The view from the summit of Little Ross Island.

From the summit of Little Ross Island we looked west down to the waters of The Sound with the point of Fox Craig beyond. It is often instructive to view paddling conditions from above.

From sea level, just 20 minutes before, the wide angle lens made the conditions look much calmer than they actually were.

The tide race was swirling round the south end of Little Ross and this was wind with tide! This large yacht was making her way up to Kirkcudbright from the Isles of Fleet where she had spent Saturday night. She had reached down under foresail alone. Because there was live firing on the range she.had to pass within 200m of the SE shore of Little Ross so she started her engine and motor sailed in before hoisting her main once in the more sheltered waters of the bay.

This is the view east from Little Ross and all the sea and land in the photo is in the exclusion zone when the range is firing. In the middle distance, Gypsy Point marks the far side of Kirkcudbright Bay. In the far distance, Abbey Head is 7km away and the firing range extends a further 3km beyond it. Despite the wind, the noise of medium and large calibre firing travelled far over the water.The flood tide runs east along this coast and the ebb west. At springs the tide makes 4 knots in each direction.

As we did not want to paddle north up Kirkcudbright Bay against the 3.5 knot ebb tide (I stopped using my Greenland paddle for everyday use after the last time I did that!) it was now time to make our way back to our kayaks to catch the end of the flood. The lower light at the north end of the island is aligned with the lighthouse astern  to give a transit for boats to find the start of the buoyed channel up the River Dee to Kirkcudbright.

As we approached the store at the west quay, the Gallovidian III was still at anchor on range duty but the other recreational boats were already making their way up river to avoid the ebb tide.

Murder at Little Ross Lighthouse.

Near the west quay at the north end of Little Ross Island lies an old workshop and store. An old Alvis Stalwart 6WD amphibious vehicle was parked next to the store. We thought we would be safer crossing the Little Ross Sound and Ross Roads in our sea kayaks.

 From the store a track leads up to the summit of Little Ross, which is crowned by the lighthouse.

Half way up, on the east side of the track, some cottages and an old smithy are adjoined by a walled garden. The garden belonged to the principal lighthouse keeper.

The Little Ross lighthouse was the first built by Alan Stephenson and was lit on 1/1/1843. The light flashes white every five seconds.

It was the first lighthouse in the world to have a catadioptric design, which meant that the beam was focussed with both lenses and mirrors. At the time the famous physicist Lord Kelvin ranked it (along with the lighthouses at Rhinns of Islay and Buchan Ness) as one of the top three lighthouses in the World.

In 1960, the light was one of the very first manned lights to be automated. This was precipitated by the tragic murder of one of the keepers by his assistant. There is a moving first hand account by David Collin, one of the people who discovered the murdered man, on the Kirkcudbright community website.

The red flag is flying high over Kirkcudbright Bay.

 Although our destination was Little Ross Island....

 ...we paddled out through Little Ross Sound and past Fox Craig to...

 ...the open Solway Firth beyond.. There is a tidal anomaly in the Sound. During spring tides the current generally flows south in the Sound during both the ebb and the flood. You are almost guaranteed some interesting wind over tide conditions here in the prevailing SW winds. It was easy to see why the other boaters had stayed within Kirkcudbright Bay.

After some fun in the Solway we paddled back through the Sound and into the lee of the north end of Little Ross Island.

During the early part of the year this is a gull nesting colony but the chicks had all fledged and the rocks were deserted. Their guano and the smell well the only reminders of the frenetic bird  activity during the Spring.

We had noticed the MV Gallovidian III had been anchored a little way offshore. Her skipper Gary McKie upped anchor and motored across to within hailing range. The Gallovidian III is the Kirkcudbright Range safety boat. Gary hailed us to ask if we knew the range was being used for live firing. Over the AKA AKA AKA and Crump Crump of small and large bore firing, we reassured him that we did.

In fact Tony and I had originally intended launching from Abbey Burn Foot (at the east end of the range) and paddling west to Little Ross Island. However, the red flags round the range were flying and the access road was blocked.

A passing Romilly in Kirkcudbright Bay.

 As we approached Little Ross Island the wind began to increase and...

 ...many of the boats, that had passed us, either anchored in the lee of the island or turned back for Kirkcudbright. This beautiful balanced lug yawl caught my eye. Her solo helmsman quickly and expertly reefed her two sails for the sail back up Kirkcudbright Bay.

