Friday we went to the Council Hall and a lovely lady spent time searching for Brad's family on ScotlandsPeople, which saved us a lot of time and money.  She told us to get out and enjoy the sunshine, so we drove up to Upper Barvas, and found the croft that my gg-grandfather John Matheson was born on, that his father and grandfather worked before him.  The current leasee, Murray, was wonderful, he spent an hour touring us around the property, explaining the croft system, and telling us what he is doing with the land.  He gave us a bottle of homemade beer, some peat and 3 warm eggs from the henhouse for our breakfast.  He also weaves Harris tweed, and gave us a demonstration and some scrap ends of cloth.

We drove on and stopped at the Blackhouse at Arnol, then the Blackhouse Village in Guiranin (I know that's probably spelled wrong!).  Learned a lot about the way of life of the crofters.  It was a very hard life.

We stopped at the Callenish Standing Stones next, very mysterious and not a lot known about them, as they don't seem to be marking anything astrological.

We drove back to Stornaway to pick up the information from the Council office, then dinner at the Arts Club restaurant.

We catch the ferry from Stornoway to Ullapool at 2:30 this afternoon (Saturday, nearly a 3 hour crossing), then stay at Holly Lodge B&B in Strathpeffer tonight.  I'll post pictures then.