Decline in yacht trade as summer departs

THERE have been fewer yachts and cruise ships visiting the harbour this week as the summer draws to a close, although the harbour has still been very busy with other traffic.

Around a dozen yachts visited, the furthest travelled being the Threshold from the USA, which arrived on Tuesday from Alesund.

One of the most interesting has been the sail training yacht Atlantica from Gothenburg, Sweden, which has been cruising the north isles. The wooden boat, which takes paying students who want to learn to sail, was built in 1981 but is an exact replica of an 1850s vessel.

Three cruise ships have came to the harbour during the week. The Kristina Regina arrived from Kirkwall and sailed to Invergordon, the Le Diamant came from Tørshavn and went to Kirkwall and the former CalMac ferry Hebridean Princess, now a small but very exclusive cruise ship, arrived on Monday en route to Kirkwall. Eight more cruise ships are due to visit before the end of the season on 19th September, including regular visitor Saga Rose which is due on Sunday.

On Monday the fisheries protection boat Jura came in for repairs and the tug Muria, which was towing a barge from Norway to London, stopped at Lerwick for engine repairs.

Regular visitors in oil-related traffic arrived all week, with supply boats, stand-by boats and diving support boats coming to the Greenhead base.

IT has been a very quiet week at Sullom Voe with only one tanker leaving the terminal. The Cosmic sailed for Portland, Maine, with 56,162 tonnes of Brent crude last Thursday.

Schiehallion is not expected to be in full production until the end of the month.

There were no Schiehallion imports or exports this week and no ship-to-ship transfers.