Day 18 - July 29, 2022 - Brae - Eshaness

I will offer just a few observations about the Shetland Islands.  The people are friendly.  The food is great! The weather -- well, it's hard to say because we have been blessed with great weather (for the Shetlands), but I can say it is windy.  The Islands average over 50 days a year with gale force winds (that's greater than 60 mph).  It is also a wet climate, but they don't get an excessively great amount of downfall, only about 49 inches annually.  It just rains frequently in small amounts.  The temperatures range for the 12 months, from an average low of 36 degrees Fahrenheit to an average high of 56 degrees Fahrenheit.  Of course they do have higher and lower temperatures, but these are the average. In the Shetlands, you probably will not freeze in the winter or roast in the summer, but you might blow away!

 After another excellent Scottish breakfast, we boarded our mini-bus and headed to the north-west of Shetland mainland.  Our first stop was Mavis Grind.

Mavis Grind is a very narrow neck of land of Shetland Mainland parting the Atlantic Ocean to the west from the North Sea to the east. By Mavis Grind is the Northmavine peninsula joined to the rest of Mainland. is a few miles from the settlement of Brae.  Mavis Grind is just 35 yards wide at its narrowest point (It seemed a bit wider to me, but perhaps it was low tide). The name of the isthmus is from the Old Norse Maefeiðs grind, meaning "the gate to the narrow isthmus".  Mavis Grind is said to be the only place in the United Kingdom where one can toss a stone across land from the North Sea to the Atlantic Ocean. 

This is a stock photo showing the Atlantic on the right and the North Sea on the left.

Looking out into the Atlantic.

For an idea of our travels today, Mavis Grind is at the black arrow.  Brae, where our hotel is located is just to the right of Mavis Grind.  The map below shows the location with regard to all of Shetland.

After leaving Mavis Grind, we continued north and westward to Eshaness, and Eshaness Lighthouse.  This is on the coast just north of Steness as highlighted on the first map.  The scenery was beautiful and for the most part I will let the photos speak for themselves.

This is the newest of the lighthouses built by the Stevenson family.  This one was opened in 1929.

Look closely and you can see a white spot near the center of the grassy area to the right at the bottom of this cleft.  

It is a sheep which somehow got to the bottom.  It has apparently been there for several weeks and seems to be thriving.

All of those little white specks are sheep.  There are about 150,00 sheep in the Shetlands compared to about 23,00 persons.

After returning to Brae for lunch, we boarded the bus and road a few miles to the Sullorn Voe Terminal an oil and gas terminal with a local for commentary.  For me personally this was a total waste of time.

We then came back to Brae to visit the "Delting Galley Shed" to learn about a festival held on the Islands - Up Helly AA, a Viking inspired annual festival which is a big event.  Kay, Janet and Carl attended, but I came back to the hotel to work on the blog.

These photos Janet shared from their Up Helly AA session...

Carl the Terrible

Shield-Maiden Janet

We walked a short five minutes to Frankie's, the farthest north fish shop in the UK.  They have also won numerous awards for their food.  It is not a fancy shop but the food was good.  Kay and I had mussels and Janet and Carl had the fish and chips.  The mussels were great and the fish and chips looked the best of any I have seen on this trip (and I have seen a lot).

Tomorrow, we fly back to Edinburgh for two nights, then catch the train back to Aberdeen where we start the  second part of our trip.