See this link for the new web site with lots of info for anyone interested in renting Tom’s bothy at Achmore. See the Map link above for location of this and other places on Scoraig.
There is a gallery of photos around Scoraig on the site too.
Dear parents/carers,
It is good to be back. The children have been busy bees and the garden and classroom are looking lovely.
Dates for your diary:
IEP’s ,for some pupils, pupils will be sent out next week and, as always, you will be invited to come in to school and discuss these with me. I am happy to answer any questions that you may have.
Margaret Beaton, Hostel Provision, is hoping to come out on Tuesday 18th June. You are invited to come along and meet with her. Details to follow.
Thursday 13th June- Drumming event. This will be lots of noise and lots of fun. It will take place in the Secondary building and some pupils and staff from Milton school are coming over to join us. We look forward to meeting them. Many thanks to all who organised and funded this event.
Wednesday 19th June- A Parent Council meeting has been arranged for this date at 4 p.m. in the Primary School building. All welcome to attend. Please let Joany know of any items for the agenda, in advance so that she can send out the agenda prior to the meeting. I am happy to discuss the timetable and look at resources as requested.
The Feis ladies will be returning to Scoraig to do a whole day of music on 25th or 26 th June.
Cinema nights will resume when the nights get darker ! The board is not good unless it is dark. In the meantime enjoy spring and summer. Hopefully the sun will shine.
We will be sorry to say goodbye to Alex at the end of this term. She is a valued member of the school and we will all miss her. We wish her well at Ullapool and are sure that she will meet lots of new friends.
Many thanks to all who supported the school in my absence. Since my return the children have all been very helpful and considerate.Thank You
Many thanks to Susan for organising the recent Scottish Ambulance visit for pupils. It was very worthwhile and we learned a lot. The children also got a chance to use the Annie dummy. They gave sensible answers and did all of the practical activities very well, showing that they had listened. The ladies were very impressed.
Thanks to Bill for ferrying us across the water to our swimming lessons and to all in the STG who gave funding which allowed us to pay for the bus journeys this year. Sharing with Badcaul was a successful transition event as the children got to know one another more.
Thanks to all who helped at the wind turbine workshop lunches and who donated money to the school to pay for the drumming. This will be a spectacular event and we are all looking forward to it.
Thank you to Martha for doing a great job of transforming our garden. In line with the curriculum for excellence the children are doing active learning and lifelong skills. We hope to have enough vegetables for a good pot of soup !
Do not hesitate to contact me if you wish to discuss anything.
Best wishes,
Alison
Scoraig Summer Market
1:00 – 3:00 at the Secondary School
Home Grown Produce, Home spun and naturally dyed wools, Tweeds, Drawings, Photographs, Felts and lots of skilfully made arts and crafts.
The Bunkhouse Cafe
Open 12:00 – 4:00 Serving tea, coffee, soup and filled rolls and home baking.
Catch Bill’s ferry at 11:00 and return at 4:00 ( ring Bill 07747630249 )
or walk in along the loch side.
A great day out exploring this remote and peaceful peninsula.
I believe Wolves and Bears were mentioned and advocated by some speakers.
What fun, well, fun if you are safely housed in your nice city and can then swoop off to the countryside now and then. No harm can come to you as long as you stay in or near your car. And keep the windows shut.
Not so good if you are a sheep or new born calf on the hill in winter weather I imagine, or it could be rough times if you are a small child walking to school, or even perhaps in the playground. Probably a bit shaky if you are a shepherd checking your sheep on the hill.
Now I’m all for restoring the ecosystem to the way it was but I suggest that we should work back through the things that have most recently been wiped out.
I think we should start off with a bit of a major gesture and get smallpox going again. That would be a start and might reduce the population a bit. All those mumps and measles which we had when I was a child weren’t very effective but TB (Or Consumption as our great grandmothers called it) could help a bit. Nothing else comes to mind at the moment, so when the above scourges have got properly established maybe we should get the wolves and bears cranked up.
