A flying visit to Campbeltown.

The MV Isle of Arran entered Campbeltown Loch to the north of Davaar Island and it's lighthouse. The fishing boat CN17 Perserverance was dropping her pots not far offshore.

Tony and I made our way down to the car deck to get ready to embark at 16:30.

We launched from this slipway just to the north of the ferry terminal. Amazingly we were on the water by 16:56. This was to be a flying visit to Campbeltown as we hoped to get well up the east coast of Kintyre before nightfall. Leaving the slipway we passed MV Fame from Bergen. She is a general cargo ship and is often seen round the Clyde.

Although Campbeltown is a pretty quiet place these days at various times it has had a huge fishing fleet, a coalmine, a canal which was superseded by a railway, 30 odd whisky distilleries, a huge military airbase and extensive farms in the surrounding countryside.

It was not just the ferry that was bringing visitors to Cambeltown. This was the 18:05 FlyBE flight coming in from Glasgow.

The MV Isle of Arran soon swept out of Cambeltown Loch...

...and we followed in her wake, leaving Campbeltown quickly behind. A nice little tail wind got up so we wasted no time in...

...launching our Flat Earth kayak sails.

In no time we were at the mouth of the loch and caught sight of a distant Ailsa Craig on which we hoped to camp in three nights time but...

...for now we turned our bows north to paddle sail up the east coast of Kintyre towards the Kilbrannan Sound and the soaring granite peaks of Arran beyond. Our adventure had started...

A four pointed cross on a two pointed island.

As we approached the mouth of Campbeltown Loch our eyes were drawn to the NE and the Isle of Arran which lay on the far side of the Kilbrannan Sound. It looked very enticing in the early evening light. That had been our poor weather alternative route back to Ardrossan but since the weather was fair we turned our eyes south towards the...

 ...causeway that links the west point of Davaar island to the mainland of Kintyre. We were amazed at the number of gannets, guillemots and razorbills we saw in the air and waters around us.

There was still just under 3 hours till local HW and the causeway was still dry so we set off round the outside of Davaar island which would add about 2 km to our route south, towards the Mull of Kintyre.

The attractive, white cottage (called the Lookout), which blends so well with the magnificent scenery, is now a holiday rental home. Its rather utilitarian architecture can perhaps be blamed on WW2 austerity. It was built for Royal Navy crews to watch shipping entering the loch and operate anti-submarine nets and cables.

The lighthouse was built in 1854 by David and Thomas Stevenson. It was automated in 1983. The light has a double white flash every 10 seconds.

Davaar is derived from the Gaelic "Da-Bharr" which means two points. We now approached the second, northern point.

This can be a lively place at the height of a flood tide (if the wind is from the north) but all was calm as we rounded the point and caught our first sight of the rocky monolith of Ailsa Craig.

 Once we were in the lee of Davaar Island, the wind dropped but soon picked up as...

...we cleared its southern cliffs. We did not have time to stop but on a previous visit....

 ...Tony and I had entered a cave with two entrances at the back of which...

 ...stood a wooden cross.

As our eyes became used to the darkness we saw a painting of Christ on the back wall of the cave. It was pained in 1887 by Archibald MacKinnon who was a local teacher. It has been restored several times by art teachers from the school in Campbeltown. In 2006 it was vandalised when someone painted a copy of Jim Fitzpatrick's image of Che Guevara over Christ's face.

It was a relief  to feel the pull of the sail in the free air as we cleared Davaar Island. My injured left shoulder was already hurting and we had nearly 200 km to go before we got back to Ardrossan...

Single ticket to Campbeltown please.

Calmac recently launched a new service from Ardrossan on the Ayrshire coast to Campbeltown on the distant (by road) Mull of Kintyre. It is a pretty limited service but the ferry that left at 1330 on Sunday and arrived at Campbeltown at 1630 looked interesting and avoided a crack of dawn start. We decided to leave our cars in the manned 24 hr car park at Ardrossan ferry terminal and buy single tickets to Campbelltown and paddle back to Ardrossan.

The girl at the check in desk was somewhat surprised, "You are the first people to buy single tickets. Most people want to come back from Campbeltown!"

We wheeled our kayaks on trolleys onto the car deck of the MV Isle of Arran and soon...

 ...we were steaming past Horse Island which lies off the entrance to Ardrossan harbour. Its distinctive now unlit tapered beacon was built in 1811 after many shipwrecks on the isle. It is 52 ft high and 19 ft square at ground level.

We ate an early meal on the ferry as the plan was we would paddle 28km south from Campbeltown (until about 10pm) that night. As the ferry approached the town's south pier we spotted the...

 ...slipway that we would use to launch.

 When the call came for drivers to go to the car deck, Phil, Jennifer, Mike and I ambled down to our preloaded kayaks.

 We found the slipway without difficulty, and were on the water by 17:05. HW was at 20:19 so we did not think we would be ble to paddle between tidal Davaar Island and the mainland. This would add 2km to our route.

 The new quay is a very impressive development for a small place like Campbeltown. It was built for the wind turbine factory at Macrihanish but that is now closed. It is hoped that Campbeltown might be a base for the servicing of huge offshore winfarm developments off Islay, Tiree and in the Clyde. Of course the new Calmac ferry service uses it but after the ferry left, we four sea kayakers had pretty much to ourselves.

 Soon we left the Old Quay and...

 ...the douce villas of the wealthy Victorian merchants, fish merchants, boat owners, distillers and shipyard owners of this once thriving town. It grew in the days when commerce and travel were by sea but with the development of road transport it became just too remote and its wealth faded.  Perhaps the reintroduction of the ferry service will inject new life into this lovely corner of Scotland.

As soon as we were clear of the quays a decent west wind got up and we were surrounded by diving gannets. We hoisted sails and set course for Davaar Island at the entrance to Campbeltown Loch.