The Mysteries of the Isles 2 Coast


The Mysteries of the Isles 2

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We're about to embark on a voyage of discovery.

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Our destinations are the glorious islands of the British Isles.

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Jewels set in spectacular seas

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with a treasure trove of secrets in store.

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This is an epic adventure to explore the mysteries of the Isles.

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My own magical mystery tour starts here on Orkney.

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Orkney is actually a collection of 70 islands.

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The harbour at Stromness has been a settlement

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since the time of the Vikings.

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The sea was the highway the islanders needed to survive.

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Stromness was once a jumping off point for global adventure.

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The town was connected to the wider world

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by mighty sailing ships stopping over in the port.

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If only we could've been here in the great days of sail.

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Well, how about that?

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I'm hoping to hitch a lift on an island-hopping ride.

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Every year, a fleet of tall ships

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races around the harbours of the globe

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recreating historic trade routes.

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This year, they're passing through the Northern Isles of Scotland.

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The community here was transformed by the tall ships.

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They brought wealth, but they also took men away.

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It's a classic dilemma for all small isles.

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When the wider world comes knocking,

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is the attraction of island life strong enough

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to keep communities together?

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-Permission to board, captain.

-Welcome aboard.

-Thank you.

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To explore the effect these vessels had on the islanders,

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I'm signing on as a crew hand

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aboard the Norwegian tall ship, Sorlandet.

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My destination is Shetland

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but I'm planning to stop off at tiny Fair Isle.

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It barely registers on the map, but the community there thrives,

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even though many other Scottish isles have been abandoned.

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It's a mystery how those on Fair Isle manage to hang on.

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I wanted to discover the secrets of their success.

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With a favourable wind, we'll get to Fair Isle within two days.

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We're under motor power now,

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but soon it'll be all hands on deck to unfurl the 27 sails.

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The islands of Orkney are disappearing below the horizon.

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I'm just putting myself in the shoes of the islanders

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who boarded ships just like this to sail to new lives in faraway lands.

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It must have been hugely exciting.

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But their excitement was tempered

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by the prospect of hard graft and so is mine.

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They've just taught me how to coil a rope,

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which is actually quite simple.

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It would be if you were standing on your kitchen floor at home.

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This floor is moving around all over the place.

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Then, before we've really got going, apparently, it's time for bed.

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The ship runs on shift work and I'm on an early.

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But sleep doesn't come easily when the boat is lurching

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and there's only a few hours of darkness.

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It's four o'clock in the morning and I've just got out of my bunk.

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I'm on the four to eight watch. I've got to get up on deck.

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Boat is going all over the place.

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I think they put all the sails up in the night.

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Like sailors of old, I'm keeping a log, a video diary of my voyage.

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We're far out to sea.

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We've been blown along under a rig full of sails. Look at this.

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What a sight.

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This is what square rigging looks like,

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under a lot of sail out in the North Atlantic.

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Pretty impressive.

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There's precious little time to take in the view.

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Bad weather is blowing in and we've got to crack on towards Fair Isle.

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Mind your footing, mind your footing, people sleeping below.

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While the ship swings into action, the captain calmly plots our route,

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heading for a small speck of land.

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Fair Isle looks like a tiny rock in the middle of the ocean

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completely on its own.

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Why do you want to take the ship to Fair Isle?

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-There is barter with the inhabitants of Fair Isle.

-Barter?

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Yes, where you trade things that you have for things that they have.

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They used to do this with the ships in the old days.

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They trade their woollen mittens for fish hooks,

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oars and things like that.

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What have you brought from Norway

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to trade with the inhabitants of Fair Isle?

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We've bought some goat cheese, some brown, Norwegian goat cheese.

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OK. Do you think they'll like that? Do you know they like goats cheese?

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I think it remains to be found out.

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The only issue we have now, is if the seas pick up too much,

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we'll have an issue with anchoring at Fair Isle.

