The Shetlands - Part 2

After a bit of a delay I finally have time to catch up with the blogs again. So after a trip to Lincolnshire for the Waddington ASirshow, followed by a few days in Northumberland and a visit to the Farnes, I can now finish my Shetland blogs, so where was I! Ah yes we had just arrived at Baltasound on Unst and seen the Shrike, so from there it was a 10 minute journey to our hotel.

After dinner there was trip out to look for Red-throated divers, but we decided to give it a miss as we were tired and were sure that we would get other opportunities.

Day 3 saw us get up for a pre-breakfast walk with David Lindo, it was a nice little jaunt with a few birds around although the only photo of note was this singing Chiffchaff:

After breakfast we set out to Hermaness NR and headed for the northern most tip of the British Isles. It was about an hours walk from the small car park (including all our stops to look at something) to get up to the headland, with lots of interest on the way:

Dunlin

Bonxies (Great Skua)

Sundew

Once we got to the headland we stopped and the coffee was quickly summoned out of my rucksack. We stayed a while and admired the Puffins:

 and a some passing Bonxies:

 a Rock Pipit

 and great views out to Muckle Flugga

After our rest stop we walked on a few minutes to the Gannet colony and stayed there a while:

 and plenty of Puffins too:

We then went back down to the mini buses and off to lunch and a nice Shetland Wren (sub-species):

After a late lunch we headed back towards Baltasound stopping off at Westing Pools to look for some rare Orchids, but whilst there we spotted two Red-necked Phalarope on the small lake just below us, we couldn't get close so after great views through the scopes a record shot:

We were delighted as these were our first ever Red-necked Phalarope and a very rare sighting on Unst and takes the pressure of the next days trip to Fetlar where better sightings are supposed to be had.
This was followed by a distant Golden Plover:

Before back to the digs and dinner.
That will do for part 2, part 3 will cover Fetlar and a Bonxie fest!