When mountains crumble to the sea.

If the sun refused to shine, I would still be loving you.
When mountains crumble to the sea, there will still be you and me.
"Thank You" Led Zeppelin

Finding an erratic pink rhyolite pebble on the beach at Inchmarnock took my mind to its source. It came from the mountain of Buachaille Etive Mor which sits between Glen Etive and GlenCoe nearly 100km away to the NNE. Its Gaelic name means great shepherd of Etive. It is composed mainly of rhyolite, a pink volcanic rock, which gives excellent scrambling and rock climbing.


This is the Rannoch Wall which has many popular climbing routes.


My friend, John, completes a climb up the face of the Rannoch Wall,


This is an old B&W print I took in 1973. I used an orange filter to darken the blue in the sky. It shows the King's House Hotel, which is situated at the Buachaille's feet. It was one of the old staging inns at which horse drawn carriages would stop after a day's travel. The next inn on the road north is the Clachaig, at the west end of Glen Coe, some 14km away and the next to the south is the Inveroran Hotel, 15km to the south over the Rannoch Moor, near the shores of Loch Tulla. It took a long time to travel in those days.


I wonder how long this pebble took on its journey south to Inchmarnock?

Rounders and Luncheon on Inchmarnock

Tony said "What a day indeed- a classic. Dont forget.. as well as the glacial deposits we also found a complete bat and ball set on the beach!
Looking forward to the next time.."

Indeed we did, a spiffing time was had by all.



Games were followed by second luncheon, or was it third breakfast?

Inchmarnock's beach of treasures.

Our weekend trip to Inchmarnock in the Firth of Clyde was blessed with stunning light.



We landed on a lonely beach which was patrolled by a golden eagle.



We were not the only ones disturbing the eagle's domain. Herring gulls were mobbing it.



The beach was full of treasures. The pink pebble is rhyolite which was transported here from Buachaille Etive Mor, nearly 100km to the NNE, by glaciers in the last ice age.

Another fabulous day on the Clyde

Flat calm start to the day.



We took the ferry to Bute then headed over the West Kyle of Bute to Ardlamont Point on the mainland.



We then headed down pat the west side of Inchmarnock before heading back to Bute.



Of course it did not stay calm and we had a brisk paddle into the wind for the last 9km.

It does not end there. I got the car stuck in the mud just as it was getting dark and the rain started and we only had 30 mins to catch the last ferry! Fortunately a friendly farm lad came with a very large JCB and pulled me out with a huge chain. (I had my tow hitch on.) We made the ferry by the skin of our teeth.

What a day!

Rum rocks.

The north coast of Rum is a wild place.

The Witch's Step, Arran

I recently posted about the sea level Bad Step on the Island of Skye but there are many more high level bad steps such as Ceum na Caillich (or the Witch's Step) on the north west Glen Sannox ridge in the Isle of Arran.

The view from this ridge is a simply stunning mixture of rock and sea scapes and makes for a scrambling paradise.







We recently paddled below Arran's lofty ridges and I have now posted the complete picture set over at the Scottish Seakayaking Photo Gallery.

Mackerel sky.

"Mackerel sky, mackerel sky - never long wet, never long dry. "

Is there any truth in this piece of folklore?

A mackerel sky is composed of patches of altocumulus cloud. It represents a layer of unstable and humid air which often follows a ridge of high pressure and precedes a warm front by about 400km. As warm fronts move about 50km/hr you can expect a change in the weather in about 8 hours. This was taken at 11am on our trip from Loch Sunart to Mull on 18/2/07. The wind picked up to force four from the SE by 12:00. By 14:00 the wind had increased to force 5 and it clouded over by 14:30. It was raining by 23:00.

On Saturday 17th February, when we were planning our trip, Scotland was under a ridge of high pressure and there was no wind. Sunday 18th dawned clear and still but the BBC forecast for Tobermory and Mull was for 17mph SE winds. The met office inshore forecast issued at 0600 UTC on Sunday 18 February 2007 for Mull of Kintyre to Ardnamurchan was:

Wind southeasterly 5 or 6, occasionally 7.
Precipitation: rain then showers.
Visibility: moderate or good.
Sea state: Moderate occasionally rough.

Although apparently sheltered, the Sound of Mull can be very rough especially in wind against tide conditions. LW Oban was at 12:35, 1 day before springs. Streams in the Sound of Mull change at HW and LW Oban. The flood flows to the NW and the ebb to the SE. When we crossed the Sound we had force 4 SE wind against the last hour of the ebb and it was rough in the middle. Although the wind was forecast to increase later, we enjoyed our stop at Tobermory as I knew that by that time the flood would have started and being with the wind, it would flatten the water. This is exactly what happened.



The white horses disappeared and the water flattened as the flood built up speed. We had a trouble free paddle back to the shelter of Loch Sunart.