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This tall ship is too big to get into the tiny harbour on Fair Isle.

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Instead, we're planning to drop anchor offshore.

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the bad weather could scupper that plan.

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I've just come off watch

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and Fair Isle is just off the ship's rail.

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It's the most remote inhabited island in the British Archipelago

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and I've been wanting to set foot on it for most of my life.

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Just seeing it is exciting,

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but we don't know yet whether we're going to be able to go ashore

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because there's a strong wind and a big swell.

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We're just going to have to wait and see.

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Weather permitting,

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I'm hoping to meet the small community here on Fair Isle

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to discover how they've kept going when other isles were abandoned.

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It's just one of the marvellous mysteries to explore

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in the Scottish islands.

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Shrouded in cloaks of sea mist,

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the Western Isles can seem like a shadowy, secret world.

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Fertile territory for the making of myths.

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Spectacular sights and tall tales

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captivated a new breed of tourists around 150 years ago.

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They departed from new gateways to adventure, like here at Largs.

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Following in the footsteps of Victorian travellers,

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Tessa's searching out the truth of an island tale

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that seems much stranger than fiction.

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In the late 1800s,

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the sleepy town of Largs was a thriving tourist destination.

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The golden ticket for travel hungry adventurers of the Victorian age

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was a grand tour of the Western Isles.

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The new craze for paddle-steamer voyages

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drew people here from far and wide,

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especially those obsessed with a scientific sense of discovery.

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One such traveller was French author Jules Verne,

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a founding father of science fiction.

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In 1879, Verne, in search of new wonders,

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travelled to the Western Isles.

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The man who wrote Around The World In 80 Days

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and 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea

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was inspired here to write a book about a natural phenomenon.

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Part fact, part fiction.

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The mysterious and elusive green ray.

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In the book, Jules Verne describes a fleeting green flash of light

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that reveals itself just as the sun sets.

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He called it Le Rayon Vert,

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meaning the green ray, more commonly known as the green flash.

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The novel tells the story of a young woman, Helena,

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who, having read of the green ray,

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sets off on a voyage to the Western Isles

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to try and see it herself.

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Legend tells that the green ray destroys illusions

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and will allow her to find true love.

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Joining me as I begin my voyage into the islands, is Ian Thompson,

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who has studied Verne's book.

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Does the green ray really exist? Will we be able to see it?

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Yes, the phenomenon certainly exists.

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We don't know that Verne himself witnessed it.

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There's nothing in the correspondence or diaries

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to prove that, but it certainly does exist and has been witnessed,

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photographed and I have here an example where we see,

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just for a few seconds, this green flash or green ray.

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That was what Verne's heroine was after.

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And it's what I'm after too.

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Like both Jules Verne and his heroine, Helena,

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I'm boarding a steamer to travel to the Western Isles.

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The green ray is very interesting in Verne's huge output,

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because it's the one novel that follows exactly

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his own travel and his travels in Scotland.

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He adored all the myths and legends and history of Scotland

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and he regarded it as more or less his ancestral home.

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Why, in particular, are the Western Isles a good place

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for seeing this green flash phenomenon?

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The western coast of the Western Isles

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offered a completely unblocked view of the horizon and sunset.

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So, in other words, here, where we are right now, is no good.

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You can't see over the horizon.

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It's clearly not an easy phenomenon to capture.

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It does require very specific atmospheric conditions.

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What do you think our chances are?

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Pretty slim.

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To have any hope, I need to push on to the open sea.

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Like Helena, I'm determined to witness the green flash.

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Has anybody else here seen it though?

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-I wonder, Sir, if you've ever heard of the green ray.

-I haven't, no.

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-I don't suppose you know anything about the green flash, do you?

-No.

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I haven't, I'm sorry, I don't.

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-Have you ever heard of the green flash?

-Oh, yes, I have.

-Have you?

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In fact, I've seen the green flash.

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Just as the sun goes down, just as it disappears over the horizon,

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there's a green flash.

