7.  Selkie Dancer - Kinlochbervie - 13th June -  Rounding the Cape with the Paparazzi!

 

We've rounded our first Cape!  Not Good Hope or Horn but Wrath .  On this day it was benign until the winds changed as we rounded it.  We were accompanied first by dolphins.  I am such a child.  I scream and clap my hands as they surge and swoop, under the boat and up on the other side to meet each other and lead us onwards.  Our other excitement was being buzzed and swooped by a different kind of mammal altogether.  This in the form of Paul Warrener aboard Watchdog 65 (Paul is a friend from RAF days and the plane was on fishery protection duties)  We felt most privileged and look forward to seeing the pictures they took.  We weren't so clever taking pictures of them and have only achieved one little video clip owing to the inept operation of the photographer managing to switch it off instead of on at the vital moment.

It was a long trip from Stromness which we left in the half light of dawn, sleeping and still; the soft grey/yellow houses clustered by the shore reflected in the calm waters.  The coastline of the north of Scotland was a monochrome of smudgy blues and slate greys.  We seem to be destined to miss out on all this lovely weather everyone else is having. However monochrome is fine, beautiful in its own way.  After a start at 3am, 10 hours of fast sailing and 4 hours of wind over tide (knackering) we are glad to be tied up alongside MFV Nimrod!  We slept for 12 hours but are still tired today - age!

Kinlochbervie looks like a setting from a James Bond film.  A hidden harbour in a beautiful hidden loch.  We are surrounded by high hills, wild country all around and then by the harbour, a modern purpose built ice house and packing station.  Scarcely 10 years old it is now almost devoid of fishing vessels and we are the only visiting yacht.  For creature comforts and home cooking we are indebted to the Royal National Mission to Deep Sea Fishermen (The Fishermen's Mission).

Readers will be glad to know that I got my meal in Westray.  We were picked up from the harbour at Pierowall in a big 4x4 and whisked off to the now unfamiliar comforts and sophistication of deep sofas and crystal glassware.  Our trip down to Stromness was disappointing as we had the wind on our nose and after two hours close hauled and little progress, motored the rest of the way.  Stromness was lovely, a fascinating history of whaling and exploration, war and now green energy (wind and tide).  The streets are paved with large stone flags, these also roof some of the buildings.  The narrow streets wind and twist their way down to the shore and in the main street there are many shops -  great food shops, an award winning butchers, a deli, Julia’s café where Andy inadvertently met the father of an RAF colleague.  This transpired after recognising his tie and initiating a conversation.  We took a local bus to the combined attractions of Skara Brae and Skaill House where I had stayed as a child.  Funny but I cannot remember the 5000 year old Skara Brae.  Skaill House was much more memorable for games of sardines as a teenager.

Looking ahead, we have decided to leave the Outer Hebrides for another year to spend the next four weeks loch hopping down to Oban to arrive as originally planned on 8 July.

 

Opportunities to earn MSM's still available!  

Jinti and Andy

8.  Selkie Dance - Lochinver - 21st June - Lochinver - storm bound and rain lashed.

 

From Kinlochbervie we pottered the few miles south to Loch Laxford - it rained.

 

From Loch Laxford we came further south to Kylesku - it mizzled.

 

From Kylesku we sailed up the lochs, did man overboard drills and lunched behind an island watching the birds and the antics of a young seal practising his landing techniques and calling balefully for mother who had abandoned him to fish - the sun nearly came out.  We carried on to Loch Nedd anchoring abeam a green shed that we guessed must have belonged to Nedd.

 

From there to Lochinver - high seas and strong winds.

 

At Kylesku with the imminent arrival of  Alasdair and Kate Gordon-Rogers I found I had totally misjudged the availability of food.  I walked down past the local post office, a shed in a garden, and dripped into the local hotel, still dressed in all my wet weather gear asking if there was, perchance, a Tesco/Sainsbury/Asda nearby.  The answer - as you can imagine - was negative I think she was then stifling laughter when I asked desperately if a van called.

 

Alasdair and Kate were duly dumped and staggered off the crowded bus (4 occupants including driver) with two rucksacks and three day sacks, as it turned out all food and no clothes!

 

It’s a bit much to be asked to come and suffer, like Ebenezer Mather the father of the Missions,  'the misery of heaving seas, cramped conditions, the smell of fish and fuel' and then have to bring all your food with you!  In fact their freezer is now empty and we have consumed all.

 

I have an idea to supplement my income I am thinking of launching a new beauty product - facial acupuncture; only the finest wind driven saltwater used.

 

Lochinver is a busier and scruffier version of Kinlochbervie with the same ice making towers, fish sheds, occasional fishing boat and fishermans’ mission, which after two strong gins become incomprehensibly the Mishermans Fission.  The visitor centre is excellent, the pottery tempting; there is a leisure centre which happened to have a special Golden Oldies fitness session which Kate and I attended while the 'men' went and ate all the pies in the deli/pie shop.

 

From the above you will deduce that the weather has been a disappointment.  On the plus side, the scenery is always stunning and shared with scarcely another soul - we wouldn't have missed this for anything.  The journey south will doubtless bring warmer weather and more crowded seas - a delicate balance.

 

Until next time     Andy & Jinti