The wind had moved into the north, which didn't help going up the Firth of Lorn to Oban, but it was only about 30mls, so I could tack or motor sail depending upon the conditions. To get from the top of the Sound of Jura to The Firth of Lorn there are 3 options. The first is via the Gulf of Corryvreckan between Jura and Scarba. The second is through the Sound of Luing, between Scarba and Luing. The last is through the Shuna Sound between Luing and Shuna and then Seil. The first I have spoken about. the last involves a tight right hand turn around a rock.Today I was a chicken and took the relatively easy middle route. As I passed through the Dorus Mor at the bottom of loch Craignish the 3 routes opened out before me. The conditions were very benign. There was hardly any wind and the tide was on the turn so the movement in the water was negligible. A fishing boat was towing a fish cage along at about 3kn it was that calm. Any of the routes would have been OK, but Corryvrecken seemed like a slumbering giant that I crossed the road to avoid just in case. The photo is a view down the channel. It looks so calm.
Douglas Adams (hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy) and John Lloyd wrote a small book many years ago called the Meaning of Liff. In it they made up amusing meanings for many of the varied and wonderful place names in Britain.If they had come across the Sound of Luing and seen some of the names on the chart they would surely have followed my thought pattern today.The first was "Rubh Aird Luing", which I thought sounded awfully like a Viking request for heavy petting. Then a little futher there was "Rubha na Lic" and soon I was searching the charts for more.Rubha is obviously a Celtic name for headland or promontory so there are a lot of them. The first two caused the greatest chuckle of the ones I saw today, but I'm on a mission now to improve on them. I have concluded that the Sound of Luing means the unwanted noises you hear from a nearby tent in the middle of the night when two people are at it! I think I've been in a small boat on my own for too long!
At the exit of the Sound you pass between some small islands and my chosen route lay between Fladda and Dubh Sgeir.I came this way once before and was amazed by the low height of the lighthouse on Fladda. Even though I have now seen how low lying so much of the coast line is in Ireland and the Scottish Isles, it still seems strange to someone used to the Devon and Cornish coast.
Once into the Firth of Lorn the rain returned and the wind strengthened from the north. so it was on with the engine and up the Kerrera Sound to Oban. The Scottish isles are all about small little achorages in the middle of nowhere and I felt I wasn't really doing the right thing by making for a town, but I needed to restock the food box. The lonely anchorages would have to wait for other nights.However, I didn't go to the marina but picked up a vistor's buoy belonging to the Oban Sailing Club.It was a short walk fom their pontoon to Tescos.
As I listen to the radio in the evening, the talk is of public sector strikes over the threat to pensions. The biggest strike action in 80 years is promised.i am well out of it and my employers probabaly did me a favour. i feel sorry for my ex colleagues. What a mess it all is.
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