A school trip to Shetland began a lifetime love affair with the islands for one Shropshire man.

One man and his dog - Neil Brice and Eli enjoy the island life on the Shetlands

And some say that Shropshire is cut off.

A few months ago, Neil Brice from St Georges in Telford set sail for a new life on the remote Shetland island of Burra and has been bolted up in a fisherman’s croft ever since – one man and his dog, his thoughts and the sea.

Not that church worker Neil, 50, thinks ‘the land of rainbows’ is the lonely life. It may be a 13-hour boat trip from Aberdeen and half way to Norway, but he always knew it was the place for him, ever since he came up on a school trip as a 10-year-old.

“It is certainly very different here than anywhere else I have been, but somehow it suits me,” he says.

“The place is magnetic to me and the people make it such a warm place too. People say that you either hate it or love it here – there is no middle. I love it.”

He continues: “I guess it did all start with a school trip from St George’s Junior School – now demolished of course – when Mr Haves brought a whole pile of us up to Shetland.

“This was in 1974 when fish and chips in Lerwick was 12.5p. I know this because the original itinerary for the trip records that we were given 12.5p to buy lunch.

“I did not return until a family holiday in 2002 and I only realised then that something had connected me to the place.”

Life on the islands has come under the spotlight on the hugely popular television series Simon King’s Shetland Diaries, an hour-long documentary fronted by the Springwatch presenter and screened on BBC2.

And like Simon, people can follow Neil’s life through his online blog – one of the ways he keeps in touch.

Neil, who had been the rector of five parishes just outside Cambridge since 1992, had always harboured a desire to return and did so during a sabbatical in 2004 in which he spent three months studying the church in Lerwick.

A subsequent change in personal and family circumstances led him to stop and take stock, and in December of last year he decided to follow his calling.

He is currently employed as a care worker but leads worships and assists in church ministry both at St Magnus church in Lerwick and at St Colman’s on the Island of Yell, Britain’s most northerly Episcopal church, with which he hopes to secure full-time work and remain in the Shetlands.

Comforting

The simple life certainly suits Neil. He wakes to the sound of the Atlantic Ocean and falls asleep with the comforting blink of a lighthouse in the distance. “Every day involves a walk down to the beach where my dog Eli chases a ball and runs over the golden yellow sands,” he says.

“The water is clear and you often see the seals being curious at what we are doing. I feel so lucky be able to enjoy this, and it doesn’t seem to matter what the weather is doing.”

He likens the way of life to “England in the 1950s or 1960s”. Says Neil: “The postman delivers the post to the kitchen table and you still see groups of men at the pier standing and chatting. It certainly gives me the chance to feel a little out of the rat race.

“But don’t misunderstand life here – it is not sleepy or cut off and folks here are ready to engage in conversation about most things.”

He says that driving is a pleasure because there’s never any traffic. You can plan a car journey and know that you will get there on time.

He continues: “You can leave your house and your car unlocked. I heard a funny story the other day. A friend drove home in the wrong car. A while later someone phoned up and said: ‘Jim, I think you’ve got my car, but it’s OK – I’ve got yours.’ It is a bit like that.

“It’s very rare to hear reports of break-ins, you feel very, very safe. People with young families say it’s a wonderful place to bring up children. You see children walking to the beach on their own with towels under their arms.”

And, as it was in Britain in the ’50s and ’60s, some shops still have petrol pumps outside them.

We may be surrounded by sea on mainland Britain, but Shetlanders have an immediate sense of being islanders.

“The sea is a hugely dominating factor,” he says. “You are never more than three miles from the sea and there’s a spot of land that is known for being the closest point between the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean.

“When we came in 1974 we took a bus to the spot and a few of us tried to throw a stone from the North Sea into the Atlantic.”

Shetland weather is prone to sudden change, which Neil says is part of its ever-changing beauty. Waterproof clothing is de rigueur.

“It might be a gorgeous February morning, calm with an almost unreal light, and an hour later you are sat there in the mist and gloom,” Neil adds. “They say up here that if you want to know what the weather is like, wait an hour.”

Of course, there are aspects of life that our Shropshire man misses. “Obviously I miss friends and family, and I do miss being able to put a coat on and walking to the pub to get a pint of English beer.”

At his local pub – local if you think 20 minutes’ drive is local – fresh mussels are served straight from the sea.

Music is a great tradition and it’s not unusual to encounter convivial outbursts of washboard playing, accompanied by fiddles and spoons.

It may not be the existence for many, but the simple life doesn’t preclude progress and modern ways. “When I first moved up here, some people used to imagine me with no electricity and water, and having to go out with a spear to catch my breakfast,” says Neil.

“It’s not quite like that. It’s actually quite civilised.”

l The final episode of Simon King’s Shetland Diaries is screened on BBC2 at 8pm tomorrow. Neil Brice’s blog can be followed at neil-brice.blogspot.com/