Pretty Phenomenal Puffins!

Today was a Bucket List day for me! 🌞y skies ✅, ⛴️ tour is on ✅, 🦅🦈🐳🐧 wildlife is our and about ✅!

Our morning started with a lovely breakfast at our B&B then we were off for a tour of the Treshnish Islands. The island is cared for by the National Trust of Scotland. The tour left from Tobermory, a lovely little port and capital of Isle of Mull. 💙🐬

Our first sighting on our way out to the islands was a sea eagle aka a white tailed eagle. We had the tiniest glimpse of a Minke whale and porpoise as well but no photos to show for it .

Once we reached Lunga (puffin island), we had nearly 2 1/2 hours on the island. I planned to try to get to the area where many other seabirds hang out as well but did not manage it....I kept getting distracted by these cute little birds! 😂

The area is marked off so you don't get too close. Puffins, who mate for life, dig little burrows in the ground for their ONE egg each year. No puffling sightings. They will only come out of the burrow in darkness until ready to fly off in August for their time at sea.

Sadly, the time went quickly and we had to head back to the boat. There is no dock built at the island. Instead, they use a pontoon ramp and hook up to as the boat approaches the island. Pretty cool.

After leaving the puffins behind, we cruised around Staffa Island. We only saw it from the boat but the waves corperated and we had a great view! Fingal's Cave, the main attraction, is formed entirely from hexagonal shaped basalt columns that formed from a lava flow about 65 million years ago. It is similar to the  Giant's Causeway in N. Ireland which we saw in 2023. 🎶 Felix Mendelssohn, who visited in 1829, wrote his Hebrides overture after a visit here after hearing the acoustics of the cave. 🎶

A lovely, lovely day!! ☺️

Side note:
We finally tried Irn-Bru. It is apparently more popular than Coke in Scotland! 😳 A carbonated, orange drink with a hard to describe taste so here's what Google says: "It contains citric acid, which most fizzy drinks have; this is the citrus-y ingredient included in lemon sherbert dippers. It also has quinine, which is responsible for the funky, bitter taste of tonic water."Leer más