Peatbog Faeries are a local band from Skye. Their music is a combination of traditional Scottish sounds from bagpipes, flutes and fiddles mixed with synths, drums and guitar. What you might call “fusion”….
The album contains 10 songs, most of which were written by Peter Morrison who - according to the bands official website - lives in Dunvegan.
After listening to it a couple of times today, I really appreciate it. The booklet that comes with the CD has a page for every song giving a short history of the song. Also, there’s a short story on the most important things one needs to know about faeries. The story also explains the title of the CD: faeries are a thieving lot although they only take what men deserve to lose.
If you’re into Scottish tunes with a twist, this album is a great buy.
My favorite song: The Invergarry Blues
Overall rating: 4 out of 5
[digg-me]
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