One reason that I love going to Howmore in South Uist – the second-largest island of Scotland’s Outer Hebrides – is that it reminds me of aspects of my childhood. Growing up in my home village in Ness near the Butt of Lewis at the northern tip of the Western Isles (the other name for these islands), there were always several thatched buildings nearby, the occasional home but more frequently barns and byres, all roofed with straw harvested from local crofts. These still exist in Howmore. During one of the first occasions I travelled there, I saw a group of men led by famed sea kayaker Brian Wilson thatching the roof of the youth hostel within the community, standing on the edge of the building’s whitewashed walls as they laid – unusually – each strand of heather perfectly in place.
There was much else that was wondrous about that community. Together with these old structures, there was an array of churches. Among the latter is the east gable of Teampull Mor or the “large church” – or St Mary’s – a ruin dating back, it is said, to the 13th century. Not far from it stands another church, one of the few Protestant kirks in South Uist’s largely Catholic community.
