Shetland Fling
“Writing these stories on Shetland, I thought I’d better touch on our very first visit back in the early 1970s”
We decided to get haircuts! That’s how serious we were about our trip to Shetland! A haircut was a big deal in 1972! We’d been cultivating long locks for two or three years. But there was work to be had - and an adventure. So off we went to the barber!
FALL GUYS
We made landfall in the town of Lerwick around 8am and went straight up to the Employment Office. It wasn’t open so we sat on the doorstep in the sunshine, smoking rollie-ups, waiting for 9 to arrive. By 9.20 am, we were gainfully employed!
The view from the ferry as we made landfall. The only trees to be found on Shetland shelter between the buildings.
Shetlanders seemed glad to see us ‘Soothmoothers’ as they called us, arriving to work in the No. 1 industry in these parts; fish!
Oil had been discovered in the North Sea but it was going to be another three or four years before it made landfall on these northerly lands. Meanwhile, the herring season dovetailed neatly with student summer holidays so we were happily hired to start at Young’s Seafood factory the following day!
GREMISTA
The Böd of Gremista overlooked our free camping site just outside town.
Neil and I had brought a cheap tent and two sleeping bags. We hiked out of town and found some camping space with a sea view on the east side of Lerwick, aptly named Gremista!
There was a row of cottages overlooking the machair and we asked a lady for some water. The ‘auld wife’ couldn’t be friendlier, although a tad difficult to understand. The Shetland accent is fabulous, a mix of my native Dundonian and Goblinese for all I knew. But we did get the impression that us ‘Soothmoothers’ were welcome!
In the afternoon sunshine, I foraged for comestibles while Neil set up the tent and built a fire. I had the wild idea of making ‘seafood soup’ from the mussels and seaweed I’d gathered along the shore. Looking at the bubbling pot, we decided we’d better go into town for a pub dinner.
Commercial Street is Lerwick’s main thoroughfare with plenty pubs on offer.
THE SUN NEVER SETS
Meanwhile, back in our tent in Gremista, despite several beers, sleep eluded us. The sun never really sets during the Shetland summer. At around 2am, it drops below the horizon only to rise up again an hour or so later. By 4am it was full-on sunshine. And the pub was closed!
That morning we made our bleary way for our first day of work at Young’s Fish Factory. Thankfully, we were offered a bunk that night in the infamous Mercat Huts next to the factory. We’d already packed the tent hoping that would be the case!
This is the site of the original Mercat Huts, now a swish new Business Park.
ITCHICOO PARK
“A few weeks later, the rest of Dundee had joined us... ”
As the weeks went by, every Monday morning Neil & I would go down to the harbour to welcome another emigre off the ferry, long-haired louts from Lochee, Loons Road and the lower levels of our home town of Dundee. Before long, pretty much our entire hippy clan had shifted north to take up posts in the fish-packing frenzy and a bunk in the Mercat Huts.
ALL-YOU-CAN-EAT
Packing fish for a living wasn’t so bad. We could eat as much of the ‘Silver Darlings’ as we wanted so that saved a packet. Life in Lerwick was cheap and cheerful.
We lived in the red building in the background for a spell, 20 smelly fish-packers sleeping in a huge room with one cooker between and an endless supply of smoked herring!
On the conveyor belt, we met kids from all over Scotland and sang the pop & rock songs of the day as we placed the smoked herring into wax-lined boxes ready for shipping south. Rod Stewart had only just come out with ‘Maggie May’. I remember trying to sing ‘Itchycoo Park’ by the Small Faces as we slapped the slippery cargo into their cardboard containers. The Aberdeen girls thought we were fabulous! Well, I thought they did anyway!
THE GRAND PLAN
The ‘Grand Plan’ was to make enough money to go travelling around the globe but that idea soon faded into the drink and feminine influences as they both applied their inevitable, irresistible charms.
I was the only one to try and keep that end of the bargain and left Shetland at the end of the summer, theoretically bound for India (I only got as far as Istanbul). The rest of the gang remained ensconced, some of them for several years!
Shetland would never be the same again!
