A perfect pitch

It turned out that our day could and did get better!  The camping spot we'd originally planned on was a few more kilometres up the coast, and given the wind direction we realised that it would be right in the wind.  So when a flash of white sand backed by bright green woodland caught our eye at the back of a small bay, we had to take a look.

Landing near low water we found ourselves in an enclosed bay, sheltered from the wind and in full sunshine.  A few folk were enjoying the late afternoon sunshine, indicating that the bay was fairly accessible, but it did look very promising as a wild camping spot.  Our preference is for fairly remote areas which are little used, but never look a gift horse in the mouth!

As the day visitors started to leave, we pitched our tents, Donny and Douglas pitched on the level turf above the beach itself - where there was even a picnic bench......

Allan and I chose spots in a beautiful wood of birches at the back of the bay which was alive with birdsong.  At the time and in the memory, this felt a perfect pitch.

Once we'd pitched up we wandered the bay, just enjoying the sunshine and the location.  We came across this lovely piece of beach art which must have taken both patience and real creative talent to produce.  Transient and perfect, it would be washed away by the evening's high tide.

Much of the beach was covered in pieces of white "coral" - actually Maerl, a corraline algae which when living is a purplish colour.  When they die, the calcereous remains of Maerl are broken and crushed by wave action, then bleached in the sun to form dazzling white "coral" beaches such as this one.  

A rare and fragile environment, Maerl beds have comprehensive protection, but are at risk from scallop dredging - one pass by a scallop dredger's bottom gear can destroy a bed which might be hundreds of years old.   Loch Carron has some of the best examples of Maerl beds and as a result is protected by designation as a Marine Protected Area (MPA).  

In the wood, Primroses were in flower on sunny banks - perhaps my favourite of the early Spring flowers; such a cheery sight at the back of a long winter.

After dinner we wandered over to the edge of the bay and climbed a rocky outcrop to photograph the setting sun - it was a really lovely evening.

Our fire below the Spring tide mark was lit to get going while we took our photographs and brought snacks and drinks down from the tents.

 Across the sea, beyond Skye and Raasay, the setting sun slipped down to the horizon to end a truly great day on the water.  We sat with a dram by our fire and chatted into a glorious evening.

Note: Since we camped here, the bay and its beach have been featured in a national newspaper and on a well known travel website as "one of the most beautiful and accessible in Scotland".  This is undoubtedly going to increase it's popularity and perfect as it is, we will avoid camping here for the foreseeable future in order to go a small way to reducing future pressure.

Over the sea from Skye

A spell of warm and sunny Spring weather is always so welcome here in Scotland - so when a run of fine days was forecast in the second half of April we made plans for a kayak trip.  Our starting point was to be Kyleakin on the Isle of Skye; and we met up on a sparkling morning.  Allan and I travelled from Aberdeenshire, Douglas from the Solway coast via Glasgow and Taynuilt, where he teamed up with Donny for the journey to Skye.  Our plan was very flexible....simply to spend some time kayaking around the southern part of the Inner Sound.

While we rigged our kayaks Donny got his F-RIB "Guppy" afloat and set off to do a little filming.  You'll be able to see the video of our trip on Donny's Youtube channel here.  

After the usual routine of boat packing and trying to make sure everything fitted in, we got underway and immediately put up our sails to catch a push from the north easterly breeze.  This stretch of water,  Kyle of Lochalsh or more properly Caol Loch Ailse (Strait of the Foaming Lake) has strong tidal streams, particularly at the narrow western entrance which is named separately as Kyle Akin (Haakon's Strait) - named for a Norse king who brought a huge force of longships through here and beached at Kyleakin on his way south where he would be engaged and beaten by a Scots army under King Alexander III on 2nd October 1263.

 

The building of the Skye Bridge altered the flows somewhat at Kyleakin and the strongest of the stream can be avoided by passing close under the eastern side between Eiean Ban and the mainland shore - that said it's still an energetic paddle against the tide!

We started on Skye and apart from a brief call back at Kyleakin didn't plan to paddle any of the island's coast on this trip - not so much "Over the Sea to Skye" as over the sea from Skye!

We headed north after exiting Kyleakin and stopped at Eilean a' Mhal for first luncheon. Sheltered from the breeze we sat in warm sunshine with a wonderful view across the Inner Sound to the hills of Beinn na Cailleach and Glamaig on Skye.  The colour in the water was marvellous and was the standout feature of this day.

Back underway and we continued north through the maze of the Black Islands, which today were anything but black - indeed there was a riot of colour.  This group of islands usually provides sheltered paddling in a compact area which changes from hour to hour according to the state of the tide.

Conditions were pretty good for early Spring - dry and bright with a north easterly breeze, and we observed this effect of cloud capping some, but not all, of the higher hills several times during our trip.

 As we left the Black Islands we paddled into the breeze and so dropped our sails.  After an energetic couple of kilometres of paddling we came into a lagoon with the most wonderful colour of water as the sun lit the white sand below our boats.  Really - could a day get any better than this?!