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It's quite amazing to see it.

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Reassured, I continue heading west. It's a race against the sun.

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Back in Verne's day,

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the fashionable sets in London, Paris and Berlin

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saw the Western Isles as the last wilderness of Europe.

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It's clear that Verne too was captivated by this place.

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As he made his way to the lochs and out to the islands,

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natural wonders like the Corryvreckan Whirlpool fuelled his imagination,

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as did the imposing island of Staffa and the wondrous Fingal's Cave.

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With sunset approaching, the paddle steamer leaves me behind.

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I've arrived at the island where Verne's heroine got her chance

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to see the green flash.

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But she had better luck than me.

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I've got a view of the horizon, but the clouds have closed in.

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The sun's nowhere to be seen, the elements are against me.

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But I was brought up in Scotland, so I am not daft enough

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to have left the green flash to chance. I've got a Plan B.

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'I am meeting Johannes Courtial,

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'who is giving me my very own green flash demonstration.'

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How does a green flash actually work?

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There's the sun,

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and, when it's setting, the light from the sun reaches the observer

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by entering the atmosphere, where it gets bent.

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When the sun sets on the horizon,

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the light goes through a bit of atmosphere a bit like a prism.

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-I happen to have one here.

-So if the atmosphere is like a prism,

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what effect does that have on the light?

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What this does is it splits the sun's light

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into, effectively, a rainbow.

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The red bit is at the bottom, the blue bit is at the top,

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and as the sun sets below the horizon,

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this rainbow disappears.

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The blue is at the end, so that would set last,

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but the green flashes green and not blue,

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and that's because blue light is scattered by the atmosphere.

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This is why the sky is blue,

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and that's why, in this rainbow,

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blue is missing and then the top colour is green.

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The last colour that is disappearing below the horizon is a bit of green.

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-When that sets, that's the green flash.

-Eureka!

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-Can you re-create the green flash here?

-Well, we'll do our best.

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We have all we need, I think. We have a fish tank with angled sides.

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This will act like a prism.

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'To make the tank mimic the bending power

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'of the Earth's atmosphere, we fill it with water.'

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'Add powder to scatter the light, and finally a torch, our sun.'

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I can see some form of rainbow here.

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I do see it actually, a kind of blue-y green rim.

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But I thought that that green flash was meant to be at the top,

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the last bit of the sun to disappear, not on the right-hand side.

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That's because our atmosphere is standing on its side.

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This way is up.

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'With a little magic touch,

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'it starts to look a lot more like the setting sun,

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'complete with mysterious green flash.'

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Given what we've been up against, I think you've worked wonders.

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This is amazing. I actually understand it.

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'And though I may have cheated a little,

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'with the help of a German scientist and a plastic fish tank,

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'I've joined the lucky few to have seen

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'the rare and mysterious green flash.'

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I'm sailing aboard the Norwegian tall ship Sorlandet

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on a voyage between the northern isles of Scotland.

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We've arrived at Fair Isle, a wonderfully remote community.

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I've wanted to come here for years,

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since I first heard about it as a boy.

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But tall ships are too big for Fair Isle's tiny harbour,

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so we need to find calmer water to launch a boat.

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We seem to be sailing to and fro among the shore of Fair Isle.

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-Is there a problem?

-In the north end there where the other ships are,

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there's a bit of swell, so now we're at the south end of the island,

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we're going to pass it, turn the ship around, come back,

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and see if we can anchor just about where we are now

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and a little bit closer to shore.

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And it ought to be safe.

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We are hoping to drop anchor off this remarkable island,

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still home to about 70 people.

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A tiny stepping stone between Orkney and Shetland,

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Fair Isle is surrounded by an ocean of sea.

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3,000 miles over there is Canada,

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and hundreds of miles that direction is Norway and mainland Europe.

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Fair Isle is sat in one of the biggest shipping lanes in the world.

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Arriving by trading ship helped solve the mystery

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of how small island communities used to support themselves out here.

