The islanders called back to Uist by a strong pull of home

Three islanders speak about an island under their skin, returning home and the enterprises that keep them there.

Down on the machair at Carnan in South Uist, a herd of crofter DJ Cameron’s cattle graze on wildflowers on the same spot where his father’s beasts did decades before. Lapwings pick at the dried cowpats for sustenance and woodcocks come in at night to do the same. Where the cows kick up the earth, the birds see an opportunity to swoop in and tug for worms. Everything here supports each other, much like the island at large.

For DJ, these are the scenes he was born into but then left behind as he travelled the world with work – from the Falklands to Gabon and Turkmenistan. Ultimately, he returned to Uist as part of his own cycle of life after taking redundancy from the oil and gas industry.

From their home at Lochskipport in the east of the island, he and his partner Lindsay run Long Island Retreats which invites visitors to experience a local view of Uist, its history and the crofting way of life which has been the bedrock of life here for many over generations."Since the inception of crofting my family has been crofting,” DJ says.

Jonny Ingledew (left) and Kate MacDonald (right) at work at North Harris Distillery where they make their award-winning gin with small batch whisky coming soon. PIC: Contributed.

His decision to return home was quickened by the deteriorating health of his father and a wish to uphold the ways of his family – and the ways of Uist.

“I knew in my own head that if we got rid of the livestock, that would be gone forever – and it would never come back. As a family, we had put in too much just to let it go. It had also always been my intention to return to Uist,” he adds.

The winding B-road to DJ’s house is dotted with Shetland ponies bred from his mother’s colt, Jasper, and the old sheep fank where neighbours gathered to help each other with shearing and dipping holds on in the landscape. Family threads and connections run through everything here and, for DJ, giving people a richer feel for the islands, its past and its people is fundamentally key.

Jonny Ingledew and Kate MacDonald at Nunton Steadings in Benbecula - the home of North Uist Distillery. PIC: Contributed.

"It is about giving people a deeper understanding of a very fragile environment.

"Last month, we had a handful of people here who were looking for the great escape. They found areas of the Highlands and Islands very, very touristy but they liked South Uist and Benbecula the way it was. They preferred it that way and it is what they wanted to see,” he adds.

For David Steele, of Uist Sea Tours, that call back home led him to run boat tours and walking tours around Eriskay, where his grandparents are from.

Crofter DJ Cameron near his home at Lochskipport, South Uist, where he runs Long Island Retreats and tours of the island, its crofting ways and traditions. PIC: Contributed.

David says: “I went to Glasgow to try a different style of life and see if a wee boy from the islands could handle life in the city. And I liked Glasgow, I didn’t mind it at all, but the sea called me back.”

David spends his days taking guests close to wildlife that gathers in the waters off Eriskay with a resident pod of bottlenosed dolphins among the joys found here. Overhead, golden eagles are not uncommon and day trips to St Kilda and the abandoned island of Mingulay are also popular.

With the holiday season so short in Uist, where tourist business usually fades as the school returns, David has turned his mind to another enterprise. That business is rum, with the South Uist Distillers Co launched in July with three varieties now on the shelves. David is now pushing forward with plans to open a distillery in Uist, with a site now identified.

He said: “Most people on the island, we don’t do one thing. We are making the Rum in Glasgow just now but we are bringing it back to South Uist.”

Crofter DJ Cameron wants to take visitors into the 'fragile environment' of Uist where one species supports another. Pictured are part of his cattle herd on the machair .PIC: Contributed.

Husband and wife Jonny Ingledew and Kate MacDonald left Uist for the mainland after school to study and start their careers. As good as it was, their dreams lay elsewhere and they returned home to set up North Uist Distillery in 2019. Their Downpour Gin, where local heathers and botanicals mingle, has won multiple awards with plans now far advanced to start producing small-batch whisky at their 18th Century Nunton Steadings using ancient bere barley – the only barley grown in Uist – next year. All whisky was once produced from bere with the distillery taking production back to the original ways with the ambition a field to bottle business.

Their return to Uist has allowed them to grow their contemporary business from traditional roots and be part of their community once again.

Jonny adds: “I suppose when you are in a city, you have all your friends, your motley crew, and you go to gigs and you go to bars. Everyone is the same and you are all the same flavour. You like the same things.

“Then you would come home for a visit and there is a sort of melancholy as you see everyone before leaving again.

“Now, I am just as likely to spend a Friday night with my neighbour who is 70 as I am with a friend who is 30. When someone moves off the island, you really feel it and then when someone comes, you really embrace them.”

The route home was made easier for the couple given their shared hope of setting up North Uist Distillery.

David Steele of South Uist Sea Tours has also launched a rum business to keep money coming in once the tourist season ends. PIC: Contributed.

Jonny says: “I was actually in the North East working in oil and gas and we would go into the Cairngorms at the weekend to get outside and visit whisky distilleries and then at night sit outside with a campfire, enjoying a dram and then having these fresh thoughts about setting up a distillery. We had this romantic view of whisky and, at the same time, this desire to move back home. It was a merger of these two things – there was this watershed moment.

“I handed in my notice, much to the amusement of colleagues and decided to go and study brewing and distilling. The rest I suppose is history.”