Heather's travel notes: June 22 From St Columba to Fingal’s Cave

Our ship Polar Pioneer waiting for us to board

With archaeological evidence of human habitation dating back to the Mesolithic Age (9000 to 4000 BC), Oban was an ideal port to start our expedition of wild, ancient Scotland. Add to that lowering skies and craggy coastlines - we had a perfect introduction to Scotland’s Western Isles. Toss in a bottle of bubbles and chocolates (waiting for us in our wee cabin for our wedding anniversary) and it was a pretty good start!

Our first morning at sea brought fair weather and that was to follow us throughout our expedition. After an enormous breakfast, we wriggling into wet-pants, rain jacket, gumboots, hat, gloves, lifejacket and then over the top of all that, our backpacks plus walking sticks of course. After all that, we picked our way carefully down the gangway and lurched clumsily into the zodiacs - only to do that all again in reverse at the end of each excursion. We were off to visit Iona, a tiny island off the coast of Mull.

It was here in C6 AD that a group of Irish monks, led by St Columba, arrived from Ireland in leather-covered boats and established a monastery. So it was that Christianity spread throughout Scotland and England.

We were very fortunate to be travelling with a Scottish archaeologist and historian. She was also a brilliant weaver of fascinating stories, as well as having an encyclopaedic knowledge of the history of Scotland - a regular Dr Google. Talk about steep learning curves! Meso- and Neo-lithic Ages, the Bronze Age. The Vikings ‘invaded’ the Hebrides and other Scottish islands along their trade-cum-exploration route in C8 and after that for about 7 centuries a large part of ‘Scotland’ was under Norwegian rule. I didn’t know any of that - and so many other things!

Viking exploration routes 700 to 941

The Isle of Iona is a quiet delight. It has been described as a 'thin place' where the veil between the spiritual (heaven) and material (earth) worlds feels especially permeable, allowing for deeper spiritual experiences, prayer, and connection to the divine. It certainly engendered a feeling of peace as we wandered through the abbey grounds and cemeteries and passed the old nunnery. The abbey is one of the oldest Christian religious centres in Western Europe. It felt very special. The crosses around the abbey were quite interesting. They looked truncated but their cross beams could be extended to look like a more traditional cross, but in order to take the weight, a circle of stone was added. That design was later to become the style of the Celtic Cross.

The Book of Kells, an illuminated manuscript of the four Gospels, which most of us associate with Ireland, was created around 800 AD here in Iona and finishing at Kells in Ireland. It survived Viking raids, theft, and damage to its binding over centuries. I understand that the monks spirited it away to Kells when Viking raids were at their worst. Eventually during the 1650s it was moved to Dublin.

The Iona Nunnery was a place of tranquility. It is a well-preserved medieval Augustinian convent founded around 1200 by Reginald of the Isles for his sister Bethóc and during its lifetime, it was a significant religious center for women. A special place for me was the garden beside the abbey. It once produced the food for the abbey and its inhabitants as well as growing many medicinal plants. The monks, it seems, were knowledgable herbalists and healers.

We wandered the lanes near the abbey grounds before being rounded up to go back to the ship for lunch before our afternoon excursion which was to the uninhabited Island of Staffa (Pillar Island) so called because of its tall dolerite columns - much like the columns on the southern coast of Tasmania and Northern Ireland’s Giant's Causeway. We poked into the island’s Fingal’s Cave, famous for its amazing acoustics - and of course someone sang to prove it. The cave is known as Uamh-Binn, or 'The Cave of Melody'. In the common local imagination, it has always been linked to the Giant's Causeway of Northern Ireland. According to the legend, the two places are the opposite ends of an ancient bridge built by the benevolent Irish giant Fionn mac Cumhaill. We were to be regaled with many more legends and myths before our journey's end.

We then headed back out to sea to visit a puffin colony further along the coast. My heart sank when I saw the height of the cliff we had to scale, but it was worth the steep climb to watch thousands of adorable Atlantic Puffins landing and taking off again to fish out to sea. Absolutely wonderful to witness but the climb was physically exhausting - I was yet to get into my stride, still waiting!!