Oban to Stonehaven

Anna was in hospital for two weeks. She had two operations to remove abscesses and after lots of antibiotics she began to improve. Everyone was relieved when she was allowed to go home. 

Mirror images at Ballachulish Village

We hired a car and drove to Edinburgh to meet our daughter-in-law’s parents, Jim and Christie. They were staying with Simon and Erin for a few days. The weather was awful as the tail end of Hurricane Bertha gave Scotland a whipping. We all wore full waterproofs to walk to The Witchery under the Castle for lunch. We ate heartily and enjoyed each other’s company. Thanks for lunch, Simon and Erin. The drive back to Oban was slightly drier and that night we welcomed Jamie and Bugsy on board to sleepover. They caught the early morning ferry to Mull the next day.

Ballachulish Bridge, Loch Leven

We continued north in cold and rainy weather and tried to anchor three times off Eriska in Loch Crearan . Each time we dragged, so as soon as the tide eased we motored back into the Lynne of Lorne and anchored at the first attempt in Airds Bay just south of Port Appin. The tide runs strongly through all the narrows between the islands and at the mouths of lochs, so we had to leave Airds Bay at 6.30am to arrive at Loch Leven at slack high water. The clearance under the Ballachulish Bridge is 17m at the highest spring tide. Our mast plus the boat is 16m high. Would we make it under or would we lose our VHF/AIS aerial, our wind direction indicator and our tricolour? It was a close call and I shouted, “Turn around!” as I did not think we would fit under. Well, Jeremy likes a challenge and he continued. We slid under with barely any clearance. Later, we read in another pilot book that the bridge is only 16m high.

Entering one of the staircase locks

We had a peaceful night in Loch Leven on a mooring which was kindly offered for our use. There was little space amongst the many moorings to anchor. The next day we pushed the end of the tide up Loch Linnhe to reach Corran Narrows at slack water, then on to Corpach where we entered the Caledonian Canal via the sea lock. Once the fees were paid (180 pounds for a transit) we joined two other yachts and went up Neptune’s Staircase, assisted by Errol, who kindly offered to be a rope handler for us. We spent the night at Gairlochy, enjoying the new shower and laundry facilities.

Tied up on the Caledonian Canal

The weather continued to be awful with further gales and severe gales raging out at sea. We crossed the first loch in strong winds and pouring rain, tying up for the night at Fort Augustus. It took two hours to go down the staircase of locks the next morning.  We entered Loch Ness with the wind behind us and regular showers of rain reduced our visibility considerably. We didn’t see the monster, but a dark and ominous shadow appeared on our depth sounder as we crossed the deepest part. Perhaps it was Nessie! That night we tied up to a pontoon in Dochgarroch and filled up with water in the rain.

Inverness Castle

We were able to take on diesel at Seaport Marina the next day, go down the 5 locks at Muirtown and exit the canal at the sea lock. We spent two nights in Inverness Marina waiting for the rough sea to settle after the gales. We sailed all day and overnight on the 20^th and 21^st August, as all the north facing harbours on the Moray Firth were too dangerous to enter. 

Unique war memorial at Stonehaven

We were goose-winged with full sails in brief sunshine when 24 knots of wind came from nowhere and the mainsail, which was on a preventer, backed. The genoa was quickly furled and the main gybed, so disaster was averted after a few worrying moments. After that, we had two reefs in the main and a small genoa as the force 6 wind blew. After a week of northerly winds, the first southerlies were forecast as we rounded Rattray Head and headed south. We had to motor into the headwind making just over 3 knots in cold and uncomfortable conditions. Why did we leave the Caribbean?

Stonehaven Marina