Far Out Yet Still Close

No man is an island, as John Donne wrote, but north of the border, you can live on one. Scotland's. The Shetland's is good like that, with 15 inhabited ones to choose from. We are here in Fair Isle, Britain's most remote one.

Thanks to the popularity of the TV series Shetland, we had it on our radar as a place to visit this year. Of all the 115 islands in the archipelago, just a few—15—are inhabited. We're going to Britain's most remote island: Fair Isle.

First, Sarah and I fly into Lerwick, Shetland's mainland, via Edinburgh, Scotland. Next, we get a PCR test for COVID (Think Positive, Test Negative).

Then, we continue on to Fair Isle — population 55, now 57! What a place to self-isolate during the global pandemic!

At first, I thought Fair Isle was the Faroe Islands (that's Danish and in the sub-Arctic Circle). But the Shetland Isles are in the North Atlantic, closer to Norway than to Aberdeen. Go Vikings!

FAIR ISLE — Are we there yet? Being there...

There are two choices for transport to reach the island — take it or leave it.

The first involves a 20-minute straight run aboard a 'puddle jumper,' a 7-seater fixed-wing twin-engine prop plane — a heart-in-the-mouth flight up-close and personal with the pilot and his control dashboard.

If this link is canceled due to fog, wind, or just plain bad weather, then it's the ferry — a converted fishing vessel — the only other alternative. A notoriously rough 2-hour crossing aboard the island’s ferry, the Good Shepherd IV. Sometimes the North Sea is even too rough for the ferry.

Living Off the Grid and On the Edges

Fair Isle is not connected to the National Grid. Energy is generated on the island by the Fair Isle Electricity Company (FIEC), using wind turbines and solar, stored in a battery backup system.

No man is an island,
Entire of itself;
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main;

If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less,
As well as if a promontory were,
As well as if a manor of thy friend's
Or of thine own were.

Any man's death diminishes me,
Because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee.