Join in with an extra special Black Isle Repair Cafe celebrating 2 years of repairs across the area!

As well as having our usual repair stations and a chance to learn some new skills from the volunteers (please bring your repairs along on the day) we also have some live music and kids activities as well so a great afternoon out for the family.  Free entry and all repairs and refreshments are by donation. The Black Isle Repair Cafe encourages the use of reusables so you're very welcome to bring along your own mug for coffee/tea.

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The Annual Potato Day run by Transition Black Isle is happening on March 2 at North Kessock Village Hall from 11 am to 3 pm.  You know what to expect.  Enthusiastic folk buying individual tubers of a great number of heritage and modern potato varieties - some organically grown too.  We invite you to come and get your seed potatoes bringing bags for each variety, and start the growing year off by preparing where you will eventually grow them.  

Here is the poster

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Bring your repairs & shop pre-loved/second hand items at the BLACK ISLE REPAIR CAFE & RE-LOVE SALE!

Promoting REPAIR & REUSE - you can bring along any broken items you have at home that need fixing (GENERAL REPAIRS - ELECTRICAL REPAIRS - SEWING-TOOL SHARPENING - COMPUTER CLINIC & BIKE REPAIRS) as well as having a browse for a bargain.

Items from stall holders for sale include tools, vintage clothing, books, kids toys, household items & more.

Any repairs you have will be looked at by a skilled volunteer & repairs are by donation (pay what you can).

Tea, coffee, cake & juice all available from the Black Isle Repair Cafe by donation. (BYO mug or cup if you can).

Entry is free and kids corner & live choir also part of the event so all welcome to come and enjoy the afternoon. The event makes up one of the many events happening all across the Highlands as part of the HIGHLAND CLIMATE FESTIVAL.

SAT 2nd SEPTEMBER 1-4pm
BLACK ISLE LEISURE CENTRE, FORTROSE

This feed was drawn from the Black-Isle Info website

This feed was drawn from the Black-Isle Info website

The Black Isle Partnership has been funded to develop a Local Place Plan for the Scottish Government to provide a framework for future development on the Black Isle. The work will be undertaken over the next year. The Local Place Plan will build on existing surveys, and will consult communities on what their priorities are over the next 10 years. The outcome should be a hit-list of priority and workable projects and – critically – how they can be funded.

A specialist contractor will be hired to undertake research and conduct consultations and develop the Plan. We are seeking a part time Project Coordinator to oversee this process and to work on other projects of the Black Isle Partnership including tourism.

Details are in the job advertisement downloadable from https://www.black-isle.info/userfiles/file/Public/Local-Place-Plan-Project-Coordinator.docx

A full job description is downloadable from https://www.black-isle.info/userfiles/file/Public/BIP-Place-Plan-coordinator.docx

The closing date for applications is June 17.

This feed was drawn from the Black-Isle Info website

The Black Isle Health and Nature Summer Festival took place over the last weekend of July. Groups in each of the villages organised Get to Know Your Village Walks and other activities.  The walks were rather leisurely and planned to get folk to appreciate how much there is to see and understand about their village area.

Full details for each of the villages was provided on this website.  THere will be a report on the whole weekend shortly. See The Black Isle Health and Nature Summer Festival.

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The Black Isle Partnership having served as the local Community Anchor Organisation for the Scottish Government's Supporting Communities Fund has now been awarded funding for Community Recovery projects from Foundation Scotland.  The latest April newsletter from the Black Isle Partnership details the past achievements and what may be expected in the months ahead from the Befriending Project and of the Black Isle Tourism Team .  Read the newsletter here.

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There is an open invitation for anybody to have their say on how the Black Isle could become more resilient as we all react and respond to the Covid-19 pandemic.  There is no better time than now to look to the future.

Jon Palmer, Chair of the Black Isle Partnership, has devised a survey/questionnaire for the purpose of soliciting ideas from as broad a range of residents of the Black Isle as possible.

