We decided to leave a day early to try for some mainland birds on the way home and therefore switched our tickets to the Stornoway - Ullapool ferry instead of the Tarbert - Uig crossing. This proved to be an excellent choice with the best sea watch I have ever encountered. Final tally of the birds we saw over two hours included 50+ Bonxies, 20+ Arctic Skuas, 2 Long Tailed Skuas, 2 Leach's Petrels, 1 European Storm Petrel, 120+ Sooty Shearwaters, Manx Shearwaters, Fulmars, Gannets and Guillemots. Cetaceans spotted were Bottlenose and Common Dolphins and a possible Whale sp.
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| Spot the Sooty Shearwater |
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| Dolphin |
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| Dolphins |
Our next destination was the Cairngorm base station, where we parked the car and ascended for two hours to the slopes of Ben Macdui to view the resident Snowy Owl. This has to go down as one of the best birding experiences of my life and a huge thank you to Matt for taking me to see the bird even though he had only been a couple of weeks before.
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| Snowy Owl |
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| Snowy Owl |
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| Snowy Owl |
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| Snowy Owl |
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| View from the Cairngorms |
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