There was virtually no wind all afternoon and George steered us to Mallaig. On the way, a family of common dolphins joined us and played around. Young dolphins jumped right out of the water and the adults spent some time bow-riding.
Archeologists have found that part of the stream is canalised with stone walls and there are mechanisms for keeping the water in the loch, making a wet dock. It is generally reckoned that these date from around 1000 CE but continued in use for a long time.
When Alison dropped me off I clambered over the rocks to the stream and got across near the outlet and explored.
It takes a good eye to spot anything man-made. But it's easy to spot good places to use as quays and dry-docks and 'nousts' winter storage haul-out places.
We had not explored ashore yesterday evening, so we got into Worm straight after breakfast and rowed off to look for a landing place. The only spot we could find that did not require us to wade through seaweed was the trip boat landing ladder, so after a good look at other options we headed there. One of the other yacht's crew had just landed there using their tender, and tied their dinghy out of the way round the corner. We copied them, and set off for a walk. Clouds still wreathed the Cuillins, but visibility was good at sea level. The sun was well hidden, and the midges were out, but we had prepared ourselves with “Smidge” and they left us alone.
The bothy hut was locked up tight. There were a variety of routes to take up to Loch Coruisk, some on rock and some across boggy ground. One was obviously the “proper” path as attempts had been made to keep it dry, but it was often easier to leave it and take to the smooth rocks. |
| Loch Coruisk |
The first of the trip boats arrived when we did, so we waited for them to disgorge their passengers before bringing Worm round. Once we were in Worm I began to row us back to Robinetta, when Julian suddenly realised he had left his camera on the rock were we had sat to wait for the trip boat.
I dropped Julian off, then rowed clear of the landing steps to let the trip boat passengers ashore.
We were back on Robinetta by quarter to eleven, and we got the engine on and pulled up the anchor. The boat with all the children showed no signs of heading out; they were busy exploring the anchorage on paddle boards…
We tried sailing west through the Sound of Soay, but after 5 minutes the wind went too light to give us steerage, so we continued under engine towards the anchorage by Sgeir Mor. There was a yacht already there, a Nautical ketch, but there was still room for us to anchor, so we did so and had lunch before trying to get ashore.
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| The best place to land a passenger |
There were no handy trip boat steps here, and the shore was very rocky, with no passes for dinghies. The Nauticat had put people ashore but their dinghy was back on the boat, and after rowing all along the shore I decided we would need to do the same. I put Julian ashore, very carefully, then rowed clear of the rocks to spend a lovely half hour or so admiring the star fish and jelly fish visible in the clear water. Having a camera capable of underwater photography is a boom, even if I rarely use it.
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| My first successful underwater photos |
The winds had died down, so it was time to move on. The weather seemed the same, with mist that hid the hills and made everything damp, then moments of bright sunshine; tens of minutes before the clouds covered the sky and the blue sea became grey again.
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| Leaving Loch Harport |
Julian felt pretty depressed by the weather, so he went below, and tried to cheer himself up by making drop scones for elevenses. They came out amazingly well, especially since he had no recipe, and was cooking them on a frying pan on a boat that was rolling quite a bit.
The wind came back in again, and we sailed for ten minutes before it faded away. An hour later the wind was back again, and this time it stayed. We reached Sgier Mhor at 14:40, and sailed past it into the Sound of Soay.
Hiding behind Sgeir Mhor is a small bay that can be used as an occasional anchorage. We were thinking of going in there, because it is the site of the “Viking canal”, a narrow channel that leads into a brackish lake that the Vikings used as a place to maintain their boats. We wanted to see how easy it would be to get a boat up it, and how much it had been altered for the purpose. However the weather was too grey for photographs, and the sea too rolly to encourage us to stop and explore.
We sailed past it, and headed into the Sound of Soay on a dead run. I did not feel comfortable on that point of sail, and visibility was dropping as mist came sweeping down from the hills. We had sunshine and a beam reach if we went south of Soay instead, so that is what we did.
By the time we were at the south end of Soay the wind had gone very light, and as we gybed round to head towards Loch Scavaig the engine went back on.
