Rain squalls over Ailsa Craig.

As Phil and I approached Drumbain Point there was no sign of Ailsa Craig. It was completely...

...obscured by a heavy rain squall. At first we thought it was going to catch us out too but...

 ......the squall gradually cleared and we continued south under lightening skies.

Ailsa Craig normally dominates the views of the mouth of the Firth of Clyde and it was good to have it back again. I hope to paddle there again soon but as it is 16km from the nearest part of the mainland it is an exposed paddle. You need to be quite fit in case unexpected squalls blow in so Phil and I pressed on into the southerly wind. Each stroke was another step on the road to recovery of paddling fitness.

Oilean, 2nd edition, David Walsh, Pesda Press Review.

I have been reading  David Walsh's Oileán –The Irish Islands Guide published by Pesda Press. It covers 574 Irish Islands that can be visited by kayak or small boat. David has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the islands having visited 503 of them!

Since the first edition, this book has grown from 218 pages to 292 pages and the number of islands covered has risen from over 300 to over 570. It is therefore definitely worth buying, even though you have the first edition. This Irish volume differs from the Pesda sea kayaking Guides to the British coast. Its pages include fewer maps and most of the photos are smaller and so it contains a lot more text. Although the book is primarily about the islands, it contains essential tidal information for major mainland headlands and of course relevant tidal information required for island crossings. It also includes a great many launch points on the mainland. Unlike the other guides it makes few suggestions for recommended routes but where tidal conditions dictate David does suggest a preferred option. Although it has been written by a sea kayaker it would equally be of interest to anyone with a small seaworthy boat. For yachties it complements the existing pilots (which lack this book's detail on the islands) but for them, pilots are still necessary as this book does not cover anchorage information. It is designed to be read with the appropriate maps and full grid references are given for key locations.

The concept of the book occurred in 1993 when David and Fred Cooney attempted to land on Davillaun island. They failed to find a landing spot and were later disappointed to discover that there was a hidden cove with easy landing. The core of the book is the description of the islands. Primarily this covers landing sites, camping possibilities, sources of drinking water and tides. Due to the comprehensive nature of this book and the sheer number of islands and launch sites I do not think there is any danger that it will create honeypot destinations which might suffer from undue numbers of visitors. If anything this guide will spread the load of increasing numbers of visitors to the islands which can only be good for both the islands and the visitors. It also includes fascinating insights into ownership of the islands and access (Ireland has no equivalent of the Scottish Land Reform Act). The book includes a wealth of historical information and describes the wildlife that may be encountered on and between the islands. The author has the gift of instilling the essence and character of each island into what may just be a paragraph for a smaller island.

A book of this type could easily have ended up as a dry gazetteer but not so with David Walsh's excellent writing. He displays an eye for keen observation and writes in a lively style with dry wit. For example in describing one island's wealthy owners desire for privacy and their concern for the welfare of the nesting bird population, he goes onto describes their unsightly rubbish dump which is out of sight of their house. He then describes their precious nesting sea birds and the tradition of harvesting their eggs. "Apparently the birds all feed on municipal dumps across on the mainland and the eggs do not taste fishy at all."

Oilean is highly readable, encyclopaedic and essential reading for those with an interest in the Irish islands. The book includes almost all of them. It even includes Rockall though I was somewhat disappointed to find no reference to Craggy Island. I must read it again!

Tthe dark basaltic ridges were cast into sharp relief by the sun..

 It was pleasantly sunny when Phil and I set of fro Seafield on the Firth of Clyde. I think it was the first blink of sun in about four months!

 The eider duck mating season has already started.

 We set off to the SW with the Heads of Ayr on our left and...

 ...the mountains of Arran on our right.

 The north side of the Heads of Ayr were in deep shade but as...

...we passed to their south, the dark basaltic ridges were cast into sharp relief by the sun..

Karitek Easy Load Roof Rack long term review..

