Sunday 18th October

A cold northeasterly wind was blowing today, which chopped the sea up and make everything feel very “end of season”. We found lots of birds feeding in groups here and there, and searched our hardest for fins underneath them but drew a blank today. There are a lot of auks feeding out there at the moment – guillemots and razorbills – both on the water and flapping past in groups. Still lots of gannets around, and weirdly a few random Manx shearwaters. There were plenty of seals hauling out on the island, including adult males and females. One of the males was extremely pale for a male, with a dark triangle of fur on his nose, and one of the females was the one with the heart shaped scar. This afternoon we sailed a really long way following groups of kittiwakes and hoping for some tuna action, but didn’t see any today.