In this way there would be a MORE LEVEL PLAYING FIELD and city dwellers would cop it as much as those who live in the country and have spent the last 1000 or so years making it a reasonably habitable place.
Oh, I forgot sabre tooth tigers but I fear those are rather hard to come by.
Alan
Scorraig
Ewan Young of Ullapool Community Trust got in touch with the SCA to offer support and to suggest that we individually complete a Broadband Questionnaire. This might in time lead to improved internet services for the residents on the peninsula.
Download the questionnaire as a word file here.UCT Broadband Survey and send your completed return to UCT.
(from Alison Barr)
As some of you know I came third, highly commended in the international Baker Prize and was invited to go to the Skeabost Hotel, north Skye, where the Skye reading room is based.
Having been given personal leave by Highland, Nick and I went up there and stayed for two nights at a cosy little studio near Edinbane then moved on to the big old hotel on the shores of Loch Snizort. The studio was at Knot, which was appropriate as the poem was all about ropes!
On the Tuesday evening before the event I met the other writers. Richard Neath of the Reading Room made us very welcome and bought us drinks. See the Skye reading Room site for more information:
http://theskyereadingroom.wordpress.com/
On Wednesday afternoon I was interviewed on Cuillin FM by Charlotte Johnson. Yesterday part one of the Reading Room programme was broadcast and part two (with me included!) goes out next Thursday 7th March at 3pm. If you want to watch it here is the link:
http://www.cuillinfm.co.uk/ If you miss it live you can still stream it!
At 7 pm the event started. There was an audience of around 50, including well known writers and the judges. Everyone said that it was hardest to go up first but in fact I much preferred this. I so enjoyed reading my poems and although I was a little nervous beforehand I just got up and did what I had to do. I had a slot of about 15 minutes.
Afterwards I was a bit dazed as people were asking me who my publisher was and what my site was. Needless to say I don’t have these things organised! It was interesting to note the other 4 winners were all full time writers, one was with her agent, one had attended St Andrews and one Harvard! I was my natural self and would say that my poems were original and heartfelt.
I was very proud and had a great sense of achievement. My certificate is up on the bookcase here at the Dome. The poem,’ Invasion’ will be published in a Reading Room anthology and also in Northwords, a free poetry magazine which goes out all over Scotland. Look out for the Spring edition. West Highland Free press may also take up the story in next Friday’s edition.
http://www.northwordsnow.co.uk/
I got the idea for the poem whilst walking the shore below the Dome. Every time that I visited there were pieces of rope lying around. When I revisited the beach they had shifted, disappeared or new ropes and tangles had arrives. I envisaged them here on Scoraig, out across the islands, Britain, Europe and the world. The subject is familiar to us all. So, here is my poem. Enjoy- the Invasion of the ropes, born here on Scoraig!
Ropes have minds of their own.
They migrate to one another,
corkscrew across salty seas,
multi- coloured DNA spirals,
congregate in bundles.
Some stranded on beaches,
brilliant Bluefire jellyfish,
long tentacles trailing.
Some, washed up swirls,
mini-galaxies
draped over black rocks.
Some, net-intact,
vibrant orange, fisherman yellow,
concertina diamond jersey patterns.
Some brittle with age, sun baked,
degraded, weathered, weakened,
at a touch breaking into powdery filaments.
Assorted lengths float around
deep sea orifices and eddies,
hang around in crisscross rope shoals.
Swirling, shifting slowly,
catching penetrating light rays.
Natural hemp, woven, spliced, pleated, knotted,
rough ends frayed like lions tails.
Nylon, chemical blue, orange, yellow,
white, polished, ends melted.
Lost overboard from moorings, nets, rigging lines,
drifting for days and decades.
Thin, thick, twisted cords, curled, snake entwined,
hitches, stopper knots, plaited.
Where do they all go in the end? To rope heaven?
To a giant universal rope brain with rope synapses
pulsing out messages like an international homing beacon?
Universal assembly harvested from ice scattered northern seas,
warm southern waters.
