Animals and random observations

Apparently there are lots of otters in Shetland. Otter spotting locations are even marked on tourist maps. We went to quite a few of these.

We saw no otters but plenty of seals popped their heads up to look at us.

This one is an Arctic Bearded seal, an unusual visitor, who decided to rest all week on a boat ramp in the middle of Lerwick.

The inter-island ferries look like whales with open mouths spewing out vehicles onto the wharf, and then swallowing up more cars.

 There are sheep on the beach.

 And a fish on this hill. Look carefully, it is outlined in the heather. No one knows how it got there.

Shetland is mostly bare hills covered in heather, grass and peat.

Trees are so rare that these ones on a farm are marked on the tourist map. 

There are a lot of Shetland ponies in Shetland. After all, this is where they originated. They are no longer used as pack horses or work in coal mines and can only be ridden by small children, but they are still bred here. 

 The little piebald decided to come over to say hello.

This beautiful boy was my favourite. He was on an open hillside above a sandy beach with a flock of ewes and lambs, no other ponies. When he saw me he marched purposefully straight up to me.

I didn't have any treats to feed him but he seemed to enjoy having his ears rubbed and his photo taken.

We arrived in Shetland by 12 hour overnight ferry, a ship half the size of Tassie's Spirit ferries. We had a very smooth sailing but sometimes the North Sea sailing is so rough they actually have the chairs chained to the floor so they don't fly around. We paid a bit extra for sleeping pods thinking we would be able to lie down flat to get some sleep. We got no sleep, as they just recline more than airplane seats and were so uncomfortable. They should be called anti-sleeping pods. Today we are taking a one hour flight to the city of Aberdeen.