Life at the Ends of the Earth Grand Tours of the Scottish Islands

The Outer Hebrides - among the farthest flung of Scotland's

many islands.

For centuries they've supported a vibrant culture, yet to outsiders

they once seemed to be remote Atlantic outposts.

But in the early years of the 20th century some intrepid individuals

set forth to record the last days of a disappearing world.

These are the most westerly inhabited islands in Scotland.

The next landfall is the icebound coast of northern Canada,

three and a half thousand miles away across the wild Atlantic.

For centuries, the magic of the Scottish islands has drawn

travellers from far and wide.

I'll be following in their footsteps,

exploring the remote and fascinating places scattered around our

coastline...

Any chance of a lift?

..and meeting the people who call these islands home.

This is quite exciting!

To find out how isolation preserved a unique way of life

I'm travelling to the islands

at the southern end of the Hebridean chain -

places which early travellers described

as being at the ends of the earth.

To discover what life is like for the people of these islands,

I'm travelling from Eriskay across to Barra,

before making the short trip to Vatersay, and ending

my journey at the very southern tip of the Hebrides, Barra Head.

My first stop is the magical little island of Eriskay.

It may be only two and a half miles long,

and home today to just 140 inhabitants, but visitors have

always been welcomed with stunning scenery and a fascinating history.

And on the 23rd of July 1745, after a dangerous voyage from France,

the most important visitor ever to arrive on Eriskay

walked on Scottish soil for the first time.

-ARCHIVE:

-On this very rock, Prince Charlie

first set foot in Eriskay in the summer of 1745.

The centuries contract, the past leaps to life.

A figure on the beach might be that lonely prince.

Now, it seems an unlikely starting point for a campaign that

almost overthrew the British state,

and it got off to a very shaky start.

Among the Highland clans, there was considerable

support for Bonnie Prince Charlie's claim to the throne.

But instead of bringing an army as expected, the prince came with

just seven men - and no money.

The local laird, Alexander MacDonald of Boisdale, was unimpressed.

When he came to meet the prince he advised the royal personage

to go home.

To which the prince famously replied, "I am come home."

The prince didn't listen to the laird -

instead he insisted that he was on a mission from God to reclaim

the throne for the Stuart dynasty - whatever the cost.

The cost was huge -

after initial success the Jacobite rising was crushed.

Defeated and humiliated, Charles escaped to France, never to return.

Ultimately, his presence here was a fleeting one.

The tide soon washed his footprints from the sand.

Almost 200 years later another Continental visitor

arrived on these shores.

He landed with even fewer companions than the prince had done

and he came not to conquer but to record.

His name was Werner Kissling, a wealthy German aristocrat

with a fascination for photography and ethnic culture.

The film he made about Eriskay is a beautiful

and evocative depiction of an almost forgotten way of life.

Eriskay - one of the smaller Hebridean

islands of song, fable and legend, handed down from generation

to generation for hundreds of years.

I first saw Kissling's film when I was a student and immediately

fell in love with its intimate portrayal of Hebridean life.

I now have an opportunity to discover how much has changed

since these scenes were recorded.

At the village shop, I meet up with Iain Ruaraidh MacInness

to join him on his post round,

which has to be one of the best ways of getting to know the island.

Iain Ruaraidh is going to show me the place where Kissling arrived.

So this bay appeared in the film?

This is the first opening shot of the film...

is the yacht coming through the bay.

Kissling is an intriguing character.

He'd fought in the First World War and then had a career as a diplomat

until the rise of Hitler forced him to resign

and leave Germany forever.

His wealth enabled him to pursue his passion for anthropology

and to document how these islanders lived.

What do you think they made of Kissling?

He would have been quite an exceptional character.

He was German - a foreign chap,

coming here with lots of money on his big yacht.

It must have been fascinating for them -

wandering around with his camera and his butler and his cameraman!

A wonderful character

but obviously he must have had a good rapport with the people

able to talk with them, to get them to stand, photograph them.

Iain Ruaraidh's family connections to Eriskay go back generations

and several of his relatives appear in the film.

In the scene showing the working the cloth,

four or five of the girls were aunts of mine.

It must be a unique insight

into a lost way of life now?

Yes, it's quite stunning.

What do you think Werner Kissling would have made of Eriskay

when he arrived in the 1930s?

I think he would have been fascinated with the island because

he was an anthropologist and he would have been interested that the islanders

still maintained their own culture through their language.

The island was totally Gaelic-speaking.

So he had an academic interest in coming here?

Yes.

-ARCHIVE:

-Eriskay - island of crofter fishermen and tweed weavers.

The home of less than 500 inhabitants, all Gaelic-speaking.

