Showing posts with label natural history. Show all posts
Showing posts with label natural history. Show all posts

Saturday, February 10, 2018

The economics of going on a safari adventure.

25/03/2017
After our first luncheon it was time to return to the boats. This is the P&H Scorpio HV Mk2 in CoreLite X. It is very large but supremely comfortable and as can be seen from the previous post, made an excellent stable platform for photographing bottlenose dolphins. Talking of which...
...no sooner had we launched than we were pounced upon by the pod which had been lying in ambush just offshore.


The tide had turned and the wind had got up, creating some wonderful kayaking conditions off the headlands. The flying spray, the sunshine the motion of the boats and leaping dolphins made for a simply unforgettable experience.

Unfortunately I did not risk taking my SLR out  and my little Olympus TG4 camera had so much shutter lag that I  ended up with a lot of photos of splashes where the dolphins had been. Despite the lack of photos this was an even more intense experience as the dolphins were also revelling in the rough water. They would suddenly appear out of our wave and flash across our bows before reappearing just ahead of us. It seemed that they were leading us to the shelter...

...of Port nam Murrach. Once we were safe in the calm of the bay, the dolphins disappeared for good.

Back on dry land we could hardly believe how lucky we had been to experience such a wild life safari and spectacle. You could spend thousands of pounds travelling across the world for such experiences. We had woken in our own beds that morning and so far it had just cost 13 litres of diesel fuel (£17) on the drive up. Donald had spent maybe another £2 to put petrol in his 6hp outboard.

Pleased with our economical adventuring, we wandered round this delightful spot at the edge of the Sound of Arisaig. I have in the past travelled the World and been lucky to get to many amazing places off the beaten tourist track but sometimes you do not need to go far, especially if you live on the west coast of Scotland. Another factor for me is the cost of health insurance to travel out with the UK. Last year it was £1,100!


In the distance the long finger of Ardnamurchan stretched away to the west, beyond the sparkling waters of the Sound of Arisaig to the Sea of the Hebrides beyond.

 It was with some reluctance that we made our way back to the turquoise waters of the bay but...

 ..our friends would be shortly arriving and so we set off...

 ...across the Sound of Arisaig again with the ...

...sun rapidly dipping in the west.

Thursday, February 08, 2018

Bottlenose dolphins in the Sound of Arisaig.

25/03/2017
At first Mike was oblivious to the pod of...

 ...bottlenose dolphins which had been playing in Donald's wake.

 What a spectacle they made against the backdrop of the Eigg and Rum mountains.

They were much more interested in Donald's boat than the kayaks but he obliged us by motoring back...

...and forward across...

...our bows, with the pod in tow, so that we could get a better view of their antics.

 It is difficult to resist being anthropomorphic but these guys...

 ...were having a whale of a time (if that is not an oxymoron) as they alternately lolled in the water beside us before...

 ...exploding into action again.


 They only let us be when we paddled into shallow water to take a break...

 ..on the shell sand beach of Port Eilean a' Ghaill for a delayed first luncheon.

After the excitement Donald and I reviewed our photos and could hardly believe that we had managed to capture the action. I even went for a quick swim which rather quickly pulled me back to reality!

Monday, January 15, 2018

Waiting for the Corryvreckan tide at Glengarrisdale.

As we were finishing second breakfast, the chilly silence of Corpach Bay was broken by the rumble of engines. The SC Nordic, a Danish pallet carrier of 4,786 gross tonnage, was making her way NE between Colonsay and Jura towards the Sound of Mull. She was enroute from Greenock on the Clyde to Skogn in Trondheimsfjorden, Norway. Soon she was out of earshot and silence again fell over the bay of the dead (Corpach Bay).

 Once on the water again, too much north in the wind kept our sails furled but steady progress...

...saw the brooding bulk of Scarba increasingly dominate our view ahead.


Scarba marks the northern side of the fearsome Gulf of Corryvreckan and its steep slopes plunging into the rushing tides add to the intimidating nature of the place...but more of that later.

We were able to launch the sails again as the onshore breeze backed to a tight reach. Above the rough hills our eyes were drawn to...

 ...the magnificent sight of a pair of...

 ...white tailed sea eagles soaring on the same onshore wind (which we were paddle sailing in) creating an up draught above the slope.

This one either had a white tag on its wing or was missing some feathers. Maurice was amazed. He had gone from never having seen a sea eagle to seeing 4 within 24 hours. It did occur to me that this might be the same pair that we had seen the previous day, some 25km to the west on the east coast of Colonsay. However, they are lazy big birds and once they have a mate and territory they tend not to stray far. On average a sea eagle's territory is about 8km in diameter.


 There are very few places to land on this rough coast pathless which is the domain...

...of these nimble goats.

Neither Maurice nor Sam had been through the Corryvreckan before and they fell behind in some deep discussion about what to expect.

Neither of them seemed convinced....

 ...by my reassurances that it would be flat as a pancake, especially as we drew ever nearer to the Gulf. Perhaps this was because the previous evening, Ian and I had given a dramatic account of our last trip through the Corryvreckan.  This had involved breaking standing waves and moving backwards. This was despite paddling forward at full pelt, the tide had turned against us and threatened to carry us back the way we had just come.

On this trip, the west going spring flood was still in full flow at 8 knots and as we wanted to traverse the Gulf to the east it was time for a sharp...

 ...exit to the right, where we entered Glengarrisdale Bay where the eponymous...

 ...red roofed bothy lay at the back of the bay. It would make an ideal shelter from the cold wind for our three hour wait for the tide to turn.

 So we landed on the sands of the bay and...

 ...warmed up by carrying the boats well up the beach...

...so that we would be sure the tide would not carry the boats away during an extended Glengarrisdale luncheon.

Monday, January 08, 2018

A cuckoo in every cove, flapping sails and giant wings on the NE coast of Colonsay.

It was with some reluctance that we dragged ourselves away from Balnahard strand on the NE tip of Colonsay.

Once we cleared the point, our flapping sails caught...

...the wind and fair breeze filled them taught. We made such good progress down the coast that...

 ...the distant Paps of Jura heaved ever higher above the eastern horizon.

Sam, being the youngest, had to suffer the handicap of not having...

...a sail...

...to help with his progress. Each rocky cove we passed seemed to have a cuckoo calling, which added to...

...the atmosphere of paddling this wild place. The  NE coast of Colonsay is rocky and backed by rough heather covered slopes interspersed with scrubby patches of deciduous woodland. There are few,...

 ...if any, places to land. Maurice was remarking that despite sea kayaking for years, he had never seen a sea eagle.

 "What, like that one? said Ian and only a moment later...

 ...David said "Or that one!"

Sea eagles are lazy big birds and they only flapped their great wings a few times before landing just 100m along the coast. Unfortunately for them, they landed beside a pair of broody oyster catchers who vocally and bravely expressed their displeasure by "pip, pip, pipping" as they fluttered above their giant but lethargic new neighbours.

"Well you can hardly top that" said Ian until...

...a golden eagle soared high over the ruins of the appropriately named...

...Riasg Buidhe (Golden Moor). You can read more about this abandoned fishing village in this post about our previous visit. It is possible to land at the head of a gully above high tide. Unfortunately it was low tide and the once cleared gully bed is now full of boulders. So we continued on our way to Scalasaig, the main port on Colonsay.

Read Ian's account here.