following routes: Oban to Castlebay on Barra Oban to Lochboisdale on South Uist (Winter Only) Mallaig to Lochboisdale on South Uist Uig on Skye to Tarbert on Harris Uig on Skye to Lochmaddy on North Uist Ullapool to Stornoway on Lewis Tiree to Castlebay, Barra (summer only). Other ferries operate between some of the islands. National Rail services are available for onward journeys, from stations at Oban and Mallaig, which has direct services to Glasgow. However, parliamentary approval notwithstanding, plans in the 1890s to lay a railway connection to Ullapool were unable to obtain sufficient funding. There are scheduled flights from Stornoway, Benbecula and Barra airports both inter-island and to the mainland. Barra's airport is claimed to be the only one in the world to have scheduled flights landing on a beach. At high water the runways are under the sea so flight times vary with the tide. Bus na Comhairle Bus na Comhairle (meaning "Bus of the Council") is the council-owned local bus company of the Western Isles of Scotland. The company serves the Broadbay area of Lewis with 7 buses - 6 Optare Solos and 1 ADL Enviro 200. Shipwrecks The archipelago is exposed to wind and tide, and lighthouses are sited as an aid to navigation at locations from Barra Head in the south to the Butt of Lewis in the north. There are numerous sites of wrecked ships, and the Flannan Isles are the location of an enduring mystery that occurred in December 1900, when all three lighthouse keepers vanished without trace. Annie Jane, a three-masted immigrant ship out of Liverpool bound for Montreal, Canada, struck rocks off the West Beach of Vatersay during a storm on Tuesday 28 September 1853. Within ten minutes the ship began to founder and break up casting 450 people into the raging sea. In spite of the conditions, islanders tried to rescue the passengers and crew. The remains of 350 men, women and children were buried in the dunes behind the beach and a small cairn and monument marks the site. The tiny Beasts of Holm off the east coast of Lewis were the site of the sinking of during the first few hours of 1919, one of the worst maritime disasters in United Kingdom waters during the 20th century. Calvay in the Sound of Barra provided the inspiration for Compton Mackenzie's novel Whisky Galore after the ran aground there