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Whenever the people on the island saw a sailing ship coming past,

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they would try and sail out or row out to meet it.

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'Today, we'll try and meet them, and barter with the islanders.'

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Step in quickly.

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'But getting off a big ship isn't easy.

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'These are tense moments.'

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Give us a line.

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That was one of the most exciting embarkation moments

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I've ever had in my life.

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We are now going to head for the shore through a pretty impressive swell.

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Fair Isle looks pretty remote on a map,

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but it feels more remote once you've arrived at it.

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Finally, after years of anticipation,

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I get to set foot on Fair Isle.

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This is a big moment for me. I feel quite emotional about it.

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ISLANDERS CHEER

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Thank you! Thank you!

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Thank you very much. That's a very nice welcome indeed.

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'In the past, islanders would exchange fresh goods

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'and their famous knitwear for brandy, tea,

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'flour and other essentials from the trading ships.

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'They've been frantically knitting fishermen's hats,

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'which they hope to barter.'

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This is the famous Norwegian brown cheese.

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This is Linie Aquavit.

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< Over there, over there.

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I think we'll have to open that tonight for all the knitters first.

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'It's easy to see this as a bit of fun,

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'but exchanges like this happened for hundreds of years,

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'keeping island communities alive.'

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Fantastic! CROWD CHEERS

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'Barter complete.'

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I've just an hour or so left to explore this fascinating island.

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There's a mystery at the heart of this community that intrigues me.

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What made them stay when life became difficult?

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Not so long ago it was touch and go here on Fair Isle.

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I've got an article here from the Shetland Times of 1956.

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The really dramatic passage in this article says,

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"The report indicates that, by this summer,

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"it is possible that the island will reach the point of no return

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"as far as manning essential services is concerned,

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"so that evacuation will become inevitable."

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In 1956, a film crew came to capture the dying days of Fair Isle.

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The tall ships had gone. The island was increasingly isolated.

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Young men were forced to leave to find wives.

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The population was just 47.

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But the proposed evacuation never materialised.

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So how did Fair Isle come back from the brink?

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I'm meeting Anne Sinclair to share memories of life back then.

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Look at that.

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-So that's the lighthouse just down there.

-Yeah.

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Here's some Fair Isle knitting patterns.

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-They haven't changed at all, have they?

-No. It's called traditional.

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And that, I think, is my Auntie Molly's hands.

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You can recognise your aunt's hands?

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Yep. They're the same as mine.

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Anne's parents were from Fair Isle, but like many others, they'd left.

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When the call came to help save the island, the family returned.

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-Which year did you come back?

-'57.

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-You came back at the most difficult time in the island's history?

-Yes.

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Dad especially was really quite keen to come back here.

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They said, if young farmers didn't come, they'd evacuate Fair Isle,

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so that was the final thing, and Dad said, "Right. Let's go."

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Why did Fair Isle survive as a community

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when so many islands off the north coast of Scotland

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became depopulated and abandoned?

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I think it was sheer determination to a certain extent.

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But I think a lot of people saw this was a good way to live,

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and there were a lot of young families that came back

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and it stayed fairly young, and I think that's important.

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A lot of people have the idea,

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"Oh, Fair Isle, get away from it all.

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"It'll be like a magic place."

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And in fact, we're all human beings same as everywhere else.

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It's a magical place but it won't solve anybody's problems.

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They won't get away from anything.

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Right now, I've got to get back to the tall ship waiting for me

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offshore to continue my magical mystery tour towards Shetland.

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I'm leaving Anne with a DVD of memories

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in exchange for a Fair Isle cap.

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Right. Now you put it to the side.

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Ah, that's warm!

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A typical Fair Isle fisherman.

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I'm not tough enough to be a Fair Isle fisherman.

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I'm en route for Shetland, following in the wake of islanders

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who left a familiar life on land for the mysteries of the sea.

