While anchored overnight at St Kilda, surrounded by hundreds of thousands of seabirds, the Emma Jane had a very small, unexpected visitor. Head guide Lynsey was woken in the early hours by Jasmin, the Stewardess on board, as she set about her preparations for the day. When Jasmin arrived in the saloon to start getting the breakfast service ready, she quickly spotted the unexpected tiny guest — a puffling! The young puffin had evidently boarded the vessel during the night, after fledging from its burrow. It had clearly spent some time exploring Emma Jane, leaving behind a trail of "evidence" on the bridge, in the saloon, and even down into the guest cabins. We assumed it must have become confused by the lights and vessels in Village Bay and lost it way on its first journey to the open sea.
A team effort was required to carefully move furniture and catch the puffling. The puffling would only be around 6 weeks old but it was clearly strong and healthy. As soon as it was safely secured, after a quick photo, Lynsey expertly released it back to sea, where it immediately took to the waves. It was a pity it was too early for our guests to see the puffling at close quarters, but it was important to release the bird as soon as possible..
Young seabirds, when fledging, can sometimes become confused by artificial lights from buildings and vessels. As a company, we make a concerted effort to reduce light pollution whenever possible, particularly during the seabird fledging season. Fortunately, in this case, we were able to safely catch and release the puffling back to sea.
This was our third annual cruise with this excellent family business, and our first on the Elizabeth G (previously we had been on the Lucy Mary), and we are already booked back on the Elizabeth G in 2026 to the Flannan Isles. Getting to St Kilda has been on our bucket list for a long time, and when the weather turned bad two days before we embarked, we were resigned to being lucky to even get to the Outer Hebrides. During the early bad patch, skipper Iain worked his magic to keep us away from the rough seas and winds, whilst finding us idyllic inlets to explore and overnight in, whilst Trinity our steward and Izzy our chef kept our minds off the weather with great food and great service. Onboard and on our daily trip ashore, our wildlife guide Gill kept finding loads of wildlife and plants to wonder at and be educated on, so spirits were actually quite high despite the weather, which alleviated slightly a day or so in and allowed us to run across to the Outer Hebrides, where the pattern of great food, great service and great nature spotting continued. And then, late in our ten day window of opportunity, skipper Iain gave us the great news that the weather had improved to the point where a dash out into the Atlantic was feasible, but only for a one night stay. The next day, and with an extra early start, we hunkered down while the Elizabeth G used her stabilisers to the full in what was still a bit of a swell to us landlubbers, such that we arrived a few hours later “shaken but not stirred” at St Kilda. After a quick lunch, we headed ashore for a magical 5 hour visit, with incredibly clear and sunny skies overhead from the moment we arrived on the island, with rain only starting to appear as we headed back to our floating hotel for our well deserved dinner. The following morning we toured the rest of the archipelago, and marvelled at the stacks and the impossibly large numbers of seabirds everywhere.
John and Aileen MacLean: 31 May 2025St Kilda and the isles of the Outer Hebrides