If you remember from my last post we are in Kirkwall, Orkneys for two nights to wait out a gale. Weather intermittent sun and rain but the wind blew hard from the south for the entire time and since we were on the northern side of our dock we were being blown away from our mooring, well that we had doubled our mooring lines.

One advantage of being moored for two days was the opportunity to find the town’s laundromat and clean up a 2 week accumulation, bliss…

Left Norddepil, Faroes at 6am, all hands on deck to raise sails. Very fresh westerlies but a change coming in the next 36 hours so Gijs wanted to get to sea early to have a clear run to the Shetlands before the winds changed. All sails raised, a quick breakfast and on watch at 8. Breeze very fresh from the West and as our course was roughly East South East down came the normal jib and up went the large jib as well as the main and mizzen topsails, Tecla then carrying her full suit of sails; large jib, foresail, main and mizzen sails and main and mizzen topsails. It was a downwind run and the ship blasted its way through the swells and waves at between 8 and 9 knots all day.

Saw whales in the afternoon, two who appeared only momentarily a couple of hundred metres to starboard, fin whales I think…

It’s been a while since my last post, March in Kenya to be exact, and I’m going on the road again, or more precisely, on the sea.

One of the places that I’ve wanted to visit for a very long time are the Faroe Islands, which for those of you who aren’t quite sure, are located in the North Atlantic, SE of Iceland and NW of the Shetland Islands which are north of Scotland.

Rest of the week quickly fell into a rhythm of early morning shoots, late breakfasts, boxed lunches on the road, afternoon and sunset shoots, dinner and bed; repeat. The routine was only varied by the weather which in a matter of hours could, and did, ring all the changes on cold, windy, cloudy, sunny, rainy, snowy and back again.

If this description sounds as if it was not interesting or enjoyable, let me set correct that impression; it was very good fun and very hard work in equal parts and there was terrific sense of accomplishment in completing some of the more challenging shooting assignments....

Turns out we will have a local photographer, Peter Cairns of NorthShots as our location guide so after loading our two vans with equipment and photogs we headed out for the 4 hour drive along the side of Loch Ness to the Sligachan Hotel on Skye.

Old hotel, built in the 1830's with a long history as the jumping-off point for climbers of the surrounding Cuillin mountains. It's a wonderful, isolated spot at the side of Loch Sligachan with the Black Cuillin towering at its back. We will be spending 3 nights here with each day beginning with a sunrise shoot somewhere in the surrounding country, necessitating a 6:30 departure. Back to the hotel for breakfast at 9 and then out again at 2 for late afternoon and sunset shots returning to the hotel at 7:30/8 for drinks and dinner....