We are off to-day, it is blowing half a gale, but we are hoping it will drop off as X C Weather and Windfinder our preferred weather sites tell us, fingers crossed.

Overall this years weather has been pretty good, a lot drier with this East wind which is always good and we did not have the rain every one else has had (for a change).

So there will be a repeat of soime of yesterday’s photos but here is the story since the 21st of August. Nice to have the time to do this waiting on the ferry, hope the wait is not too long!!

This year it has been about Rona Venison . For sure the deer, especially the calves coming around the house are lovely, the mother here eating a cluster of rowan berries that had fallen from the tree in the wind. But we have a duty to manage the herd and to cull the surplus. Otherwise we would not be doing our job. The end result is our quality venison product. We have had good trade from Raasay House , Skye Wholesale , Donnie’s Tablet shed , not to mention The Harbour chip shop and the many boxes that we have sent across the Sound to Skye this season.

Our newly renovated larder and prep room have worked very well, giving us much more light and space. Easier to clean and store our equipment, excellent. We can send a frozen (under 5kg) box anywhere in the UK tracked, delivered in 24 hours for £14.65. The value of the contents of this size of box is usually around the £50 mark + or -. Best try a mixed box first then decide on what you like best for future orders. Contact us through our FB page or on my email.

We finished the larder just in time for the season opening and it has been a very busy building ever since. Some of the retrieves of the shot deer on Rona have been interesting (more over on the deer page). Thanks to Bryn for the early morning outing to Dhu Chamas to pick two up.

You may be wondering why I have a picture of a Burnetts van on here. Between 1978 and 1986 I used to go to Uist with a truck and Gordon Taylor was the bread van driver (I was the milk man) we had many adventures and stories, maybe in my impending retirement I will get a chance to write them down, happy days and although I had not seen Gordon for a long time, he was hard to forget!!!

As the month moved into September we had the usual suspects beating up their favourite Rowan Tree, interesting to see the deer browse this tree, plucking leaves off at the height it is. The tree survives, deer are the best ‘pruners’. More venison means yet more freezers. Although we are selling a lot of venison, when butchering we need lots of space, the venison business part of Rona has grown arms and legs this year for sure. This freezer was ordered on Ebay, I’m not too sure of Ebay but this dealer had really good feedback so we took the chance. Ordered Mid Week, it was in Skye Express’ depot Portree Friday, uplifted and delivered by MV Rona on the Monday, amazing.

We had a bit of North wind this year and every year there is a time when jellyfish must be at their peak and the beaches around Rona are jammed with them. Still in August this guest from Kuwait had an unfortunate accident, his trainers were very muddy and he slipped on the steps coming back from his walk. He was one of MV Seaflower’s customers. We got the call and attended, but could see it was serious although the casualty was very calm. We called Stornoway Coastgaurd and the Portree Lifeboat attended in no time. Stuart attending to the ‘customer’ very professionally. With pain relief they moved the gentleman onto the boat thereafter to Broadford, not a good way to end your holiday. Two breaks in his upper leg.

Finally in August we had a surprise visit from two Swiss sailors whom we had met 13 years ago.Ursula and Alex Zehnder, since their visit they had crossed the Atlantic to South America, headed North and came back via Greenland, Iceland then Scandinavia. Heading off from here to the boatyard then back to Switzerland. They are retired scientists from Cern. What a life!!!!

September, right at the busiest time Stacey and Grant our new residents arrived, in at the deep end. With a wedding coming up then the stalking it was going to be a baptism of fire. And so it was.

The Wedding

Despite the weather we had a great day. Lee and Mel have been coming here for many years and Rona is a very special place for them, so naturally what could be easier than organising a wedding on the remote Island of Rona. I could fill the blog with photos but best go to Lee’s instagram page or our Facebook Page and search for the photos in the posts, it is all there in glory(or was that gory) detail.

Needless to say it all went very well, we prepared the ‘Bothy’ and the food. The drink was plentiful and it went on until a late time, I can’t remember after 9pm!!!! It was a full day, with a lot of love and emotion, not to mention the men in kilts, plus the lovely service by Rona Burstow the celebrant and Grant Munro the piper.

The week after the Wedding, we started stalking with guests. More on that on our ‘Rona Red Deer’ page soon. Suffice to say it went very well and seems such a long time ago as I write this.

So the year is almost done, all the excitement of 2023 is past, but more could be coming, who knows. Autumn is trying hard to stop the winter appearing as the leaves are still hanging on the trees. The weather has been good since the stalking. But Storm Ciaran is blowing here to-day and the ferry is undecided at the moment.

Work goes on. Last week we took the moorings in, although a yacht arrived here last night!!!! Then tried to hook up to one of the marker buoys. The pick ups are all washed, checked and stored, we now await a diver in the spring to check what is under the water. . One of the boats is ashore, the deer are back to what they do best, eating. Whilst stalking we noted long lengths of fish farm pipe all around Rona, this one was particularly long so we decided to take it ashore, second length from the harbour (or just outside) this week. Many years ago our then ferry MV Spindrift struck one with his propellor and the engine nearly ripped a hole through the boat as it stopped the engine dead. The engine mountings taking the brunt of the force, not good.

Sunday on a day off (aye right) I spotted something strange around the septic tank, it was blocked, not a good way to spend Sunday afternoon. But it never ends, so we are looking forward to our break and hopefully the ferry will come to-day as I would like to attend the John Muir Trust meeting in the Aros Centre tonight, just to hear them justify their killing of deer and leaving the carcasses on the hill. Should be interesting.

And Finally

You don’t see many Dinosaurs on Rona apart from myself!!! A big thank you to Gill and Bryn for their two months input and help on Rona this summer, we know they really enjoyed it and we were thankfull of the help they gave that enabled us to catch up big time.

I’ll explain, Their Grandson has a thing about dinosaurs and whilst here they were telling him all about the Jurassic coast and about the dinosaurs on Rona, even riding a quad bike.