Spotting seabirds on Anglesey

Who are you looking at?

 On the very western tip  of Anglesey a  series of  steep cliffs rise  dramatically from the  Irish Sea. These cliffs  are homes to vast  numbers of seabirds  including puffins,  razorbills, kittiwakes  and guillemots. An  overnight visit to the  lovely seaside village of  Trearddur Bay allowed  us to zip a few miles up  the coast to the RSPB  South Stack bird  sanctuary to view some  of these in their glory.  The puffins had gone off for a wander somewhere else unfortunately but there were thousands of guillemots chattering away on the cliffside. Here is a group of three old birds in discussion, the one with a white ring around her eyes is a bridled guillemot, the reasons are unknown but about one in twenty of them has this distinctive feature. Apart from gossiping on the cliffs they spend more time diving than they do flying and have been known to reach depths of almost 600 feet! There were a few razorbills around but they have very similar colouring to guillemots and from a distance we couldn't tell which was which. A little further away on the island that houses the lighthouse we spotted a large colony of kittiwakes which are a type of noisy seagull with a short neck.

Come and put a nickel in.....

Our evening meal at Trearddur Bay's swish Ocean's Edge restaurant was rounded off with a Kelly's ice cream at the Sea Shanty where we spotted an orchestrion in the foyer of the cafe. Prior to the advent of juke boxes companies such as Wurlitzer, and in this case Seeburg, devised coin operated music machines. This one, made around 100 years ago, has a piano inside together with pipes and percussion instruments. We're talking here about the golden age of pre-electronic music making and well before the advent of the Hammond organ. From steam powered fairground organs to the mighty Wurlitzer a huge variety of inventive contraptions were produced to entertain the masses. Sadly few examples of these still exist. (The Great Dorset Steam Fair would be the place to see fairground organs - apparently they have the biggest gathering of them in the world, forty at least. Maybe a treat for 2024?)