Why on earth would this article have no pictures actually from St Kilda itself ? The pictures are from islands in the inner and outer Hebrides, which are a long way from St Kilda, which is the point of the piece - except for the first picture which is not sourced, but it does not look like St Kilda to me. Really bizarre thinking on the part of the Times here.
57
My wife and I visited St. Kilda some years ago while we are on a Lindblad cruise. Apparently we were fortunate because the seas were not rough. We were able to walk among the abandoned buildings and wondered what it had been like when people lived there. I may be wrong but I think the people made some income by selling bird feathers for pillows. We saw sheep grazing and wondered what use was made of them. We did see the military facility but no helicopters which is just as well. I agree with other people that the article could have been much better if there were more photos and more focus on St. Kilda rather than other places in Scottland.
31
"Powell, born in 1905, is one of the very few great filmmakers that Britain has produced." Oh, really ? Just one of a "few" ? Hmmm.
27
Skye was a glorious place to visit. I wish we had time on our honeymoon visit the Outer Hebrides. But Skye and the Red and Black Cuillins were a wonder to behold. We even got a sunburn!
13
We stayed in Harlosh on Skye last summer and visited Dunvegan Castle. One of the historical artifacts on display at the castle was a mail transportation seal bladder used by people in the Outer Hebrides or St. Kilda to communicate with the people on Skye. Just pen a note, stick it in the bladder, and throw it in the ocean and hopefully it gets to it's destination - and is found on the shoreline. Precursor to text messaging! Hopefully at some point we'll be able to visit the Outer Hebrides on one of our travels. Overall, we found Scotland, and Isle of Skye to be beautiful, and pretty remarkable.
22
"Hello, Kiloran, hello, Kiloran." My favorite Wendy Hiller movie, too!
15
My husband and I had the good fortune to get to St. Kilda as part of an adventure on a schooner built by the owner to take people who enjoyed sailing. Went to the pub there, but they were out of beer because their provisioning ship had wrecked months before. We gave them beer from our boat! Truly an isolated, interesting place.
32
I would love to know why the author has not one photo of St Kilda. They are all Mull. Perhaps forgot the camera or too sea sick to operate it!
36
How odd that most of the accompanying photos are of places other that St. Kilda. Here are my photos from a fortunate visit last summer: https://photos.app.goo.gl/xR5bnRjaxwVwofno9
90
Odd. The author commented on the many photos he took, but none of the labeled photos is actually of St Kilda. Did his camera fall in the water on the return boat ride?
30
As I read the last paragraph describing the helicopters and radar antennas, I felt like one of those cliff climbers whose rope has suddenly given way...
14
I Know Where I'm Going is a wonderful film. About a woman who very much knows her mind and is going to marry a rich man. Then she winds up in this wonderful place in a storm. Wendy Hiller is pretty much the only person who could play the main character. I keep humming the theme song "I know where I'm going and I know where I've been".....
14
my family is from scotland and we love I Know... it's one of my favorite movies since childhood. i had a mad crush on Roger Livesay... and one of my other favorite movies is Matter of Life and Death (sometimes called Stairway to Heaven).
8
I also wondered why there were so many pictures of other islands but not St Kilda when it's an article about St Kilda. If you have 'em, let's see 'em!
42
If you'd like to see St. Kilda take a look at my Tweet from earlier today.
https://twitter.com/JimRichardsonNG/status/993509441738805249
9
See May 7 correction at bottom:
An earlier version of the headline with this article referred incorrectly to St. Kilda; it is an archipelago, not a single island.
4
This story would have benefitted greatly from more photos!
42
and a map.
27
I lived briefly in Wick, Caithness (northern tip of mainland Scotland) and I felt like IT was the end of the world. I often wandered out to the cliffs and looking out, it was easy to imagine nothing beyond but ether. Still one of my favorite places on earth. I will put St. Kilda's on my future travel list!