Two other boats were making for Loch Scavaig, coming from the east. They were under sail, and although the first of them went ahead of us we felt the we would reach the anchorage before the second. We were certainly ahead of them on entering the loch, but they came charging past us under engine, and anchored closer to the recommended spot that we could. We were left to anchor in 5.4m beneath the keel with a 3.5m rise of tide to go. That meant we needed to lay out 30m of chain…
Once we were anchored we were able to hear the thunder of the water fall coming down from the cliffs. With no sun, and mist drifting round the crags it was certainly a dramatic place. The yacht that had snuck ahead of us suddenly produced 6 children, who had a great time swimming and jumping off their yacht. They provided a much needed dose of cheer.
Despite being outside the recommended anchorage we spent a peaceful evening, with minimal movement.
The weather had brightened up a bit, and the forecast winds on XCweather and Windy were not too strong, so we decided to sail round to Loch Bracadale. 30 nm on the water, but only 5 miles from Dunvegan by car. Conditions were perfect for raising sail on the mooring, which we did, but we also wanted to charge my laptop and Julian’s phone, so we put the engine on anyway.
As we came off the mooring at 10:25 there was a bit of a miscommunication. I saw the pickup buoy running down Robinetta’s port side, with no sign of the mooring buoy itself. Knowing that meant we were about to run over the mooring line I turned the engine revs to neutral. We sailed handily over the line, and Worm did not hit the mooring buoy either (although it was a close thing).
Julian set the jib, and we sailed past Dunvegan pier, and all the way out past the castle and round the dogleg into the main Loch.
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| Dunvegan Head |
We had a lovely sail towards Dunvegan Head, although the wind was getting stronger, and we had to reef down twice. By 11:40 we were reefed all the way down, but the sea was still flat and the sun was shining. We expected that the wind would strengthen once we were out ot the shelter of the headland, but instead it went lighter, and we ended up shaking out most of the reef. The waves did get bigger though, and with the lighter winds we could not power through them, so the engine went back on at 13:30.
The wind did come back up, but the sea state got steadily higher. Poor Robinetta was battering into the waves by the time we were approaching Niest Point, and we reefed down again as she was burying her bowsprit on a regular basis.
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| Neist Point |
The next couple of hours were no fun. We were making good progress, at 5 knots on reefed main, staysail, and engine, but the seas were horrible. We had no choice but to press on; our nearest shelter was our destination, but helming was very tiring. Julian went below and brought up the life jackets. Wearing them was common sense at this point. Our ensign vanished from its housing on the rudder, but we don’t know when. Meanwhile Worm followed along faithfully. I had bailed her dry from the rain before leaving Dunvegan, and she skipped and bounced across the waves without taking any water.
By 15:45 we were able to see An Dubh Sgeir at the entrance to Loch Bracadale, but turning towards it too soon would have put the waves directly on our beam and rolled Robinetta even more. We held our course for another 15 minutes, until the waves would have been more on our stern. That would also have put us at risk of a gybe, so we decided to get the main down before heading into the Loch.
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| MacCloud's Daughters |
We had not picked an anchorage in Loch Bracadale, preferring to check the wind direction once we were actually there. Even with the waves theoretically from astern there were still some coming in at a different angle; A wave suddenly dumped itself into the cockpit without warning, and I immediately went below to manually start the bilge pump. Water might be swirling in the cockpit, but it would soon find its way down into the bilges. Luckily this happened only once.
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| Oronsay |
We turned towards Loch Bracadale once we had passed Idrigill Point, and headed for the north end of Wlay. We wanted to check out the north anchorage of Oronsay, and this felt like the best route to it. We also hoped Wlay would give us shelter from the waves. It did, which was lovely for a few minutes, but the Oronsay anchorage did not feel very sheltered, so we decided to head up Loch Harport instead. This is the only place that offered shelter in all wind directions.
Going back out into the waves to round Oronsay was a reminder of how horrible most of the afternoon had been.
As we made for Ardreck Point a large American flagged yacht appeared behind us, sailing with reefed main and genoa. They soon overtook us, and headed round the point. We followed them for a little, but Julian could see gannets diving, and decided that five minutes spent fishing would be a welcome change. I did not argue. The waves were finally slight enough to be ignored, and with the engine in neutral we were sailing along on the staysail at a perfect fishing speed.
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| Ardreck Point |
I had put the kettle to boil as we approached Ardreck Point, but it had not boiled by the time Julian hauled in the line again with 6 lovely mackerel on it. That was dinner sorted..The kettle whistled as Julian manoeuvred the last fish into the bucket, and I went below to wet the tea. Our first hot drink since 11;30 this morning.