And all wresting a bare existence from the sea that is their highway

and the little crofts that are their farms.

A lot of the houses were still old

black-houses, thatched houses -

no electricity, no running water -

tilly lamps provided the light.

Do you think he realised the life on Eriskay wouldn't continue

for much longer into the 20th century

when he was making that film?

Yes, I think that's possibly the whole idea of doing it.

Finding a community like this before it went.

-It's a portrait of a lost world, in a way.

-It is.

I suspect that's what he wanted to portray.

Capturing it before it was lost for ever.

Music is in the soul of these people

and it's as natural as talk.

Traditional and melodious as only such a people could make,

living as they do in a land where the errant voices of the wind

forever whisper.

Werner Kissling wasn't the only film-maker to be

inspired by life on Eriskay however.

I'm heading around the coast to a place where an astonishing event

would bring this tiny island to world attention.

Out there, just a few yards offshore and barely visible through the mist

and the rain, is the tiny island of Calvay.

And locals still raise a glass "to the man who failed to see it".

Back in February 1941 the steamship Politician,

laden with cases of whisky,

ran aground right there.

Imagine the excitement that caused to the good folk of Eriskay.

Invoking the ancient rights of salvage,

the islanders "liberated" thousands of bottles of whisky

from the stricken vessel,

prompting the wrath of customs officials and police.

This was the inspiration for the book Whisky Galore!

Written by Compton Mackenzie in 1947,

it was made into the classic Ealing comedy of the same name.

Film versions of historical events

often use a degree of artistic licence to beef up the drama.

To find out how much Whisky Galore! deviated from the true story,

I've come to this Eriskay pub, aptly named The Politician.

Some 70 years after the event, I'm amazed to see

some of The Politician's valuable cargo on display in the bar.

This bottle is one of the originals that's never been opened.

Morag MacKinnon is the landlady here,

and she explained that, while fictional accounts focused

on the whisky, there was much more in the holds of The Politician.

There was linens and cottons, bicycles, machetes -

that's not much use... Well, you never know.

-Why machetes?

-She was going to Jamaica, so the machetes were for the sugar cane.

Food, of course, and shoes.

It was wintertime, February 1941, wartime,

and people on the islands didn't have a lot of money.

Didn't have a lot of anything, really.

The fact that they were able to get these things from the ship

was great.

It was a bonanza!

Absolutely. Yes, it was a very valuable cargo.

Everybody who had access to a boat went out to salvage some of it.

But it didn't go down well with the authorities?

No, it didn't.

In the film, the game of cat and mouse between customs officials

and islanders is portrayed as a humorous romp.

In reality, however, the authorities took the matter extremely seriously.

Homes were raided and crofts were turned upside down.

Bottles were hidden,

or sometimes drunk in order to get rid of the evidence.

They tried to find people in possession of the whisky,

or anything that came off from the ship.

And they were determined to make examples of those people.

This is my partner's uncle - he was called James Campbell.

He was the first person that boarded the ship.

This is a copy of the charge.

The items, as you will see, are pretty insignificant.

Door locks and fittings.

A shovel.

Shaving stick...

-A bunch of keys.

-No whisky.

All very, very insignificant.

-Paint brush.

-Low value items.

But he was obviously found in possession of this stuff

and they could prove it came from the ship.

James Campbell was sentenced to four weeks in prison

and several islanders received similar harsh sentences.

Were they being made an example of, do you think?

Yes. That's certainly what the reckoning was,

because there was no need for it.

Some of the hidden whisky has reappeared over the years.

The most valuable are those with the contents intact,

like this one, which was found in a peat bog.

Although unfit for human consumption,

bottles like this can fetch upwards of £12,000.

Unfortunately, since it was removed from the peat the lead seal

has corroded and its precious contents are evaporating.

Do you think there's any chance of finding fresh bottles

of undrunk whisky on the island?

I would say that there is a chance, because people hid them in a panic

and a lot of them were slightly under the influence.

A lot of them forgot where they hid them.

I think that people will occasionally come across them.

-Something to look forward to.

-Yes, indeed!

In the film, the stricken ship eventually sinks,

but in reality events came to a more dramatic conclusion.

To put an end to further temptation,

the authorities had the wreck of The Politician blown up -

along with the remaining whisky, much to the dismay of

the islanders, one of whom famously commentated, "Dynamiting whiskey,

"you wouldn't think there were men in the world as crazy as that!"

I'm heading south on the ferry

and my next stop is the isle of Barra, population

of around 1,000,

living on 24 square miles of hill, moor and machair.

Barra was granted to Clan MacNeil in the 15th century

by the Lord of the Isles and remained in the family

for the next 400 years, largely thanks to the impregnability

of Kisimul Castle, which was home to the great MacNeil chief himself.

