A gelati and a free crossing to Inveraray for peasants, the blind and pilgrims.

Leaving Inveraray Castle, we drifted down the River Aray and reentered the sea at Loch Shira, a side arm of Loch Fyne. Loch Fyne is a deep indentation of the Firth of Clyde which stretches 137km into the mountains of Argyll from the mouth of the Firth. The delightful town of Inveraray was a planned town built by the 3rd Duke of Argyll in the latter half of the 18th century.


For the first couple of centuries much of Inveraray's communication and transport depended on the sea. There is a maritime museum based at the town's pier.


We paddled towards two of the ships that are current exhibits. In years gone by the pier would have been several thick with Loch Fyne skiffs, which were used to catch herring which were at one time plentiful in the Clyde. My great, great grandfather's brother was a herring fisherman on Loch Fyne but he drowned when his skiff sank in a storm with the loss of all hands. The bodies were never recovered.


This three masted schooner was built in Dublin in 1910 as a lightship called the LV Penguin. She was converted to a sail training ship in 1966 and renamed the Arctic Penguin. She has been at Inveraray since 1995. The smaller ship is the last of the Clyde puffers, the VIC 72 built in 1944. She has been renamed the Vital Spark after the Neil Munro novels about Para Handy, a puffer captain. Her original name was Eilean Easdale and she operated between Ayr harbour and the Isle of Easdale through the Crinan canal. VIC stands for Victualling Inshore Craft. These were designed to go through the Crinan canal and so had to be less than 67 feet long. They had flat bottoms so that they could be beached at communities without a harbour and unloaded when the tide went out.


We now paddled round to the south side of Inveraray's pier and saw another of the town's museums. The solid looking building at the left of this photo is Inveraray courthouse and jail.


It was built in 1820 but closed as a jail in 1889. The courthouse remained in occasional use until 1954 when the Sheriff Court moved to Dunoon. Inveraray's importance to Argyll had declined with the fishing fleet and better road links to other centres.


We decided to land to the south of the pier. We walked up to West Main Street and Mr Pia's ice cream parlour where we purchased some gelati, which we consumed upon the shore of Inveraray.


We looked over Loch Fyne to St Catherine's, whence we had come. There was a regular ferry between the two towns from 1680 until 1963. The steam ship pioneer David Napier put the SS Argyle on the route in 1856. The ferry's charter stated that it should provide free crossing for "peasants, the blind and pilgrims".

The lawns of Inveraray Castle.

It was not long until we had launched on Loch Fyne. The head of the loch is surrounded by the mountains of Argyll.


I had lent David my Quest LV as he was keen to try my new Flat Earth kayak sail.


We spotted the 16th century home of the MacNaughton clan, Dunderave Castle, on the far side of the loch...


... but we were heading to the south and the entrance to Loch Shira which is marked by this enormous Royal Navy mooring buoy. The loch is about 80m deep here so fairly big ships can tie up.


On the NW shore of Loch Shira we spotted Inveraray castle, the family seat of the Duke of Argyll, the chief of the Campbell clan. Inveraray means the mouth of the river Aray. Unlike the grim tower of Dunderave, the present castle was built as a grand residence between 1720 and 1789. It is a mixture of Baroque, Palladian and Gothic styles.


It was spring high water...


...so we decided to paddle up the river...


...and pay our respects at the Duke's front lawn...


...after which we drifted back downstream and under the road bridge to Inveraray town.

Seakayaking desktop wallpaper calendar, September 2010

September, Traigh Ban, NE Colonsay, Inner Hebrides.

If you click on the photo you will get the 1920x1280 size. I will post other sizes at the weekend.

No otters at Otter Ferry, Loch Fyne!

David, Phil and I arrived at Otter Ferry which is about half way up Loch Fyne, one of Scotland's longest sea Lochs at the head of the Firth of Clyde. There is an excellent pub here just by the sea shore.


We were welcomed by the pipping of the resident oyster catchers at the end of the old pier.


Otter does not refer to the furry mammal but to "oitir" a long spit of shingle that extends for a long way across the loch just under the water.


Leaving one car at Otter Ferry we drove up to St Catherine's jetty near the head of the loch to launch. The sharp witted reader will have already sussed our route in this long narrow loch!

From the Dorus Mor to Crinan

From the Corryvreckan we had to paddle at a high ferry angle to get round the north end of Reisa an t-Sruith. Once past here we were propelled through the Dorus Mor (the gap behind the paddlers) and thence towards Crinan still at 11km/hr!


All was quiet as we approached Crinan...


...and landed at the slipway...


...after a superb day of tidal assistance.


A trailer makes light work of transporting 4 kayaks on the long road home.

A Corryvreckan eddy.

We waited at the SE entrance to the Corryvreckan for 1.5hours after slack water, to let the east going ebb tide build up a little bit. We then launched into a counter eddy, which took us back west at 10.8km/hr into the Corryvreckan again.

We were passed by a west going yacht, motoring at full belt on top of the 10.8km/hr of the eddy. It was really nice to see its single handed skipper displaying such a confident knowledge of these tricky waters. We exchanged waves of mutual respect!


Tony and I then broke out into the main ebb. The eddy line was rather stimulating and then, out in the main current, huge boils, 150m across, erupted on the surface from the depths below. However, there was not a breath of wind and the surface of the Corryvreckan remained surprisingly calm. Even a light wind can turn these waters into somewhere very unpleasant. We were entertained by some porpoises feeding on confused fish.


After spending some time in the eddy, Jennifer and Phil came out to join Tony and I. It was their first trip into the Corryvereckan other than at slack water.


Once we were all in the main ebb, we found ourselves "drifting" along at only 14km/hr!


All too soon, we were ejected from the Corryvreckan. This is Phil's "Been there, done that." photo!


This was our track through and across the Corryvreckan from west to east. Slack, before the east going ebb, was predicted at 16:00, it was 3 days after neaps. We entered the west end of the Corryvreckan at 15:38, passed 180m SW of the pinnacle over which the whirlpools form at 15:52. at 16:01 the sea went glassy calm indicating slack water. (Note: tidal predictions here are very dependent on air pressure and are only reasonably accurate in the middle of a high pressure system.) We landed at Port nam Furm, at the SE entrance to the Corryvreckan, at 16:18. We relaunched at 17:18 into the west going eddy and finally left the Corryvreckan at 17:46, an hour and 46 minutes after slack water.


Don't be fooled by the calm conditions we encountered in the Corryvreckan on this current trip. This photo with a little wind shows the Corryvreckan in a much more serious mood.

Waiting for the ebb in the Corryvreckan.

We entered the great gulf of Corryvreckan just before slack water. There was no swell and we had never seen the SW of Scarba in such calm conditions.


Jennifer tried to look under the water to see if she could see the Old Hag that stirs the Corryvreckan but the witch must have been scared of Jennifer's goldfish hat.


Even at slack water there was some stirring as we paddled over the submarine pinnacle that throws up the "whirlpool".


Even Phil had found the whole experience somewhat anticlimactic, so we decided to stop for an evening meal...


...on a lovely cobbled beach on the NE tip of Jura.


We had a grandstand view of the Corryvreckan as we consumed our victuals and washed them down with a fine malt or two. We would now wait until the ebb had built up sufficiently for a little fun...

Sea Kayaking desktop wallpaper calendar August 2010

August, The Sound of Gunna.

The seakayakphoto.com August desktop calendar is available for download here.

Seakayakphoto.com will have limited posts for the next few weeks.

Guirasdeal, a miniature Scarba!

On leaving Lunga we approached the fair isle of Guirasdeal and Scarba beyond. It is like a miniature Scarba. One wonders what sort of cataclysmic geological events shaped this wonderful little isle.


We often take a break on its steep cobble beach but I knew my knee could not stand a landing there. At this point we had to decide whether to return to the Sound of Jura via the Grey Dogs (over Jennifer's left shoulder) or to carry on further south west and go through the Corryvreckan.


We decided to make for the Corryvreckan and crossed over to Scarba. There is another beach at the NW corner of Scarba but it is not suitable for dodgy knees either!


The cliffs, with their dry caves and raised beach, make Scarba's west coast a truly inhospitable place. This is the calmest we have ever seen it but there was nowhere to land, for anyone with the remotest sympathy for gel coat, so we kept paddling!


We came to the final headland before the Corryvreckan, what would it be like?

Givin' the Dogs the slip!

Although there was some growling from the throat of the Dogs and the occasional fleck of saliva, all looked remarkably calm and, much to Phil and Jennifer's relief, we slipped past the Grey Dogs on our way north to the tip of Rubha Fiola.


Scarba slipped astern but still dominated the skyline above the east coast of Lunga.


Ahead lay Fladda lighthouse backed by the island of Seil and the distant mountains of Morvern. Fladda light was built by David and Thomas Stevenson in 1860. The light flashes white from north through east to south and flashes red to the north and there are red and green sectors to the south. There is a large walled garden in which the keepers grew vegetables. Our speed increased as we passed Lunga and increased to 12km/hr before we reached our turning point of Rubha Fiola.


Rounding the point at the north end of Rubha Fiola, we were fortunate that the current on the west side was much less, even at the height of the tidal flow. We had now entered the Firth of Lorn and a dramatic coastline lay ahead, with the headlands of Rhubha Fiola, Lunga, Scarba and distant Jura all blocking our way back to Crinan.


It was about this point that Jennifer and Phil realised that we were now committed to returning either by the Grey Dogs or the great Gulf of Corryvreckan...


...so they consoled one another with some Jelly Beans!

Relaxing, with the roaring of the Dogs in our ears.

The tides carried us north at 8km/hr out of the Sound of Jura into the Sound of Luing, which separates Scarba on the west from Luing on the east.


The east coast of Scarba is sheltered from the prevailing wind and has a thick growth of deciduous woodland. Both red and fallow deer can be seen here. Kilmory Lodge lies 88m above sea level while the summit of Cruach Scarba 449m towers high above.


We had now been paddling for two hours and ten minutes. Even with tidal assistance, we were ready for lunch by the time we reached Poll na h'Ealaidh, Scarba's sole claim to anything resembling a harbour. The view to the north, through the Sound of Luing and across the Firth of Lorn ended in the distant mountains of Mull and Morvern.


We walked out to the end of the pier, hardly able to believe that we had just paddled all the way from the distant hills of Knapdale behind us.


We had a leisurely lunch while the tide built up to full speed in the nearby Grey Dogs, which lie between Scarba and the steep rocky knolls of Lunga to the north. Relaxing afterwards, with the roaring of the Dogs in our ears, Tony helped put Phil at ease by telling him about the huge standing waves we would encounter in the races ahead. "You'll be fine Phil, it's easier when the waves are bigger than 8 feet, they're more spaced out!"