Rathlin Island - 2015 style

Well I had a couple of weeks off blogging, as I'm sure you all know (Ed: eh?).  In those weeks I actually did some things, visited some places, y'know.  One was Rathlin, a great place to be in July, when the seabird colony is at its peak.

This year Missy wanted to stay over for a night, so my mate Dr Charles and his young one Kaci came along and made it a very enjoyable trip.  Lots of photography was talked - by the adults anyway.

We stayed in one of the guest houses on the island - not that you are spoilt for choice, with only a couple of hundred people normally living there.  But we landed on our feet with Alan Curry and his wife Hilary, who not only fetched us from Ballycastle and put us up for the night but generally looked after us very well indeed - more of that to come.  Here's Alan talking the head off some people in his wee inflatable, Alhamudillah ('All Praise Be To God').  I'm not sure if Alan is religious or not, but he was telling us his daughter studied Arabic, so I'm guessing that's the connection.

Alan, with Alhamudillah, Rathlin Island

There's a bigger 'proper' boat you can take over from the mainland, but it's nowhere near as much fun, and you don't get the benefit of Alan's local knowledge.

The other boat