She is a 22 foot Romilly, a design by Nigel Irens. A particular feature is her freestanding carbon fibre masts and spars. Her name is Speedwell and her owner David Collin has sailed her out of Kirkcudbright Bay since 2000. Very nice indeed...almost enough to make me interested in boat owning again but I am not sure if a Romilly would survive...

...the White Steeds of the Solway, at a tidal mooring in Fleet Bay, due to her lying on her side when drying out.

The Devil's Thrashing Floor, the White Steeds of the Solway and the wrecks and carlins of Senwick Bay.

As Tony and I paddled down the wooded shores of Kirkcudbright Bay, we were sheltered from a brisk SW wind which was blowing offshore. The wind combined with the flood spring tide made for hungry work and it was time for first luncheon.  The tidal shallows here are called "The Devil's Thrashing Floor" and...

...they were the cause of many ship wrecks, such as that of the two masted sailing schooner Monrieth in 1900. Her wooden ribs can still be seen at low tide. When the wind bows against the tide in these waters conditions are right for the wonderfully named "White Steeds of the Solway" to make their appearance. These may be the Devil's steeds...

...but they can be fun!

However, all was calm this day and we soon came to the delightful sheltered  cove at Senwick Bay. It is not always thus, in 1887 the Preston brig "Just" was lost here as were the Whitehaven brig "Mary Isabella", the Harrington brig "Dido" and the Workington brig "Joshua" all in the same storm in 1822. The other name for Senwick Bay is Carlin's Cove. Carlin is the Old Scots word for a witch. You can just imagine the Thrashing Floor and Senwick Bay on that stormy night. The wind was shrieking through the doomed ships' rigging and the trees on the shore like a wailing banshee...

On this July day the cove was a real sun trap and we enjoyed a long break  as a succession of motor and sailing boats from Kirkcudbright made their way past us on their way out to sea.

All too soon it was time to take to the water again and Little Ross island slowly got nearer. Its lighthouse had been constructed in 1843 in an attempt to reduce the appalling loss of ships on the Devil's Thrashing Floor.

A distinct lack of malodour down in the Kirkcudbright mud.

This is another trip from my back catalogue. It was a glorious July day when Tony and I made our way down the muddy banks of the River Dee at Kirkcudbright on the Solway coast. We launched from Gartshore Park to the west of the town. Although the mud looks terrible , it was actually only 2 cm thick with relatively firm ground beneath. We had expected it to be foul smelling but it was not malodorous.

We launched 2 hours after low water so the flood was well established. We kept out the main current by paddling in the shallows and sticking to the inside of the bends. The tower marks what used to be the end of the Kircudbright sewage pipe. Fortunately a new marine outfall was built in 2006 and the sewage treatment works' effluent is now discharged about 10km away, under the sea at the mouth of Kircudbright Bay.

 Squabbling gulls were feeding at the rising margin of the tide which was...

 ...sweeping upstream. We could not yet see the sea beyond the muddy banks of the river channel.

 This old wooden fishing boat now lies above all but the highest tides but she has seen better days.

We paddled along the wooded shores of St Mary's Isle. The "isle" was the site of a priory dating back to the 12th century but nowadays it is just a secular peninsula. The channel between the isle and the mainland has long since silted up and the monks have long gone..

At last we caught sight of our destination. As the tide in the channel rose, Little Ross island and its lighthouse appeared over the mudflats.

Black Bun and a black swan in the gloaming.

 We landed at Bracken Bay for the second time but all the hot mulled wine had been finished...

 ...that morning and so we enjoyed watching the day slip away while enjoying a hot coffee and some home made Black Bun (Scottish Christmas cake).

Reinvigorated, we set off on the final leg of our journey as the...

...glow in the south western sky was fading.

We paddled on towards the ruin of Greenan castle as darkness began to fall and...

...the lights of Ayr came on and twinkled across the bay. Quite a commotion of bird noise drifted over the water from the flocks of birds feeding at the mouth of the River Doon.

Just as we made landfall at Seafield, a black swan landed noisily in the water beside us. It is a native of Australia and this one spent several months at the mouth of the river Doon in the company of the local mute swans. Presumably it was an escape from a zoo or a bird park. We were frozen as we loaded the boats onto the cars, goodness knows how the Antipodean bird was feeling, a long, long way from home.