After I tore tendons in my shoulder lifting a Delphin off my roof rack I fitted a Karitek Easy load roof rack. I have already reviewed this here but thought it would be worth revisiting given I have now started kayaking again after shoulder surgery. It has now covered about 4,000 miles driving round Scotland and my friend Mike who also bought one at the same time has probably done the same. The rack has survived motorways at 70mph and bouncy country roads at slower speeds. We were particularly impressed how it handled 3 kayaks on the very rough single track road that leads out to Ardnamurchan point.

At first sight it is an expensive bit of kit. However, it is a drop in the ocean compared to the expense of the shoulder surgery and being off the water for seven months. Think very carefully before loading a kayak onto your roof rack on your own. I didn't. I had been doing single handed lifts for 11 years and ignored the warning signs until the fateful day. With my arms above my head I had just started lowering the kakay to the ground when I heard a snap then heard and felt a longer ripping sensation deep in my shoulder joint. The noise and the pain almost caused me to vomit. Afterwards a contrast MRI scan of the shoulder showed I had torn tendons, ligaments and the joint capsule itself. Contrast media (which was injected into the joint capsule) leaked out and made its way down to my elbow.

Surgery was inevitable and this has been followed by lengthy and painful physiotherapy, which is continuing 7 months after surgery. So I leave it to the reader to judge whether a Karitek Easy Load Roof Rack represents value for money. However, if you are "careful" with your money and are a risk taker by nature, then I can recommend an excellent orthopaedic surgeon....

Back to the Karitek ELRR. One of the great advantages for loading solo is that it can be done at waist height. It really is a piece of cake. The rack is a pleasure to use.

So how has it stood up to use? Well it is almost all made of aluminium and stainless steel and has resisted the rigours of weather and salt water with no visible corrosion. Nothing has worn out.

Two small problems have occurred, both caused by me leaving the rack on my monoblock drive during a torrential rainstorm. I was removing the rack from the car when the storm struck and so left it horizontally on my drive while I rushed indoors. The rain caused the sand (which grouts the monoblock) to bounce up into the channels in which the rack's brass pivot wheels run. It sounded dreadful when I next attempted to slide it up and down. Unfortunately a hose and water was not sufficient to shift the sand (which had stuck to the light spray lubricant inside the channel). I cured this by soaking a rag in degreaser and pushing it through the channel with a screw driver. Smooth sliding was restored.

The sand also made the plastic roller that runs over the top of the roof bars stiff. I unscrewed this to clean it but unfortunately I also unscrewed the helicoil insert (which its retaining bolt screws into). Karitek sensibly use helicoils to retain all the stainless steel bolts that screw into the softer main aluminum members of the rack. If one does come out, they sell a helicoil replacement kit with installation tool for £3. This includes 4 helicoils. The repair took about 5 minutes (as I had disassembled part of the rack) but the Karitek tool would allow the repair to be made in situ. I will not be leaving the rack horizontally on sandy ground again.

In conclusion, and after extended use, I have found the Karitek ELRR to be an eminently practical and reliable solution to handling a sea kayak on my own. Without it I would not yet have been able to return to sea kayaking. This is truly a 5 star piece of kit.

A calm evening in the Gare Loch.

 We were now on the final leg of my first sea kayaking trip in seven months. We paddled down the outer Gare Loch...

 ...passing the outer boom of Rhu marina where a flock of...

 ...oyster catchers had gathered to roost for the approaching night.

 The sea was like a mirror as we approached Cairndhu Point...

 ...and Kidston Park where we had left the cars. In the late nineteenth century this was called Neddy's Point. Neddy was the Duke of Argyll's fisherman and lived in a cottage on the point. There was a plan to build a large villa on the point but in 1874 a local businessman and politician William Kidston, a landowner Sir James Colquhoun and Provost Breingan of Helensburgh donated and raised money to buy the land for a public park.

Although we only covered 18km in calm conditions, I was delighted how both my shoulder and knee stood up to sea kayaking after my two brushes with the orthopaedic surgeons. Time for some more sea kayaking!

