Sleep was a little disturbed at our camp on the shore of Loch Etive; the Red Deer stags continued their roaring all night, the sound echoing across the loch. Just as dawn broke they seemed to quieten, allowing an extra hour's sleep for the humans.
We woke to a morning filled with promise; a light cover of cloud was already starting to be burned off by the rising sun. We were pleasantly surprised that there was no condensation on the tents and no dew on the ground, allowing us to pack tents away quickly.
We got on the water before 0900 and headed out to the centre of the narrow loch. Behind us the ridges of Ben Cruachan looked very atmospheric with streamers of morning cloud hanging in the corries of that great and complex hill.
The north west shore of Loch Etive is more wooded than the south eastern side and was beautifully lit by the morning sunshine, gorgeous shades of autumnal colours were picked out wherever sunlight broke through.
We headed over and paddled slowly up the shore towards the head of the loch alongside woods of oak, holly and birch, set off with a deep russet carpet of brackens which had already "gone over". We felt that the morning could scarcely be better....until we turned a small headland and got the view we'd come for.
Landing on a shingle shore we just stood and stared before reaching for our cameras. The dramatic hills at the head of the loch were reflected perfectly in the still water and we took image after image after image. I'm still not sure whether I prefer the images with the shoreline boulders......
......or the ones without the boulders! The head of Loch Etive lies between the Blackmount and Glencoe and the hills in view are some of the best of both those grand ranges. The sharp peaks at the ends of Buachaille Etive Beag and Buachaille Etive Mor are prominent, with the passes of the Lairig Eilde and the Lairig Gartain between them. In shadow on the right of this image is the base of Ben Starav, a hill I'd put in my top ten of Munros...it was all pretty special!
We sat for a considerable time just absorbing the views and enjoying the stillness of the morning - after our initial amazed exclamations about the view, words seemed a little superfluous. Coffee was taken along with snacks to prolong the sitting around, but eventually we knew we'd have to get back on the water if we were to take advantage of the ebb tide further down the loch.
The views as we headed back down the upper part of the loch were hardly poor either! What tiny breeze there had been had died completely and we paddled on absolutely still water, the only movement was that created by our paddle strokes - and we felt almost guilty when we created ripples on such perfection!
Stands of trees on the shore created great reflections; at times these seemed similar to the fractal patterns in children's kaleidoscopes. I positioned myself to photograph first Allan.....
...and then Raymond in the middle of these reflected geometric patterns.
A wider view shows just how perfect this morning was as we paddled under the sweep of Ben Trillieachan (hill of the sandpiper - though many climbers who've had experience of the famous slabs on the north end of the hill would claim it's "sandpaper"!).
As we left the narrow upper part of the loch we took a last look back at the view. Our passage back to Taynuilt was assisted by the pull of the ebb tide and we averaged a healthy 8.5km/h without much effort, popping through the narrows on the last of the ebb.
This had been a great overnight exploration of Loch Etive, we'd had great views and amazing wildlife encounters as well as a comfortable camp - it's a loch I know that I'll return to paddle again.
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