Skip to content

2024 Outer Hebrides Day 11 – Stormbound at Harris Tweed

  • by

2024 Outer Hebrides – Fuzzy Water

Day 11 27 August – Stormbound at Harris Tweed

Paddlers Keith S, Frankie A, Debbie H (Team Mercedes) Catriona H and Gary B

Another day when the weather was just too much weather to get out on the water. Team Mercedes became Team Mercedes plus with some transfers in from Gary’s car for a day of alternate activities starting with a trip to the Harris Tweed exhibition.

When you are a sea kayaker who sews then really a must-visit venue. Harris Tweed is an amazing fabric steeped in the history of the islands and is one of the most desirable wool fabrics in the world. The process of making the tweed is fascinating and the palette of colours from the dyed-in-the-wool process is stunning. So, wandering around the exhibition and learning more about the processes of warping, weaving, finishing and stamping was a true pleasure for me. Possibly less so for Keith, Gary, Debbie and Catriona. High-quality wool is also rather expensive, so I made do with bags of remnants. A sustainable solution that is now well on the way to becoming a crazy pair of Harris Tweed trousers.

A collage of different fabricsDescription automatically generated
A trip to the Harris Tweed exhibition.

We left the exhibition and travelled the rest of the Golden Road to visit a brewery for those in search of further beer supplies for personal consumption and gifts. The brewery boasted a very nice restaurant so that was lunch sorted alongside a couple of flights for the beer seekers. to choose their favourites.

A sand dunes with a cloudy skyDescription automatically generated with medium confidence

A visit to the Scarista standing stone and a walk along golden sands was the perfect post-prandial activity. Sanderlings were a point of interest and much googling for identification, orange wellies meant that Debbie was the only person who could claim a Tuesday paddle in the sea.

A stone in a grassy field by the waterDescription automatically generated
The Scarista standing stone

Returning to the car all footwear was examined closely for sand and sheep poo before being allowed to enter the vehicle to return to the cottage to find out what our fellow expedition paddlers holidaymakers had been up to.

The rest of this post has been hidden and is only visible to logged in members. Click here or tap the login tab on the main menu or enquire about membership.