11
A couple of hundred less words describing the trip their (substitute arduous, nerve-wracking, difficult, tiring, etc.) and get the reader there, then follow it with dozens of more photos instead. The writer goes on about the littered harbor when one photo might have said it all. Loved the evocative portrait of the woman in the hotel, was this an islander dreaming about a sunny summer day that never came? etc etc etc
And all this talk about birds and eggs and none to be found in the photos. Instead a long history of the film-worthiness of these isles... I give this travelogue a C-...
40
I agree with the grade but I'm less certain about what this article actually is; travelogue, nostalgia, movie review, criticism of misleading pictures...
It's anybody's guess.
I'm afraid this piece doesn't do any of the possible intents very well.
30
Wonderful account and written with a keen and intriguing brilliance by Mr. Mukherjee. Thank you!
11
Fascinating article, and stunning photos - but I second Dee, in commenting about the need for at least one map showing the Hebrides and their position in relation to mainland Scotland. I would have greatly enhanced an otherwise good presentation!
32
Lovely article. I, too, have long wanted to travel to the Hebrides after having seen "The Edge of the World" and "I Know Where I'm Going!" The latter is possibly my favorite P&P film. It's a great weather film. As Raymond Chandler said when he saw the film, "I've never seen a picture which smelled of the wind and rain in quite this way." Someday, I'll be the judge of the scenery myself when I finally see St. Kilda and the Isle of Mull.
16
How lovely! On our trip to Scotland 15 years ago, my husband and I very much wanted to go to Tobermory as my late FIL had named a boat for the island. Alas, the ferry said it could get us over, but probably not back the same day. We had to settle for a short ferry ride to Cumbrae, the name of FIL's previous boat.
Western Scotland is so unspoilt and lovely. We took the trip on the Jacobite steam engine train over the Rannoch Moor. Just breathtaking.
16
I've visited many of the locales featured in "I Know Where I'm Going!," which is one of my all-time favorite films. Will have to check out "The Edge of the World." The Western Isles have a haunting attraction for me. Wish the illustrations for this article had included a map.
25
It is beautiful.
I'm sure it could have been made more accessible. That would have provided access to health care and so forth too.
The problem is the same as in so many of the tiny towns being abandoned across America -- there is no way to make a living. A few people could be resident authors, or run a radio station, or something else tied to the wider world, but that can't be everyone.
As a retirement community, the demands to be tied in are even greater. Likewise tourist.
I can see how people could be able to live there. I just can't see why a community would do it.
Too bad, because it is beautiful.
19
Maps, please!
62
Nice picture by Mitch Epstein but that doesn't look like a dry stone wall. If it were a dry stone wall (like you see out on St. Kilda) you'd see holes between the stones where the wind can get through. And I'm wondering why you did a story about St. Kilda but then used a bunch of pictures that don't look much like St. Kilda from other islands?
47
Agree about the walls. They are not dry stone walls in the classic sense in the British upland country. Drystone walls, as well as having the gaps you mention, are usually field or property dividers, in lieu of fencing or hedges, not support structures for roads or tracks.
11
Indeed. And why on earth take up precious space with a photo of one corner of a hotel room, hardly evocative of a "No Man's Land"?
10
I've actually been there. It is truly the where the world ends, and the strangest place I have ever been. The sheep are bizarre--left overs from the Bronze Age and untouched since then. What a place. The wonder is not that it is now abandoned, but rather that it was ever inhabited in the first place. Well worth a visit, although sometimes it is accessible and sometimes it is not. . . .
64
If this is the strangest place you have ever seen, I conclude that you have not been able to travel much. Of course, most people don't have the privilege of traveling like you and I. The world is literally full of places that are much, much stranger than a Scottish island. I can send you a list of truly strange places if you are interested.
8
I can only imagine the locals cursing the need to survive on tourism when you arrive!
7
This is not just any Scottish island. It is many miles from anywhere (check the maps), inaccessible for most of the year, and abandoned except for the Bronze Age sheep. Have you been there?
3