Greetings from Ardfern on Loch Craignish where we have called in to have my furling mainsail looked at. It jammed again at the top leaving Campbeltown and couldn’t be pulled right out. M&N couldn’t fix it on passage or in Port Ellen and decided it needed to be looked at by a professional rigger. Ardfern is one of the few places on the west coast of Scotland with full boatyard services.
M&N thought the rigger had arrived but it was somebody who had just come in on their boat which was also a 1999 vintage Malo 36, so one of my sisters. The riggers came and we worked with them to get things sorted enough to hopefully last the rest of the season. The longer-term work can be done over the winter.
We had left Campbeltown at 0430 with a force 4 wind forecast with slight to smooth sea state. M is now thinking that there is a conspiracy between the weather forecasters and the Scottish Tourist Board, as this forecast was way off as has been the case quite a lot this year as well as previously. We sailed down the east side of the Kintyre peninsula with reefed main anyway (so it didn’t matter too much that the main wouldn’t come out all the way) and reefed foresail. The wind was on the nose as we headed around the Mull of Kintyre through Sanda Sound and picked up to force 6 gusting 7 and the seas were big and rough. It was a pretty unpleasant bouncy and long motor sail across to Port Ellen on Islay. There was plenty of space on the harbour pontoon when we arrived but a lot more boats came in later and the place filled up. It was very international with boats from Norway, Sweden, Germany, Netherlands, Ireland, France and Poland as well as a few flying the red ensign. Talking of which, our red ensign was fraying after a couple of very windy sails and was repaired by N using the handbag emergency kit in its sparkly pouch which Carol had given each of the Dartmouth Chumps girls at Christmas. It contained a needle and red thread amongst its other essentials. 2 of the Norwegian girls jumped into the sea from the ladder on my pontoon, and jumped straight back out again with a lot of interesting English and Norwegian swearing which we think indicated the water was cold!
M&N had a nice walk around the harbour in the late afternoon sunshine and shared their ice creams with a visiting border collie.
Next day M&N set off along the 3 mile long whisky trail which they also walked last year. It goes past the Laphroaig and Lagavulin distilleries to Ardbeg distillery. M&N had a really nice lunch there and a wee dram before walking the 3 miles back to Port Ellen to enjoy the afternoon and evening sunshine.
Up at 0545 to get the tide up the Sound of Jura. The wind was light then disappeared so mainly motoring but did manage an hour under sail. Some porpoises and a couple of seal mums with their pups escorted us up the Sound past Islay and Jura. The scenery was stunning and the sun came out. It was an enjoyable trip past the unusually calm Dorus Mor and looking across at the infamous Corryvreckan Sound. We stopped at the fuel dock for diesel and moored in Ardfern next to a large and very posh Grand Banks motor yacht.
Now that my main sail is fixed (touch wood) we will head north past Oban and up the Sound of Mull. There are some nice places to stop and enjoy before we plan to head out past Ardnamurchan Point (where we took a bit of a pounding in rough seas last year) and point north out into the islands.
Next update soon.
Katrina
x