From the top of the tower

MacNeil's trumpeter once cried, "Hear ye all ye people

"and listen all ye nations, the great MacNeil of Barra having

"finished his meal, the princes of the earth may dine."

And there's one local delicacy that the boastful McNeil chief

would certainly have dined upon.

This wonderful stretch of beach is reputedly

the best place in the entire country to find cockles,

and to do the job you need

nothing more sophisticated than a bucket and a garden rake.

So let's see what's lurking beneath the sand!

Cockles are small, clam-like creatures

that were once popular in seaside resorts.

Here we have an empty cockle shell - not much use!

They lie just under the surface of the sand

and are best harvested between autumn and early winter.

The harvest of cockle shells from this fantastic beach

found their way to tables throughout the country,

usually via a jam jar full of vinegar.

Given their abundance around our coast,

it's unfortunate that they have of late fallen out of favour.

But during the dark days of the Clearances, these tidal sands

would have been dotted with the silhouettes of hundreds of people,

whole families, raking through the wet sand to find something to eat.

The great cockle beach covers eight square miles.

One man with a rake patiently gathering cockles,

a man contented with life.

A man who is doing a lot better than me!

I think I might be going hungry tonight!

I can't find anything at all.

There's something beneath... Oh, look at that!

Yes! I'll be feasting on that tonight!

Another one.

There we go. I have to say, it's a very peaceful place

to spend an hour or two raking the sands for your tea.

# ..Through streets broad and narrow... #

But cockle picking on this beach is not without its dangers.

One of which is, rather surprisingly, low-flying aircraft.

The prospect of being hit by a plane

in this vast expanse of sand

might seem an unlikely one, but the hazard is real.

Because this is the runway of Barra's airport -

the only airport in the world where scheduled flights land on the beach.

It first opened in 1936,

and has been voted by pilots as one of the top airports to fly into.

Every year, 10,000 passengers arrive here.

Neil MacLean is the man who ensures aircraft land safely,

a task made more complicated by the fact that twice a day,

when the tide is high, the runway is under water.

So what are the hazards associated with landing on sand?

Dead seal, dead dolphin, dead birds, some barrels.

The fire service go out twice a day and check the beach to make sure

there's no rubbish left behind

that might cause problems with the aircraft.

So the runway could be closed because of a dead dolphin?

Not for long, we'd shift it!

If we had a whale, I think we might have an issue.

That would cause a problem cos our tractors aren't that big!

We've had one occasion where someone had built an enormous sandcastle

with a moat and they were quite put out when we went out

with a tractor and flattened it! Kind of felt sorry for the children!

Conditions on Barra can change quickly.

Landing here can sometimes be very challenging for pilots,

and passengers too.

We've had one gentleman on one occasion,

as the aircraft was coming in,

who though the aircraft was in fact crashing

and he proceeded to start working on the emergency exits

to try and get out. Which is probably disconcerting for other passengers.

But luckily he never managed to open the door or the window.

-But I think he got quite a fright.

-I bet he did!

The reward for landing on Barra is immediate.

Visitors can enjoy some of the most stunning scenery

anywhere in the world, and Neil has offered to show me around.

Today, tourism is a vital part of the local economy.

But in the past islanders had to rely on crofting,

the traditional way of life here.

Like a lot of islanders, Neil chose to leave Barra to see

something of the world, but returned home to take on the family croft,

making him the archetypical multi-tasking islander.

What do you actually do on the croft?

Well, sheep, pigs, ducks, geese, turkeys.

I grow carrots, onions, leeks. I've got some apple trees,

I've got a couple of plum trees and a couple of pear trees.

Crofting is unique to the Scottish Highlands and Islands.

Traditionally, tenant farmers worked

small and often poor-quality plots of land to eke out a living.

Is crofting still quite important here on Barra?

I would say it's very important, it ties people to the land.

And a lot of people fail to understand how important

for people on the edges of the Hebrides,

how important land is.

When you look at the history of these islands

and how the population suffered in the past

when others owned the land,

it's always controlled by someone else.

And now we've got land, people like to keep it.

Over the years, Neil has turned his hand to many different things.

But his latest product is something

not traditionally associated with the Hebrides -

making his own wine.

I made 50 litres of wine off this one vine.

What's it like, your Hebridean wine?

-Well, it's a work in progress, let's say.

-Well, I'm impressed.

It's this kind of resourcefulness and hard work

that has kept crofting alive on these islands.

I'm heading south across the causeway

that links Barra to Vatersay,

a place where the locals had to fight

for the right to make their homes here.

Back in the 19th century, hundreds of people lived here

until they were forcibly evicted by an absentee landlord

who wanted the whole island as a single farming unit.

