St. Martin's, Isles of Scilly 14/4/17

A great day out with Jake and Ian. We left Ovingdean at 2.30am and arrived in good time in Penzance at some point during the early morning for a MacD's breakfast. It was then time to board the trusty Scillonian III where thankfully for Ian the crossing was a smooth one. A few Manx Shearwaters and large pod of Common Dolphins were the only bits on offer. Once at St. Mary's quay the decision to book a faster boat over to St. Martins was very wise as this allowed us roughly three hours on the island, rather then barely two hours if we had chosen the regular boat.

It was a brisk half-hour walk up to Daymark from Lower Town and with two Scilly regulars by my side, there was no chance of getting lost. When we finally reached 'Bread and Cheese Cove', a downhill jog led us to a Scilly lad who allowed us to look through his scope at the stunning male Rock Thrush. The bird showed admirably for twenty minutes (at times getting in a tussle with some Wheatears) before flying further around the cove becoming more distant until it was finally lost. After a packed lunch and a rest we slowly wandered around to Higher Town quay seeing only a couple of Great Northern Divers.

At 3.45pm the same speedy boat picked us up and we joined the Scillonian III at St. Mary's quay soon after, where another smooth crossing was had back to Penzance. The journey home was long and tiring and I arrived at 12.30am.

Another successful Scilly day twitch and thanks to Ian and Jake for making it a fun day. What made it even better was finding out that the Rock Thrush was Ian's 500th species in Britain, and Brighton getting another win towards their Championship title!!

 looking down towards Bread and Cheese Cove