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To find out what lay in store, like them,

0:23:030:23:07

I'm travelling 19th-century style.

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Back then, ships like this carried island men to adventure

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across the sea, but it wasn't a free ride.

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They often had to work their passage.

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I think I better do the same.

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At sea, a boat becomes an island in itself.

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Everyone needs to pull together and tow the line.

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While some jobs are mundane, others are exhilarating.

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I'm about to have the biggest adventure you can have

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on a tall ship, which is going up in the rigging.

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I've got a camera mounted on my nut,

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and the man whose taking me up is David,

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who has a lifetime's experience on sailing ships.

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-David, take me up.

-If you go first.

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Here we go.

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This is...

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Already the deck is receding below me.

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Whoa, gosh, the wind is strong.

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The wind is one third stronger up here.

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The ship's moving all over the place. This is really difficult.

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-Is this where I clip on?

-Yes, please. On the wire itself.

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-That's it.

-Clip done. This is the moment. Up and over the edge.

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Looming out over the deck.

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Arms out straight. Push with your feet.

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One foot on the platform, two feet on the platform. I'm up.

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Expletive deleted. Oh, man. What a sight. What a sight.

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To be up in the top of the rigging of a tall ship

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looking out across the ocean,

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the sails billowing with wind, totally timeless moment.

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This is exactly what seafarers for hundreds of years have seen.

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This is a voyage of real highs

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and lows, snatching sleep when you can.

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There's one very odd thing that happens, which is your body clock goes completely peculiar.

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Eh...right now, I have no idea what time of day it is.

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It must be evening, cos I slept for two hours.

0:25:430:25:47

I got out of this bunk. I was sleeping fully clothed, like now.

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Then I ate the meal, which turned out to be supper.

0:25:510:25:54

Getting a bit tired. In fact, I'm now permanently tired.

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But the ship doesn't sleep.

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There's an important tack at midnight.

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Everyone's needed to move the massive sails.

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-Are you ready to do this?

-Yeah!

-Yeah! Very good.

0:26:110:26:16

It's all gone badly wrong. We've got some of the sails on one side of the ship,

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some on the other. We got caught by the wind.

0:26:230:26:26

Now there's a rush on to try to get the ship straightened out.

0:26:260:26:28

Suddenly, everyone stops. The crew must rethink.

0:26:360:26:41

A palpable air of tension on the deck now.

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Pull it towards me. Pull it towards me.

0:26:450:26:48

Here we go.

0:26:480:26:50

Despite our efforts, the ship did more of a three-point turn than an elegant tack.

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Orkney was where I started my island adventure.

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Four long days and short nights later,

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the edge of Shetland sits on the horizon.

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Journey's end.

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We've arrived off the Shetland Islands,

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we're waiting for the pilot, the big seas have abated,

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it's as calm and almost as flat as the Mediterranean,

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and the Shetlands look as welcoming to me

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as they always have done to voyagers coming in from across the ocean.

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A wonderful sight.

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I've made it.

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And I'm absolutely exhausted.

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But what a way to arrive in Shetland!

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For a rare gathering of square riggers from around the globe.

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Permission to come ashore.

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Lerwick is absolutely packed, it's as if the whole island

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has poured down to the quaysides to see the ships come in.

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The tall ships are on their annual race.

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This is just a brief stop-over for them but for me,

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the experience of life under sail will linger long in the memory.

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Friendships forged at sea,

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formed from the shared experience of pulling together.

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Making landfall on new shores,

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with a warm welcome for a stranger from down south.

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CHEERING

0:28:560:28:58

I've travelled far, but always felt at home.

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Our islands hold a mysterious attraction.

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Their magic spoke to our ancestors, and it still calls us.

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One thing that unites us across these isles

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is that we're all islanders,

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whether we live on rocks in the sea that are very large or very small.

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Maybe the joy of coming to the coast is that here,

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we can still experience the very essence of our island story.

0:29:220:29:28

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

0:29:450:29:48

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