Modern art flotsam birthed from tankers, P and O’s,
Nile sloops, Hebridean yachts and local fishers,
Dover to Calais Norfolk line, Mediterranean cruisers,
shiny red funnelled Cal Macs, Japanese sampans.
Big tangles washed up on beaches all over the world,
where eyes cast over them and ghost ships cast off.
About The Great Tapestry of Scotland
There is a new blog to record and share our experiences as we stitch our panel for The Great Tapestry of Scotland.
Our panel (sketch above) depicting Fingal’s cave, is part of a series of 150 that will all illustrate different aspects of Scottish history.
They will be displayed in the Scottish Parliament in the summer of 2013.
We can also create out own personal Scoraig design in the 3 panels at the bottom.
Scoraig Community Association
Members meeting 20.1.10
Present: Laurence Glass (Chair) Cathy Dagg (secretary) Hugh Piggott, Jytte Piggott, Malcolm Alston, Aggie Brudenell, Jill Beavitt, Bill Burstall, Nick Lancaster, Andy Cox, Jessie Millard, Pat Sherrington, Susan MacSweeney, Joany MacGuire
1.0 Finances
There is not much to report. About £1000 has been spent on the road job over the past 2 months, and it should be possible to get another £1000 before the end of the financial year, so we are on track to spend the full road budget with the assumption that we will get the same amount again in the next financial year, but not an increase. There should be enough money in the account, together with funds raised at the forthcoming Burns Night, to pay for work on Badluarach pier shed.
2.0 Road Job
It was noted that resurfacing the 3m stretch below Nigel’s gate cost £150 for chippings. A discussion on the optimum depth of chippings ensued, with 3 inches being preferred. Work is still held back by Chris’s speed of producing chippings, but it is hoped he’ll speed up now that he has been blasting again. More chippings have been ordered but Chris probably needs reminding. (Bill will do so) It was noted that the correct cost of chippings is £86 +VAT per load. Laurence suggested a new technique of pre-mixing sand and gravel in a mixer, and a discussion ensued on the most efficient way of doing this. It was noted that nothing has been done yet about the bottom corner at Chris’ although Kevin had expressed an interest in doing the work.
3.0 Trailers
There has been some response to the note put out about unwanted trailers at Badluarach jetty. Some may be suitable to provide parts for a cobbled together road menders trailer. A second reminder will be sent out before trailers are brought over, and there will be a pause for owners to reclaim them if they wish. This will be done when the days get longer and probably in conjunction with work on the Badluarach pier shed. The aim of the exercise is also to get rid of scrap from Badluarach side, so Karl will be approached about this.
4.0 Mooring Boat
The Serena has a split in the transom that could do with repairing. The wooden boat will be tarred by Aggie when the weather gets warm enough. Laurence will take the pump to Caley Marina to get the new diaphragm.
5.0 Lock-up Garages
Dougie and Gail wonder if there would be interest in lock-up garages at the bottom of their croft. They would build them and rent them out. We will get more information and prices before advertising further.
6.0 Solar panels for Topher’s shed
Djinni may be upgrading and replacing her present panels which would be suitable
7.0 Boat Parking
The shifting of boats to west of the pier is successful in creating plenty of room to the east, and the SCA thanks everyone who has done so.
8.0 Attracting new residents
Apologies for referring to young families in the note, as it should be made clear people of all ages will be welcomed.
Cathy suggested that the people who are trying to sell property are having no luck, and that a trial period of Scoraig life for a few weeks or months would enable people to make an informed decision about moving here before having to make the large financial commitment of buying, and that it would be in the long term interest of the sellers to allow their properties to be rented. SCA could act as agents,
Reservations about the proposal included:
Suggested alternatives included:
Major problems for newcomers perceived as lack of work opportunities
The following actions were agreed:
Letter to house-owners suggesting letting scheme (Lathams, Paul and Sheila, Kathryn Cooper)
Targeted advertising in publications like Practical Self Sufficiency
Produce fact sheet including accounts of personal experiences of recent newcomers.
Next meeting March 24th.
Cathy