Ebb tide in the Rhu Narrows.

Our peaceful reverie on the shores of the Gare Loch came to an end as the VHF crackled into life on channel 73 as HMS Raider asked QHM Faslane for permission to pass through the Rhu Narrows. HMS Raider is an Archer class armed fast patrol boat operated by the Royal Navy in a Force Protection role with her sister ship HMS Tracker.

As the tide had now turned it was time to make our way back to Limekiln Point where...

...we looked right then left then right again before ferrying...

...across the Narrows and the shipping channel.. As the tide was ebbing at 2 knots we crossed at quite a high angle before...

...breaking out behind the special purpose light that...

...marks the end of the tidal spit on the east side of the narrows. You can see the blip in mid channel where I stopped to take the 4th photo.

Then the ebb tide slowly but steadily carried us away from the mountains and the inner Gare Loch.

The elephant in the loch.

Once through the Rhu Narrows we paddled into the inner recesses of  the Gare Loch. After the constriction of the Narrows, the scenery opens out here and moody clouds hung low over the snow flecked mountains of Argyll. Although we were paddling on salt water, we were  completely surrounded by land. Only the 250m wide Rhu narrows connected us to the Firth of Clyde and we were 120 kilometers from the open sea at the mouth of the Firth of Clyde.

This remoteness from the sea and enclosed location was chosen to site HMS Neptune, the land based site for Britain's nuclear deterrent. We could see the base at Faslane Bay near the head of the loch.

As instructed by QHM Faslane, we kept to the west shore of the Gare Loch and although the MOD Police launches and RIBs gave us the once over with binoculars they left us in peace. We stopped for second luncheon on a little beach of...

 ...shingle and mussel shells. As we munched our sandwiches we looked over the Gareloch to the Faslane base. It was sited here to minimise the chances of a stealth attack by a Russian submarine.

Some 6,500 service and civilian personnel work at the base. By the time you add in their families you can appreciate that this base is a very significant part of the economy of the west of Scotland. Of course it doesn't make ploughshares and so it has attracted much protest from CND since it was established in the 1960's. For many years there was a big Peace Camp at the gates of the base but enthusiasm for that seems to have died out a bit over recent years.

In the late 1970's I did GP training in Helensburgh with an excellent GP called Dr Robin. He was GP to Faslane and arranged for me to get clearance to visit the base and see onboard a Repulse class Polaris carrying nuclear submarine and a smaller nuclear submarine with conventional armaments. I met a number of officers and crew and I doubt I would manage to live and work in such confined spaces for months at a time. The Repulse class submarine was cramped but the conventional submarine had a tiny living space, almost all the internal space was filled by tubes and machinery.

This is one of the current Vanguard class of Trident missile carrying nuclear submarines making her way up the Clyde to Faslane. It could be HMS Vanguard, Vigilant, Victorious or Vengeance but I don't know which. Subs like these do not have name or number plates.

One of the SNP policies, if the population in the forthcoming referendum votes for independence, is to do away with the nuclear deterrent. By nature I am a pacifist, I don't watch boxing or violent TV shows. I had my fill of street violence attending to its victims when working in Glasgow A&E departments. But I am also the first generation of my family that has not had to go and fight in a war. I have been researching my family history round about the time of First World war. Reading letters sent back from the front. Hearing about death, injury, disability and psychological trauma in the family and the loss of generations as maiden aunts' boyfriends were killed, leaves no doubt about the horrors of war. A great uncle who was left disabled and deaf after being blown up by a shell was awarded a medal for...

...meritorious service in Egypt during 1915. He went on to fight in Gallipoli where he was left for dead after the shell struck. He was so affected by what he had experienced in the war that he never discussed it afterwards and never told anyone about the medal. We only discovered about the medal 99 years later.

I believe that the presence of Faslane has helped to avert further war during the "Cold War" years and so (paradoxically as a pacifist) I support its presence. I wonder how the many thousands of people who work there will be voting in the independence referendum?