We've just had a great week managing to see several highlights of the West Coast.
At the end of Archie and Fergus's last post, we'd been to St Kilda, got to Barra and had a day in Castlebay.
The following day, Thursday, we hired a car and explored Barra. We started by going to Vatersay, just south of Barra and linked by a causeway. We spent an hour or so on one of the big, white sand beaches.
Then went to visit a smaller beach where, in 1988 when my parents ran Lorne Leader, we burnt the top of her mizzen mast on a big bonfire after it fell down on the way to St Kilda. Feels like a long time ago!
We drove up Barra's West Coast which is a beautiful mix of rocks, dunes, beaches and machair.
After lunch in a lovely wee community cafe, we went to the airport, which is a small airport building beside a big beach. The beach forms the runway, so the flight schedule is tidally dependent! There was a plane just boarding so we watched it take off on the beach before we carried on exploring.
That evening we had a lovely curry in a tiny restaurant in Castlebay, sitting in the intermittent rain in our dry robes!
We had spotted a potential calm in the weather to get to the Treshnish islands, one of Sarah's highlights from her last sailing trip to Scotland and somewhere we were keen to show the boys. The islands are home to thousands of puffins in breeding season, which is very much coming to and end now in lae July. We had a great sail from Barra through Gunna Sound between Coll and Tiree, reaching in a SW force 4-5, then sailed on to a lovely anchorage between Ulva and Gometra on the West coast of Mull.
On Saturday morning, we motored to Staffa, the island famous for Fingal's Cave and having a population of puffins. There isn't a secure anchorage, so I dropped Sarah, Archie and Fergus ashore and waited on board. They were the first people on the island as we beat the tripper boats (on a calm day in summer there can be up to 1,000 visitors a day on boats from Iona and Mull) so they got to visit Fingals Cave and explore the island in peace. They didn't find any puffins ashore, and thought that we might have missed the season. Staffa has amazing bassalt columns, the same volcanic geology as the Giant's Causeway in Northern Ireland.
From Staffa, we made our way to the anchorage at Lunga, one of the Treshnish islands. After lunch, we landed on the rocky beach and walked up to the grassy slopes above the cliffs.
There were plenty of puffins still nesting and we were able to spend time watching them popping out of their burrows, hopping about, flying off, landing with mouthfuls of sand eels for their young, and flying past. We weren't too late for Puffin season after all!
It was a calm evening, so we were able to stay in the anchorage at Lunga overnight, a really special spot.
On Sunday, we left Lunga and headed South to a lovely beach on the North end of Iona. We took the tender ashore a got a bit wet coming ashore in the surf!
The sun came out and we walked down to the village, past the abbey and nunnery. We had lunch in the sunshine at the St Columba hotel, walked down to the Pier then back to the beach.
We played on the beach for a while before heading back to thew boat, and sailing to Bunessan, on the North side off the Ross of Mull.
As we were sailing into Bunessan we realised that exactly seven days ago we were entering the Sound of Harris on the way to St Kilda, so in a week we'd visited St Kilda, Barra, Staffa, the Treshnish, Iona and Mull - lots of highlights packed in to only seven days!
On Sunday afternoon our friends from Craobh Haven, Mark and Helen and their son Magnus, set off on their own boat for Mull, and on Monday morning they sailed round to join us in Bunessan.
After home school, we had lunch with them and then went for a walk ashore. Archie and Fergus took their scooters and we walked to Bunessan village for an ice cream (kids) and a pint (us!)
Yesterday we both left Bunessan and sailed North up the West Coast of Mull, past Staffa and the Treshnish, south of Ardmanurchan and back to Tobermory. We took the opportunity to practice poling out or headsail while sailing downwind toward Ardnamurchan, which is a set up we expect to be using for much of our ocean sailing later in the year.
Mark and Helen have now headed down the Sound of Mull back towards Craobh, and we're doing home school in a cafe in Tobermory. We were hoping to head North, back to the Small Isles, today. However, the forecast suggests that after tomorrow there will be several days of strong South and South Westerlies that would make getting back around Ardmanurchan a bit of an uncomfortable slog. So, instead we'll spend a few days exploring Mull and the surrounds. We want to be back around Oban or Craobh Haven in a week's time to start heading South back to Ireland and Cornwall - already we are having to think about planning for the end of our scottish adventure!
However, in the meantime, we'll enjoy exploring some new anchorages as we slowly work our way South.