PETER HART – AFFAIRS OF THE HART
THE NORTH ATLANTIC DIARIES
(This feature originally appeared in the November December 2015 issue of Windsurf Magazine. To read more features like this first, Print and Digital subscriptions are available. Prices include delivery globally for 10 x issues a year!)
Autumns in Ireland and Scotland are like Forest Gump’s box of chocolates, you never know what you’re going to get – but they’re always ‘chocolatey.’
“ It’s really kicking off over there in Coll tonight. It’s completely lighting up the night sky. I didn’t know it had such a big town.” Said Steve, having just joined us from making a phone call on the pier outside the Hynish centre on Tiree (the only spot where you get a signal).
“It doesn’t” said Bill. Coll is the neighbouring island of Tiree, population 220 humans and a handful of corncrakes.
“Oh – in which in case in must be the last glimmers of the sunset.”
“What? At midnight, in October … to the east of us?!”
The penny dropped. As one, our group leapt to their collective feet, sprinted outside, screaming “NORTHERN LIGHTS!!”
It’s something I’ve always wanted to witness ever since I saw Bill Forsythe’s magical film ‘Local Hero.’ Don’t say you haven’t seen it. It was the favourite film of everyone who was conscious in 1983. It tells the story of a US oil company trying to buy off a small Scottish fishing village so they can install a refinery. They send over MacIntyre, the young exec., to offer the locals untold riches for their land so they can exploit it. But he falls in love with the place and the lifestyle (and the hotelier’s wife) and doesn’t want to leave.
It was both hilarious and poignant. The oil company boss, played by a very mature Burt Lancaster, was actually more interested in whether MacIntyre had seen the aurora borealis than whether he’d clinched the deal.
The crowning scene was a very drunk ‘Mac’ with a fistful of 10 pence pieces, calling Burt in the middle of the night from a red phone box and trying to describe the scene above his head.. “I’m watching the sky sir … it’s doing some amazing things … it’s white and green and red, oh no sorry, that’s the phone box … oh – and now it’s blue!”
So there we were, dropped into our own ‘Local Hero’ moment, in a totally unblemished corner of Scotland with no light pollution, on the clearest night imaginable, watching the best light show in the cosmos. And Tiree still has red phone boxes.
A week before that on the 1st of October in Donegal, an incredibly high pressure over most of the UK had left us in a vacuum over a mirror Atlantic and topless in 25°C. temperatures. We launched the SUPs into Sheephaven Bay, one of the most stunning stretches of coastline in the world, punctuated by endless crescent bays, forests and caves. Would the dolphins leave us alone? At least 20 of them slalomed around us as they herded shoals of Pollock into rocky corners before filling their metaphorical boots.
They dove in unison, surfaced in unison and emptied their blowholes in unison. I swear it was better rehearsed than any Florida dolphinarium … and absolutely free.
The northern lights and dolphin show occurred during my annual four week wave tour of Donegal and Tiree. It’s a trip I’ve been making for a number of decades. If I have a problem with it, it’s in explaining the concept to the uninitiated and offering a clear idea of what might happen.
Imagine a conversation with a washing machine salesman who in answer to your questions about whether a particular model gets clothes clean, answers: “Good point sir. Sometimes it can be amazing … but you never know. The Washamatic 32000 is bit of surprise package. But all I can say sir, is that whatever happens, you’ll have a lovely experience.”
It’s not a great pitch is it? But that is the exact same story with windsurfing trips to the north Atlantic.
Will there be waves and wind? Which is the jumping tack? Will I finally be able to nail the loop and sort out my bottom turns. Will I perish from hypothermia?
Ummm … there’s a very good chance you will do a lot of windsurfing – but then it might also be perfect for a SUP tour and a surf. As for jumping tacks … well that depends on the wind. Last year it was mostly westerly but the year before that was NE and a bit of south. And the waves? Well they could be anywhere between 3 inches and 30 feet. And what about warm clothing and a very thick wetsuit you ask? Yes, yes … as a precaution. But as my old Gran would say: “it‘s a difficult place to pack for.” So you also better bring some factor 50 suncream because last year a couple got horribly burned feet and noses. But what I can guarantee is that every day will be good for something and during the week, something extraordinary will happen. Like what? I don’t know – but it always does.
The joy of not knowing
The best wedding I went to was my brothers – because it was memorable – not for the vows, flowers and food, which I’m sure were tear-jerky, beautiful and delicious; but because towards the end of a very long reception I was mistaken for a tramp and locked up by the hotel under manager until someone less the worse for wear could identify me. It’s the unexpected and the unlikely that thrill us and imprint events deep into the memory.
My best windsurfing trips have also been made memorable by events other than the focused act of trying to complete a new or better move.
We can’t guarantee Northern Lights or the appearance of a private dolphin pod – but when you place yourself in a stunningly remote area facing a wild, untainted ocean and head to a different spot every day – then the doors are open for wild and wonderful events.
And wasn’t chocolate mentioned in the intro? Well the third most memorable event of the tour was the appearance of Gerry, a professional chocolatier, who arrived with a van full of designer sweet-meats. Now that really was special.
PH Peter Hart 10th October 2015