HMS Ark Royal, final voyage to Scotland.

This is what we had come to see. HMS Ark Royal, the third in the Invincible class of light aircraft carriers.

She was launched in 1981 and commissioned in 1985. She weighs 22,000 tons and measures 210m by 36m.

She can carry up to 18 Harrier GR 6/7 aircraft. Her ramp is steeper (than that of her two earlier sister ships) to enhance the Harriers' take off performance. She is currently flagship of the Royal Navy fleet.

 Here she is  moored at Glenmallan pier in Loch Long to off load her armaments.

There is an exclusion zone that extends all round Glenmallan, almost to the far side of the loch! When munitions are being loaded or unloaded it is patrolled by a naval launch and so we made a point of sticking to the far shore. I wasn't sure if photography would be exactly welcomed and my white barrelled Canon L telephoto lens  is not exactly inconspicuous. I tended to take photos when other boats were traversing the edge of the exclusion zone and distracting the patrol boat!

Sadly HMS Ark Royal is to be decommissioned...

...and so we said our farewells to this fine ship. We were glad that we had managed to kayak past her on her final trip in Scottish waters.

Sea kayaking in search of the lost Ark.

Loch Long runs very straight and it is also very deep. It  has some of the finest deep water jetties in the World. From north of Ardgartan we could see a VLCC* berthed at the Finnart oil terminal some 9km away. But this was not what we were looking for.

We continued paddling down Loch Long under the high peaks of of Argyll...

...round which the mists still clung.

The NW shore of Loch Long is remote from tarmac roads and being in a sheltered location...

...the forests still had some autumn leaves for colour. We were enjoying the natural beauty of the loch when...

...Jim thought he spotted something ahead.

Ever so slowly...

...a strange shape materialised out of the glare of the low winter sun. We had found what we were looking for!

*VLCC: very large crude carrier!

Sea kayaking inthe mountains with torpedoes and invisible ink.

By the time Jim and I returned from the shuttle, the tide was well back. We had chosen a launch site beside...

..the old pier at Arrochar and so did not have nearly half a kilometer of sticky black mud to negotiate at the head of Loch Long.

Once on the water, the Phil was dwarfed by the jagged ramparts of the Cobbler. The first of the winter snows clung to the dark rocks of the high corries.

We set off SW down Loch Long towards the distant open sea. We were hemmed in on both sides by the mountain slopes...

...that now plunged into the sea but which had once confined the glacier that had gouged out Loch Long during the Ice Ages. The SE side of the valley that contains the loch was in deep shade and our breath froze into icy crystals in the cold morning air.

We moved over to the sunny side of the loch where we passed the remains of the abandoned Admiralty buildings which were the headquarters of the Loch Long Torpedo Range. The range opened in 1912 and remained open until 1986. During WW1 in 1915, a Uruguayan national,  Augusto Alfredo Roggen, was arrested at the the nearby Tarbet Hotel. He said he was on a fishing holiday and had a map of the area (including the restricted area at the head of Loch Long) in his possession. He raised suspicion as he had arrived without rods and a when he was arrested, a revolver, ammunition and invisible ink were found in his room. Although the police were very smart to find the invisible ink, what really damned him was, that in Britain, the revolver was considered a very unsporting way to catch fish. He was transported  to the Tower of London and although the Loch Long fish were spared the bullet, he was not. In 1915 Britain, fish enjoyed a longer life than spies.

We would need to be careful...

Hunched by the cold, a long, long way from the open sea.

For a change, we decided to drive a long way from the open sea for our last trip. We left Glasgow in thick misty conditions, so thick that we missed the turn off for the Erskine Bridge and nearly ended up in Greenock. Fortunately the mist was rising by the time we arrived.

Our destination was Arrochar at the head of Loch Long. The open sea was 160km away, down Loch Long, the Firth of Clyde and the North Channel, between the Mull of Kintyre and Ireland. There are two car parks at the head of Loch Long but the tide was out, revealing evil, black mud. We launched instead, from the slipway near the old pier and parked at the car park beside the village  hall. If an event is on and this full, an alternative is to and park on some open ground to the south of the Village Inn and launch from the old slipway to its north, or some steep stone steps opposite.

Only the sea weed at low tide betrays that Loch Long is not a fresh water lake, nestling deep within the mountains.

At sea level we were still deep in the shade but high above us, the rising sun already shone on the summit of Ben Arthur, 884m. The Cobbler, as the Ben is commonly known, appeared to hunch over the head of the loch.

The still water of  Loch Long reflected the forests of the Cobbler's foothills while this cormorant sat immobile, hunched against the cold like the Cobbler. It didn't look like a good day for fishing...

...but perfect for sea kayaking, so we wasted no time getting ready.

As the mist rose  and the sky cleared, the temperature plummeted and the shaded road turned into a sheet of ice.

We were very careful as we carried the kayaks along to the slipway. I have never understood kayak coaches, who insist on warm up exercises before paddling. We were roasting by the time we got the kayaks to the shore.

Mind you, Phil didn't stay roasting for long. Jim and I left him for an hour as we negotiated the treacherous mountain road over to Lochgoilhead, where we left a shuttle car before returning to Arrochar.

A dream of the otter and the mountain

Although we were some way offshore, an otter surfaced between Tony and myself, a still wriggling fish clamped firmly in its jaws. Unfortunately it was gone before I got my camera out.

As we approached Brodick Bay...

...we paddled alongside a beautiful mixed woodland.

I had borrowed Tony's new Werner Cyprus paddles. He was very pleased when I finally, and ever so reluctantly, gave them back. He just laughed when I said I would just have to buy some myself!

As we made our way across Brodick Bay, Goatfell rose majestically behind us.

The wind dropped to nothing and we drifted, savouring the moment for as long as we could, not wanting the dream of the day to end. It was now just a short distance to the ferry terminal and a ride back to reality in MV Caledonian Isles. The remarkable thing is that we were only 22km from the Ayrshire coast and home.

Guaranteed seal sighting at Corrie, or your money back!

 We left Sannox to paddle down the east coast of Arran to the ferry terminal at Brodick.

 We were surrounded by torrential rainstorms...

which turned the sky black and chilled the air.

We always see a seal basking on the rocks at Corrie. In the distance the MV Stadiongracht, a 172m cargo boat, was making its way from Brodick Bay up the Clyde to Greenock.

Off Merkland Point, we got a great view to Holy Island and the distant Ayrshire coast. The entrance to Loch Ryan could be seen to the left of the steep slopes of Holy Island.

Landfall on the golden sands of Sannox.

The approach to Glen Sannox in Arran must be one of the finest crossings in Scotland.

As you get nearer the mountains...

...begin to fill the entire horizon and sea kayakers find themselves dwarfed by the scale of the landscape.

The crossing from Bute is 10.7km and we were ready to stretch our legs by the time we reached ...

...the golden sands of Glen Sannox. What a location for second luncheon!