A shooting and second coming at the three pillars of Knockbrex.

Last week the Atlantic storm St Jude hit southern Britain. In SW Scotland we escaped the worst but my friend Cameron enjoyed strong wind windsurfing in Fleet Bay. I started windsurfing in 1977 but have not windsurfed since I dislocated my right knee falling down a sand dune on Gunna in June 2009 but I do hope to get back to it someday...

I can't sea kayak at the moment either as I am recovering from shoulder surgery which happened at the end of July. Actually even my walking is not too good and I am due to have major surgery to reconstruct my left knee on Monday (as it is also dislocating). Despite this I decided to go for a...

 ...short walk to Knockbrex Bay to see the storm. This ash tree shows the direction and strength of the prevailing wind. No sooner had we left the shelter of the trees than we came across a...

 ...really splendid sight. Shafts of sunlight broke through a dark stormy sky and illuminated the three priapic pillars of Knockbrex.

The pillars were being battered by the storm but were standing firm as...

 ...successive waves rose up their shafts before exploding into clouds of spray which ...

 ...swept round...

...each side of the pillars before...

 ,,,coming together again on the downwind side. As the ground shook to the impact of the waves...

 ..we found the scene to be strangely uplifting.

It was after all, only 3 months since I had been chased off this beach by a man wielding a shotgun. That resulted in two police armed response units and a helicopter being sent from Glasgow. It is just as well I do not scare easily as I might not have come back to Knockbrex...

Red sky at night does not always promise...

The swell in Fleet Bay was much bigger than a force 5 wind would suggest.


I decided to paddle out to the mouth of the bay and go round the Garvellan rocks at its entrance.


As the spring ebb tide was assisting me, I made good progress, despite the head wind. There is a good little tide race off the Garvellan rocks and in the wind against tide conditions I found the it quite exciting. The low brace proved to be most useful.


The evening sky turned blood red as the sun sank below the western horizon.

18/10/2008


The red sky had not foretold a fine day. The wind was averaging 34 knots and gusting to 55 knots. Not a day for sea kayaking but ideal for windsurfing! At least I now knew where the previous day's swell had come from! This photo shows the flood tide. Later on when the spring ebb started the swell steepened up in a most satisfactory way!


Sadly that was our last weekend on the Solway until next spring.

19/10/2008

Faster than the wind

I have been windsurfing since 1977. Like sea kayaking you can do it in a variety of conditions but I find that the two sports are highly complimentary and tend to windsurf when the wind is stronger.

Quite a lot of the time you can do both and a speed comparison is interesting. There was a 12 to 17 knot wind blowing straight down the bay to the sea. Paddling the mile across the bay at right angles to the wind, I averaged 2.9 knots.

Repeating the exercise on a light wind windsurfer with a 7.0m sail I averaged 25.1 knots. It is a great feeling flying along faster than the wind, with only the skeg in the water. I am surprised more sea kayakers do not windsurf.