Away and underway

Through both lockdowns I've been exploring local hills and routes and there will be a whole series of "catch-up" posts at some point.  Great as this was, it was a relief to get to the point where travel restrictions could be lifted and we could get "away".

In the week that Covid-19 restrictions were lifted sufficiently to allow travel outwith our own local authority area, Lorna, Allan and I met at Inverness and drove on to meet up with Douglas who'd travelled from south Glasgow, Raymond who had travelled from north Glasgow and Donny who had come up from Taynuilt near Oban.

You'll be able to follow this trip in "Sea Kayak tri-vision" by checking out Douglas' blog starting here, and Donny's Youtube channel here.

 

Our rendezvous at Glenelg takes some getting to; down the main road towards Skye and then a twisting drive on the single-track road over the 339m/1112ft pass of Mam Ratagan.  Mind you, it's a lot closer than the twinned location on Mars!  The strange association was instituted in 2011 when NASA was looking for a palindromic name for a location on the Martian surface which the "Curiosity" rover would visit twice - and Glenelg is Scotland's only palindromic place-name.

We parked our cars at Bernera beach and checked with a local lady that they'd not be in anyone's way for a few days.  We took our time packing, it's been over a year since we last packed boats for a multi-day adventure!  Finally all was ready.  Our friend Donny was using his 2.75m folding RIB (F-Rib) "Guppy" and set off a little ahead of us to play in the tidal stream at Kylerhea.  We'd timed our departure to take advantage of the last of the south going tide which would push us down the Sound of Sleat (pronounced "Slate") towards our intended camp site for the first night.

We'd deliberately scheduled a short first day as we didn't set out until early afternoon.  A couple of hours of steady paddling got us back in the rhythm of travelling in fully laden kayaks and it wasn't long before we reached our intended camp.  

As it was low water and Springs, we had a fair carry to get the boats up - as there were five kayakers we were able to lift even the laden boats and move them in two stages; firstly up to the beach to give us time to sort our camp.  We moved them to the same place as our tents later on.  Donny anchored "Guppy" in a lagoon around a sheltered point on the other side of our camp.

We pitched our tents and got a cup of tea on....we'd arrived and another adventure was underway!

Our camp was sufficiently spacious that we had choices of where to put the tents...which is not always a good thing as several pitches looked equally promising!  To get our boats above the Spring high water mark we moved them up to the turf - which was actually a little higher than mine and Douglas' tents!

Our camp looked across a sheltered bay to a ridge, above which the upper slopes of Beinn Sgritheall (scree mountain) soared.  A couple of heavy showers blew through, sending us into our tents temporarily - and each one left more snow on the mountain.

While the temperature was on the cool side, it was undoubtedly Spring.  Bright clumps of Primroses (Primula vulgaris) dotted our camp, splashes of colour among winter-bleached grasses.

The play of light was really quite special and the occasional shower was well worth sitting out to watch the change of colour and form during the late afternoon.

A rainbow stretched across the bay; too broad for my camera lens to get it all in as it arced up over one side.....

.....and back down to the other side of the bay.

 Dinner was a superb chicken casserole followed by home-made carrot cake - both courses courtesy of Lorna.  I was unsurprised to find that there were large quantities of driftwood along the shore; the absence of people around to collect it for over a year meant that we could gather what we needed from close at hand, and even to just collect the driest pieces.   The fire was lit below the high tide mark which meant that by the early hours of the morning all trace of it would be erased.  We sat long into the evening around the fire, catching up with each other after not having been together as a group for so long.  It felt so good to be away and underway.....

Under the bridge to Skye

I set off on a chilly but quiet morning from Kyle of Lochalsh to paddle north to Plockton, then return to Kyle.  The whole coast between the two is dotted with islands and skerries noted for wildlife and owned by the National Trust for Scotland.

At Neap tides and with almost no wind Kyle Akin (Hakon's Narrows - a hint to the Norse influence here) was quiet.  At Springs and with some wind, it's a very different and challenging stretch of water.  Ahead, the Skye bridge spans the Kyle.  This bridge, opened in 1995, replaced the Calmac ferry and reduced queues, but was very controversial because of the punitive tolls.  The eventual removal of tolls on this and all bridges in Scotland was due largely to ordinary people making a principled and obdurate stand.

You can still travel as in the words of the famous song, "over the sea to Skye" by using the Glenelg Ferry which runs from April to October.  It's by far the most pleasant way to reach Skye, and thoroughly recommended.

Under the bridge on the Lochalsh side stands the Eilean Ban lighthouse.  Built in 1857 by Thomas Stevenson, it's no longer lit but is still a daymark.  It's now pretty much overshadowed by the bridge.  The prominent hill in the background is Dun Caan on the island of Raasay.

From most angles the bridge is a fairly unremarkable concrete span, but from directly below it has a undoubted slender grace.  I now left the traffic and bustle to paddle north along the coast.