Saturday: St Mary’s

The weather forecast predicted rain all day, so our initial plan of circumnavigating St Mary’s was aborted in favour of a shorter walk up the west coast. We climbed up to Harry’s Walls Battery, some kind of defensive rampart against the French, the construction of which was never completed. Further on we got to the ruins of an old settlement at Halangy Down and had a look in Bant’s Carn, a 4000-year old chambered tomb.

On the way back we had lunch at Juliet’s Garden. It was busy, but luckily they had a table indoors as it started to rain heavily.

On the way back to town we stopped to listen to a reed warbler making a racket near Porthloo pond. We had a few glimpses of it in the reeds.

In the afternoon we went into Hugh Town to buy some pork chops and veg for dinner. It seems all of the places to eat out have been booked up long in advance. There is the promising prospect of lobster and chips from the chippy one evening, though.