The motor up Loch Harport with no waves and the wind almost on the nose gave us both a chance to unwind, and we picked up a mooring buoy off the Talisker distillery at 19:35. It had been a long and tiring day, and we were glad we did not need to anchor. The bright sun as we came into Loch Bracadale had not lasted, and it was beginning to drizzle, so once Robinetta and Worm were safely put to bed we headed below for a feast of mackerel.
At the start of the day I stated what XCweather and Windy forecast, but did not mention the Inshore Water's forecast. Today's included a force 4-6 in the Minch. We ignored it, in the belief that the strong winds would not reach our intended stretch of water. Despite having to reef all the way down at a couple of points I do not think we ever had anything above force5. What we did get was the wave heights raised by a force6. We will not go out again in this stretch of water with that forecast.
We had a quiet night until 04:00 when the swell reappeared. Something
in the bow began grumbling and complaining. It was not the anchor
chain, or the bobstay which we had triced up, but it kept us mostly
awake until 06:30 when we decided there was no reason to try to stay
asleep.
Visibility was very poor, and we could not see the top of the cliff we were moored beneath on Garhn Eilean. However the mist lifted slightly by the time we had had porridge and a second cup of tea, so we decided to row to the landing spot and set foot on the island before leaving. This would not be like our visit ten years ago, when we just sailed though the anchorage.
We exchanged friendly greetings with the French yacht as we rowed past them on the way back to Robinetta. We were heading in different directions, but I suspect they were not as worried about getting help from the tide as we were.
Julian managed to haul 50m of chain up in the same time he previously needed to haul 20m. His week on the tech team at HebCelt has definitely made him fitter!
We were away from the anchorage exactly on time, and got the main sail up as we headed south past the cliffs of Eilean an Tighe. We were uncertain if there would be enough wind to sail, but as soon as we were clear of the cliffs we got a fine sailing breeze, and the engine went off.
We would have the tide with us for 4 hours, but the wind would not let us sail the course I had laid in. However we could sail to go east of the Eugenie cardinal, rather than stay west of it, so that is what we did. The wind went light as we finally caught sight of the cardinal, less than ½ nm from it, and we had to put the engine back on.
There was a line of turbulence between Eugenie and Sgeir nam Maol, but nothing to cause us problems so Robinetta went straight through it, heading for Waternich Point. Not that we could see it. We saw nothing of the coast of Skye unless we were less than 1 nm from it.
The wind came back about noon, and we managed an hour of pure sailing before it went too light to keep us moving in the waves and we needed the engine to help. It was all a bit depressing. Nothing to see, or to aim at. I welcomed the sight of a cruise ship heading in the other direction, especially as we were well clear. Then there was a yacht, with its cruising chute deployed. Both were closer to the coast of Skye than I expected, so I had to check the chart plotter to see if I had laid in the correct course. I had.
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| Waternish Point lighthouse just visible |
By three in the afternoon we were sailing south east along the Waternish peninsula, towards Loch Dunveggan. The wind was now on the stern quarter, and too light to move us along, so the engine went on and stayed on. I am sure we were sailing through some lovely scenery, we just could not see any of it.
We had a lovely surprise when a pod of dolphins came to play alongside at 16:45. Photographing them was impossible, but Julian saw a calf leaping clear of the water. This was a great welcome to Loch Dunveggan.
We checked the CA’s Captain’s Mate for up to date information about the moorings at Dunveggan, and a post from 6 weeks ago reported them as good, so we headed past the anchorage and took one of the moorings rather than spending another night at anchor.
Once we had tidied Robinetta up, we got into Worm and rowed ashore to the pontoon. There are plenty of places to eat in Dunveggan, and 2 shops, as well as the castle to visit. We expect to spend at least 2 nights here. Our plan is to stay here until we can enjoy the scenery on our way out of the loch. We have plenty of time (5 weeks) before we need to be in Oban, so are slowing right down.
Our starboard backstay rope snapped a couple of weeks ago, and we replaced it with some braid rope we had on hand. There is a good fisherman's chandlers in Stornoway, so we bought 12m of 8mm 3 strand rope. Julian has now replaced both backstays with this thicker gauge, so hopefully it will last longer this time.
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