We have lots of interesting stories and lovely photographs for you online and in this week’s edition of The Oban Times.
A Gofundme campaign has raised £5,155 and counting to help a Benderloch couple left homeless after a landslide devastated their new house. The newbuild was completely destroyed after a boulder from Beinn Lora, reportedly “the size of a house” crashed on top of it on Friday. No one was at home when it happened.
We also have news of two very important public meetings coming up, with BID4Oban hosting a Have Your Say session for businesses affected by recent devastating floods at The Rockfield Centre on Wednesday December 13.
Oban Community Council and the Oban Community Harbour Development Association also want to hear your views on Argyll and Bute Council’s future management plans for Oban harbour at the same venue on Thursday December 14.
Meanwhile, Oban is all lit up for Christmas, but fundraisers are only three quarters of the way to funding it all and still need your help. The town’s switch-on event attracted more than 5,000 people this year and one of the brightest ‘stars’ of the light show was a 3D interactive penguin in Station Square.
We also have a photograph gallery of the fabulous trees at this year St Conan’s Kirk Christmas Tree Festival after the event raised more than £10,000 for projects at the historic Lochawe church. Local groups and organisations contributed 73 trees to this year’s festival.
In other new, the Benderloch community were out in force last weekend to support the village’s Christmas lights switch-on and inaugural tractor run, with a ‘best dressed’ tractor award up for grabs. Both events on Saturday saw around 500 people and 15 tractors descend on the village to get in the festive mood.
Spotlight Musical Theatre Group also thrilled crowds at The Corran Halls last week, putting on four performances of their pantomime, Mother Hubbard and the Magic Purse.
Elsewhere, it has been revealed that crew members of a 5,344 tonne cargo ship drank beer and Jägermeister before their vessel ran aground in the Little Minch. The BBC Marmara collided with the small island of Eilean Trodday near North Skye in the early hours of July 21 2021.
And members of the public can vote to decide the names of the two new CalMac vessels set to serve Harris and North Uist from 2025, with a shortlist of the options in this week’s Oban Times.
In the sport, 49 young swimmers made a splash in the Oban Otters Swimming Gala at Atlantis Leisure, with many records tumbling in the pool on Saturday. Youngsters were competing over all four strokes and distances of 25 metres, 50 metres and 100 metres.
There was also good news for John McPhee as the motorcyclist will return to compete in the WorldSSP Championship for the 2024 season after securing a deal with the Polish WRP Wepol team.
In football it was a good weekend for Oban Saints, with their under-14s team progressing to the third round of the Regional Cup and the senior team also celebrating after defeating Campsie Minerva 2-1 in the SPAFA Premier Division.
This week’s shinty round-up previews the upcoming Macaulay Cup draw, we have the lowdown from Oban Camanachd’s annual general meeting and Skye have named a new manager.
Oban Ravens also tackled the Whitecraigs WISPS in Glasgow last month, Bob MacIntyre finished his golfing year in Australia and the latest Oban & District Darts League concluded with a finals night and awards ceremony.
You can read all these stories and much more at www.obantimes.co.uk or by picking up a newspaper in local shops and petrol stations from Thursday.