Can you believe this weather?

Given yesterdays forecast for gales turned out to be total pants we were up at the crack of dawn this morning prepared to head for Wick. A hour later, while sitting in the sea lock at Clachnharry there was 30 knots from the north west blowing over the top and once again our plans got blown away.

We there sailed perhaps nearly 3/4 of a mile before turning into the tightest, furthest from the entrance berth in Inverness Marina. How we'll extricate ourselves I don't know. We're right in front of the lifeboat. If they get a shout, we're toast! (Oddly enough, the personalised number plate of the local undertakers.)

Consequently, we are still languishing in Inverness waiting on the north westerlies to die down a bit so we can get north.

We've had two days of 30knots with at least one more to come. We are all therefore now experts and aspiring tour guides for the city of Inverness able to point tourists in any direction to any of e dozens of pubs.

Fifteen minutes in the ancestry shop brought a bit of a blow when their computer programme showed I was the only Englishman on the boat!

Undeterred I took the group to Culloden Moor to see where the Jacobites (Charlie's team) got a doing. The National Trust have built a very comprehensive tourist centre and for once, it was worth the effort to get up the hill and tour the site...... and, to give it the full effect, it snowed then hailed while we listened to the presentation.

One thing I forgot to mention was that while in Kerrera we met our first ARC 2013 fellow participant. Guess what..... Shekim from Norway. He's heading south while we're heading for Norway.

We must be nuts.

Daft enough to be heading out later to see Gerry and some other bloke playing guitars way past our bedtime.