“THEY’RE the clowns of the sea – they never stop fascinating me,”; says my tour guide, Steven Banks, as we bob along the fringes of one of Britain’s most fascinating islands.
This outpost, around a mile from ’s shores, may be out of bounds for humans, but it is a favoured part-time home for some of the most endangered, bizarre and, yes, slightly clown-like birds in the Northern Hemisphere — puffins.
Even exceptionally rare ones can be spotted.
“We had a golden puffin here two years ago,”; says Steven, who, with his uncle, runs Dave Grey Puffin Cruises.
The , in the northern port town of Amble, was set up by his grandad in 1969.
Steven takes guests on the ten-minute crossing to Coquet Island, a rocky outcrop that is home to upwards of 30,000 puffins during the nesting months, from March to July.
Flying in from the distant Atlantic, they congregate here to find a mate, before doing a fairly equal share (males also nest on the solitary egg the female lays) in raising their young.
That golden puffin, whose feathers are actually brown but give off a gold sheen when sunlight hits them, isn’t around on my visit.
But it’s hard to be disappointed when we’re able to get so close to these comical who, when they walk, genuinely seem to be wearing clown shoes.
“They feed off tiny fish called sand eels,”; Steven tells me.
This was obvious enough from their beaks, with many crammed full of several fish at once, ready to bring back to the nest.
“Coquet Island is protected so nobody is allowed to walk on it, but, as you can see, you really don’t need to,”; he adds.
Steven is right. The birds are utterly unfazed by our presence — strutting, sunbathing and out for a closer look at our vessel, Glad Tidings III.
From our position on the ocean, it felt like we had the best seat in the house for watching them.
Puffins aren’t the only wildlife you’ll see around Coquet, though.
Steven tells me he often spots seals, terns and even dolphins who, in his experience, are rather keen on swimming alongside his boat as it chugs back towards Amble.
Unsurprisingly, Amble has a serious affinity towards puffins.
There’s a festival dedicated to them each May, which has been running for the past 12 years.
All year round the rejuvenated harbour area offers puffin-accented mugs, hats and hoodies.
There’s also a lively outdoor market, art galleries and a surprisingly large array of fish .
I head back to the Amble Inn, a new restaurant and hotel at the edge of the town, which has a Texas-meets-Toledo vibe to its huge wood-beamed dining space, festooned with quirky lamps, antiques and booths.
Here, it seems every other person who is visiting this windswept yet beguiling town has also come to see the puffins.
It isn’t long before fellow diners and I swap stories of the colourful birds as the afternoon sun bleaches the vast skies into hues of amber and peach.
“They’ve got such wistful eyes,”; says one woman who has travelled from for her puffin fix.
“It’s hard to believe when you see so many of them here that they’re actually endangered.”;
Over a dinner of haddock-infused bubble and squeak, I overhear one couple discuss how puffins are still sometimes eaten where the heart is considered a speciality.
Luckily, that’s not the case here.
Thanks to the protective work of the RSPB, and Steven’s watchful eye from the bow of the Glad Tidings III, the puffins of Coquet are likely to remain firmly off the menu in this part of the world for some time to come.
I’ll be sticking to my haddock.
