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END OF AN ERA…..START OF A NEW ONE
For those who are not already aware, The Ullapool Fish Shop and DM Seafoods retail operation will be closing down on Friday 8th March 2024, which will be our last trading day for both shop and the retail van.
Both Mairi and I would like to thank all our customers, past and present, who have used us at both the shop and the van.
It’s a bitter sweet time for Mairi and I… the end of a business that was built up from zero. Most importantly I have to thank Stephen Couper (SRC Foods) for what started out as a random conversation with an idea 18 years ago. When we took the shop on 4 years ago it was our intention to open a Seafood/Fish & Chip Cafe… Then Covid Struck … Finally, we are now able to do this and if all goes according to plan, we will open on Monday 25th March.
Keep an eye out for more info in the Ully News and on Facebook.
Slainte David and Mairi

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REGIONAL & COUNTY FINALIST FOR INDEPENDENT BOOKSHOP OF THE YEAR
Ullapool Bookshop is absolutely delighted and honoured to be a Regional and Country Finalist for The British Book Awards. As we celebrated our 20th birthday in 2023, this news comes as a wonderful cherry on the top of our cake, to complete what has been a pivotal celebratory year for Ullapool Bookshop.
Many thanks are due to our wonderful bookshop staff, the owners (Katrina and William Thomson) and also to our loyal
customers and distributors too. Without all of these, this nomination would not have been possible, this is an absolute honour and we are thrilled to be in such amazing company, along with the other finalists.
The Regional and County Finalist from 10 Independent Bookshops in Scotland is announced on March 12th by The Bookseller (after having each entry carefully considered by a team of judges) and the winner of this goes forward to a grand ceremony in London in May at The British Book Awards.
Katharine Douglas, Ullapool Bookshop Manager

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CONGRATULATIONS!
On 29 February 2024 Watch Commander Stuart Edwards retires after 40 years service with the Fire Service in Achiltibuie.
Stuart joined the Achiltibuie Volunteer Fire Unit on 29 February 1984 as a Volunteer Fire Fighter with the Highland and Islands Fire Brigade. The title Volunteer was soon changed to Auxiliary to better reflect our status. The Unit saw many improvements over the years culminating in the move from borrowed sheds and garages to a purpose built fully equipped Fire Station in 2002.
In 2003 following my retirement Stuart took over as Sub Officer in charge of Achiltibuie. Stuart received his 20 year Long Service medal in 2004 from Fire Master Brian Murray. In 2005 the Brigade title changed to Highlands and Islands Fire Service and then in 2013 became part of the Scottish Fire Rescue Service. In 2014 he reached his 30 years and on Thursday he formally retires with the 40 year clasp to go with his 20 year medal.
Stuart is the first Fire Fighter in the 51 years we have had a Fire Service in the parish to reach the 40 year mark.
Well Done Stuart!
Alastair Armitstead

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WILL VIGAR: Poem and Video
The Ullapool News has been sent the following poem by Will Vigar who has recently completed a PhD in Creative Writing. He has been greatly inspired by the scenery on his travels around Scotland, particularly the North West.
“Remembrance Sunday 2019” is from ‘Vague Wisdom’ which was published by ‘The London Magazine Editions’ last November.
The written form of the poem is a “hai bun”, a Japanese form that intersperses prose passages with haiku.
If you can, watch the video on Youtube which was made by his friend Mark (working name “Mark Automaton”).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0weuhcMyfE0

Together they work as WVMA. The video for this poem comes from an album called “Shortwave Eights” which was released at the beginning of February (https://wvma.bandcamp.com/album/shortwave-eights)

***

Ullapool – Remembrance Sunday 2019.
1
The sun absent.
The moon a papercut.
Hibernal lowery.

An unexpected crunching woke me. Footsteps on gravel. A faint gruffling noise as something brushed against the chalet door; a light clack-and-scrape against the mullions. Contented grunts sounding as a hart reached to steal a mossy treat from beneath the step.

Across an asphalt scar,
indifferent to our presence,
prickets came to dine.

The jetty, dew frozen to its surface, dips its feet, reflecting the still-quivering water’s edge. The air, so cold, so tight, that a well-placed pin could burst the atmosphere into shards of brittle oxygen. The lake had frozen beneath that papercut moon so quickly that a wavelet could still be seen threatening to break. Caught… apprehended by weather.
A single-track road flanked by quartzite whorls; muricate gorse and pervious moss winds through The Lonely Lands. A serpentine polecat flashes its ermine underbelly as it runs to safety. An aquiline danger silhouetted against whetted blue skies loses its prey.

2

We arrived to silence and ate breakfast at a waterside café watching the loch breathing through condensation that shimmered on painted on silicate. The streets filled with well-dressed and solemn people, drawn towards the harbour.

Klondykes – long gone –
have returned the harbour
to hushed sound.

The crowd grew, blocking the roads and the front. To the west, the focus. A cenotaph. A solemn finger, pointing to the heavens. Ullapool exhales as a Pipe Band punctuates the susurrant silence. The harshness of the pipes filtered by numbed air; softened by frozen breath. The mountains by the loch providing sublime reverberation.

The dulcet brume-filtered
drone whispers its lament
over black, rigored waters.

As the service concluded, I glanced toward the Brigadoon hills. Mist slow-raced to the loch – urgent but languid – before being absorbed into its waters. The reconnection of mist and loch, a reunion of mother and child. A metaphor, perhaps?

in the mists of life ….