In an introduction to the Survey, reflecting on the pandemic Jon has written in a longer article:

The long-term effects of the pandemic are only just beginning to be seen. The coming months, even years, are going to be tough. Many people are having to re-think how they make a living. The emotional strain of coping with change can take its toll. So, what are the lessons we’ve learnt so far? Where are the frailties that prevent people from leading a fulfilling life on the Black Isle? What schemes or projects can be put in place to shore up some of those weaknesses that have been exposed? We want to hear your ideas. And we want to pool as many of them as possible to create a route map for the future. One where the residents of the Black Isle can be ever more resilient to the challenges life throws at us.

The survey itself can be found at 

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/TVTSJWK

Jon's full article is in the Black Isle Bulletin No 4.  

This feed was drawn from the Black-Isle Info website

During the lockdown many organisations are finding creative ways to engage their supporters and friends. The Mamie Martin Fund, a charity which supports girls’ education in Malawi, had planned a cycle tour in the Central Belt but that felt uncertain in recent months. So a stay-at-home version was launched and the idea as taken up enthusiastically in the Black Isle and beyond as 15 people signed up.

The route is 210 miles long and these cyclists are clocking up that mileage on their bikes locally. Jean Gordon and Richard Robinson in Fortrose got their friends involved. Their son James and his partner Lucy, who live in England, also signed up but travelled to Scotland to do the miles – any excuse for a trip home!  

Jean said: "With Covid-19 and lockdown, we, like so many others, have been turning to our local countryside for entertainment and activity. Taking part in The Mamie Martin Fund's Stay at Home bike ride has encouraged us to explore the network of roads, paths and forest tracks that criss-cross The Black Isle. Knowing that our travels - and bright yellow MMF T shirts - are raising awareness of the importance of girls' education in Malawi, as well as funds to enable girls in poverty to go to school, has made those journeys, however short or meandering, even more worthwhile. Story on Bikes has really caught the imagination of friends and family too, from the Highlands to Lancashire, offering lots of opportunities for us all to connect and keep in touch with each other."

The ride is about the story of Mamie Martin, who had an important role in promoting and supporting girls' education in northern Malawi in the 1920s. It will be launched in Blantyre, David Livingstone's birthplace, on Saturday 1st August, and will visit places in Scotland which are important to Mamie's story, including Tarbet, where she grew up. 

One of the group cycling between Blantyre and Tarbet is Violet Hejazi, a young woman from Syria, who is enjoying her freedom to cycle in Scotland. She has been given a bike by Bikes for Refugees Scotland and is supported by Bike for Good in Glasgow. Her neighbours and her sister's friend have been very supportive; many Individuals offered to help in terms of helping her to fix her bike or offering a rescue vehicle in case needed. She greatly appreciates this support.

About the Mamie Martin Fund: Mamie Telfer lived in Tarbet, Loch Lomond and was a teacher in Helensburgh. She married Jack Martin in 1921 and they went to Malawi as missionaries. Mamie was concerned about the lack of educational opportunities for girls there and set up classes in the villages. Sadly she died in 1928, leaving a baby daughter, Margaret. Margaret grew up in Scotland and established the Mamie Martin Fund (MMF) in 1993 with the aim of advancing the education of girls in secondary school in North Malawi, taking forward her mother's work. MMF currently pays the fees of, and supports, 138 girls across six schools, including six girls at a school for Deaf children in Embangweni. MMF works with the CCAP Synod of Livingstonia, Mchengautuba Community Day Secondary School in Mzuzu and with the RC Diocese of Karonga. At least one MMF Trustee visits Malawi each year as part of their governance.

Mamie would be so happy to know that connections between Scotland and Malawi are even stronger today and that her conviction about the necessity of educating girls is now widely accepted as true around the world.

David Livingstone Birthplace - https://www.david-livingstone-birthplace.org/

Mamie Martin Fund – https://mamiemartin.org

Bikes for Refugees Scotland http://www.bikesforrefugees.scot/

Bike for Good https://www.bikeforgood.org.uk/

You can encourage the cyclists on the fund-raising page

Contact: moira@mamiemartin.org

This feed was drawn from the Black-Isle Info website

As the Black Isle begins to welcome new and returning visitors, all should notice the appearance of Banners reminding everybody of what rules to follow to protect all from the scourge of Covid-19.  The first to appear were on the two main routes into Cromarty.  

This feed was drawn from the Black-Isle Info website