For more than 50 years, the owner of Vatersay refused to allow

anyone from the overcrowded neighbouring islands to settle here.

Desperate and defiant, the islanders began to return,

led by a group of men known to history as "the Vatersay Raiders".

The Vatersay Raiders were a group of 10 crofters

determined to stake a claim to this land.

In the summer of 1906, they landed here on Vatersay

and invoked an ancient law whereby they could claim ownership of ground

by building a wooden dwelling and kindling a fire within a day.

That might have been the islanders' way,

but in the eyes of the law, the men were criminals.

They were arrested and jailed. But in urban Scotland,

where there was increasing sympathy for their plight,

the men were seen as the heroic victims of injustice.

Their case became a cause celebre,

and although the men spent two months in prison

they ultimately succeeded.

In 1909, the government bought the island for the people

and divided it into 58 crofts.

Today, the raiders are hailed as heroes

and many of their descendants still live on Vatersay.

But it's not just the land that sustains this island community.

Fishing has always been a hugely important part of life here.

And so, donning my traditional Fair Isle fishing hat, I'm joining

skipper Neil Sinclair,

whose grandfather was one of the Vatersay Raiders,

and fisherman Paul McGuire on their lobster boat.

Would you say, Neil, that it's a dangerous job,

being a creel fisherman?

One of the most dangerous jobs you can get, fishing.

You know, the tides and the winds.

And hidden rocks. Just beneath the surface.

There's plenty of those around here, I can see.

Yeah. You get taught

by your dad and other fishermen and they keep you right.

Older fishermen keep you right.

Kenny learns how the lobster pots work

and is shown how to handle the creatures.

Many of the Vatersay fishermen learned their skills

from their fathers and grandfathers,

but that's not the case for Neil's ship-mate, Paul.

-Well, I'm actually from Cumbernauld.

-From Cumbernauld?

-Cumbernauld.

-Land-locked Cumbernauld!

-Land-locked Cumbernauld.

How did you get into fishing?

For a laugh.

What's the appeal of bobbing around

in a small boat in the North Atlantic?

Every day is different.

There's a bit of a challenge to it.

And it's quite rewarding when you catch things.

-Is that a conger eel?

-Yeah.

-My goodness me, look at this!

An enormous eel.

Amazing. This is quite exciting, isn't it?

You never know what you're going to pull up!

A lot of crabs.

-Do you keep the big ones?

-Just the decent ones.

A lobster man is the most precise of fisherman.

And if the waters he fishes are dangerous,

he still has to place each pot if he's going to make a living.

But there is one way into a lobster pot and no way out.

-That's another creel coming in.

-Yeah.

Oh, look, we've got a beauty in there.

An absolute whopper, look at that.

Those are powerful claws, aren't they?

-Hey, I must be lucky!

-You're coming back!

Another beauty, look at that!

So, what's the biggest lobster you've ever caught?

7 or 8 kilos.

-7 or 8 kilo lobster?

-Yeah.

It must have been about the size of a dog!

Yeah, they're huge, you know.

They're very rare.

Look at the size of that one!

That's a beauty!

And so, with our catch safely landed,

I continue my journey, heading south to my final destination.

The tiny island of Barra Head.

Passing the neighbouring island of Mingulay,

I'm greeted by a simply stunning sight.

Hundreds and hundreds of seals!

That's incredible!

There must be hundreds of them.

I've never seen so many seals in my entire life.

And they're going crazy.

Oh, that is amazing.

Barra Head, also known as Berneray,

is just 1½ square miles of rock.

One 19th-century travel writer described how it sits

"far out into the Atlantic, exposed to its fullest fury,

"and generally inaccessible".

Yet these ruined buildings prove

that the island once sustained a population.

In fact, people lived here until the early years of the 20th century.

Reflecting on my journey so far,

it occurs to me that the people of these islands,

despite the odds, have held on to their culture and traditions.

But sometimes the struggle proved too much,

and that seems to be what happened here.

In 1911, the last residents abandoned the island.

But before they left their island homes for the last time,

the scene was captured by the lens of a camera.

Like Werner Kissling's remarkable film of Eriskay,

these images seem to belong to another time entirely.

The man who took these pictures was called Robert Milne,

but unlike Kissling, almost nothing is known

about who he was or why he took these photographs.

But they are the only remaining visual record of life here

and a fascinating insight into the people

who once called these ruins their home.

No-one lives on Berneray today and the wilderness has now taken over,

which I suppose is appropriate

for an island that's at the ends of the earth.

Join me on my next grand tour,

when I'll be heading to the Isle of Mull

to escape the hustle and bustle of the modern world.