The bird colonies of Ailsa Craig

The sea bird breeding colonies on Ailsa Craig are amongst the biggest in the World. At this time of year, the scale of life being rejuvenated is simply humbling.

05/05/2008

Croy beach (north)

Continuing north from Culzean you pass wide Croy Bay. This is very popular with summer visitors but if you continue round the rocks of Isle Port you can pretty well have this magnificent beach to yourself.

27/04/2008

The SSSI coastline of Culzean

The magnificent structure of the castle dominates the great Ayrshire estate of Culzean. The coastline extends for 5km from Maidens Bay in the south to Croy Bay in the north. The coast is a designated Site of Special Scientific Interest. It has many igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic geological features, which create varied environments within a short distance and as a result, it is rich in marine and terrestrial plant and animal life.

The whole estate is now managed as a Country Park by the National Trust of Scotland. I have a particular attachment to this place. In the early seventies I worked as a volunteer conservation worker when the Park was being established. I was then very fortunate in spending my summer holidays from university as a seasonal ranger naturalist. Happy days in a fantastic environment working with great colleagues!

27/04/2008

Misty Maidens morning

A cold thick mist lay low over the Ayrshire coastline on Sunday morning. As we arrived at Maidens the sun began to break through.


By the time we were on the water, the mist had all but dispersed and we were in for another glorious day.



27/04/2008

The sun beat down on a burnished sea.

The sun baked down from high in the azure vault of the sky. Last weekend in Scotland it was winter, this weekend it is spring! Tony and I were paddling ever more slowly on our passage NNE from Maidens to Ayr. In the intense heat, the sweat rolled down my burning forehead becoming ever more salty as the beads made their way through my salt encrusted eye brows before running into my bloodshot eyes, stinging and blinding as they went. For the hundredth time I wiped my eyes clear with my hat but the cotton was already saturated and the back of my neck burned as soon as it was exposed to the sun's rays. I could only imagine that Tony was in a similar state to myself. I was too weak to turn round but the gentle plip plop of his paddling reassured me that he was just behind.

High noon approached and our plight worsened. A faint voice quavered from behind.

"I need a drink."

I paddled slowly on without answering such a statement of the obvious. I had nothing left to drink either. Surrounded by water we were slowly but surely dehydrating and I could sense the approaching madness as our brain cells shrunk, stretching and straining their synapses.

The voice behind continued...

"Do ye think there might be somewhere we might stop for a wee drink?"

Well I am not exactly the world's greatest sea kayaking navigator but we were paddling with the Ayrshire coast on our right.

"If we keep paddling I think we might just pass the pub at Dunure?"

"Is it very far?"

I stopped paddling, leaned forward and pressed some buttons on my GPS. One of the stored way points was for the Anchorage Bar in Dunure, I pressed another button and was just able to read the distance before drops of sweat obscured the tiny screen.

"It's 5 kilometers."

"Sure but that's 5000 meters, it's too far."

The plip plop of paddling behind me stopped.

"Would you like a pint of Guinness?"

Just the thought had me drooling in a Pavlovian slaver, further exacerbating my desperate state of dehydration.

"Tony I would love one but we need to keep paddling."

I paddled on in silence. There was no sound from behind. I rested my paddle on my cockpit rim and drifted to a stop on the windless, burning sea. Slowly and stiffly I turned, fearing the worst.

At first I couldn't see anything, as I was squinting into the fierce glare of the sun. Then I saw Tony.......










"Sure now, would ye no' like a wee drink o' Guinness?"

27/04/2008

Going Mobile on the Road to the Isles

"I don't care about pollution,
I'm an air conditioned gypsy, that's my solution"

Going Mobile, Pete Townshend

Lots of people think that sea kayaking is a green sport. However, getting to a paddling destination isn't exactly green, unless you limit yourself to local waters. Currently there is a fuel shortage in Scotland so I doubt I will be going far this weekend. This last year I have been paddling nearer at home but I mentioned Loch Hourn in a recent post. What a fantastic trip that was! A day trip in February with 380 miles there and back on the A82 and the A87. For those of you who do not know Scotland, these are not motorways, freeways or autobahns!


A. We left Glasgow in the darkness at 6am and by 07:38, just as dawn was breaking, we had reached Lochan na h-Achlaise on Rannoch Moor.


B. By 08:42 we had reached the Commando Memorial above Spean Bridge with this view over the ridges of Carn Mor Dearg to Ben Nevis beyond.


C. High above Loch Garry the morning mist was lifting at 09:06. We were headed for Loch Hourn which lies to the north (right) of the distant mountains of Knoydart.


D. This view of the Five Sisters of Kintail was taken at 09:41 near the summit of the Mam Ratagan pass...


...as was this view of a calm Loch Duich.


E. At 10:06 we arrived at beautiful Loch Hourn. Not a very green way to spend a day but it was a wonderful drive, not to mention the sea kayaking!

The rapidity with which Scottish fuel supplies have run low illustrates how reliant we are on fossil fuels. What will my grandchildren think when I tell them that one winter day, I drove 380 miles, just to go sea kayaking?

Remnants of Scotland's ancient forests of oak.

This view, of Beinn Sgritheall from Loch Hourn, is most people's idea of the scenery of Scotland: a wild landscape of bare mountains tumbling into deep sea lochs. It is, however, not natural. It is man made and is a result of deforestation. After the retreat of the last ice age, a beautiful sessile oak forest grew on much of the western sea board of Scotland. It was cut down over the centuries to clear the land for agriculture, to build ships, provide charcoal for the iron industry and tannin for the leather industry.


There are a few surviving pockets of the natural oak forest such as this one at the head of Glen Trool in Galloway.


The forest floor is carpeted with mosses, lichens, ferns and holly.


Another surviving pocket is on the north shore of Fleet Bay on the Solway Firth. Here the oaks grow right down to near the high water mark.

The great western sessile oak forest of Scotland must have been indescribably beautiful.