Comet 4 – Human nil.

I’ve been trying, and failing, to see and photograph Comet A3. A once every 80,000 years visitor. The last time it passed by Neanderthals walked the earth. From the UK the comet is low in the west and close to the horizon. Google tells me, that for our location, the best views are just after sunset. Four times in recent days I’ve taken a stone track to the top of a low hill called Binga Fea, topped by a telecoms tower and the highest spot close to home that offers a view to the west. Each time clear skies have been promised and each time low cloud has spoilt best laid plans. Yesterday evening brought more of the same, a stubborn bank of cloud sitting out to the west.

Disappointment aside though, it’s a great spot to watch day fade to night. With camera set up I went for a wander,  a male Hen Harrier passed by, appearing almost white in the half light. I caught the briefest glimpse of a Woodcock, newly arrived from Finland, a dark silhouette against a still bright, post sunset sky. To the south, across the Pentland Firth, some ten miles in the distance, there’s the coast of Caithness, where Dunnet head and its just visible lighthouse mark the most northerly point of mainland UK. Beyond that, almost lost in the haze and some 45 miles from the camera, is Morven, the tallest hill in Caithness. To the west, the next landfall is the coast of Labrador and Newfoundland, some two thousand miles away.

Looking east, Scapa Flow and Orkney spread out below you. There’s the island of Flotta, its 24/7 oil terminal lit like a small town, further out into the Flow, are the lights of a moored oil rig, pausing on its journey to the Cromarty Firth in Scotland, to be refurbed or broken for scrap. Beyond Scapa, lost to the dark, there’s the Orkney Mainland and the linked isles, the latter read like names on a shipping forecast – South Ronaldsay, Burray, Hunda, Glimps Holm, Lambs Holm.

As well as the hoped for Comet to the west, there would also be a moonrise to the north-east. The moon would rise at five to six, five minutes before sunset, a photograph was planned with the moon low in the sky, just above the islands and the sea. At half past five, not wanting to be left out, the north-eastern horizon also wrapped itself in a shroud of thickening cloud. The moon eventually rising above it, too high for the planned picture, but a bonus picture was taken anyway, the moon, cratered and bright, pulled close by a long lens.

The Comet is fading, gone by the month end. The next clear day for us is Wednesday, if the forecast is correct, I’ll take the track and try again, crossing fingers that the final score will be Comet 4 – Human 1.