Whitehaven

We met up with Bob's brother and family who live near Whitehaven. They took us back to their house and we enjoyed their hospitality for five days! We were treated to a comfortable bed, many long soaks in their jacuzzi, many fine meals and best of all they own a dish washer! Angela felt very lazy but relaxed.

The children crabbing off the jetty, while the adults were trying to find the source of an annoying leak in the domestic water system.

They caught several! This one was nearly big enough for a sandwich.

The children really enjoyed the boat and want their parents to buy one now.

Last look at Scotland and on to Cumbria.

We left scotland in the early hours of the morning on the 18th of August to catch a favourable tide for the passage to Whitehaven and enjoyed near perfect conditions for the whole trip.

Portpatrick

The mull of Galloway. Our last view of Scotland.

Bob lowering the Scottish flag. 

Tehari II arrived in Whitehaven at about 3 o'clock in the afternoon and met the only other Salar that we have seen on the entire trip. The lovely owners were on board, they gave us wine and showed us round, then came for a look on ours. They had owned their Salar for fifteen years, crossed the Atlantic travelled round the med and didn't have a bad word to say about the boat.
 

Oban to Port Patrick

We're finally on our way back after a fantastic three and a half months in Scotland.
We left Oban in the early hours of Tuesday morning, heading south to Gigha. A lovely sail in mostly light winds but with a bit of a sting in the tail. The clouds gathered about an hour before arriving and it blew up to thirty knots, making end of the journey fast but the anchorage a little bumpy.
We decided against going ashore as sorting out the dinghy is hard work in a blow but were entertained by the crew of a neighbouring boat playing the bagpipes in the cockpit.

Mull of Kintyre

Left early on Wednesday and had a cracking sail down to Portpatrick, a lovely old fishing village. We went past the Mull of Kintyre under sail and with three to four knots of tide behind us. We acheived a speed over the ground of over ten knots for about two hours and seven to eight knots for the rest of the trip. Instead of coming in at five in the evening as predicted, on an average speed of five knots we were tied up and buying fish and chips off the quay by two o'clock.

Port Patrick is our very last Scottish port and has proved a bit of a treat. Bright sunshine, lovely walks and beaches and a friendly atmosphere, we wish we could stay longer but have decided to continue as planned and set out for Whitehaven tomorrow.

Harbour

Lighthouse

From the Mull of Kintyre it is only twenty miles across to Ireland, another big temptation. It seemed sad to be so close and not to go and visit, but we've promised ourselves a return trip in the not to distant future to circumnavigate Ireland.

Marching band

A lovely colourful marching band spotted in Portree.

David's visit

Last week we had another visitor. David flew into Stornaway and joined us for a circuit of the Minch.

This is one of the habour seals in Stornoway. They are very tame as the fishing boats feed them, and come right up to the boats looking for titbits. 

We had a cracking sail across to Ullapool in a reasonable amount of wind but after that it was more motor sailing as the wind went light. We went south to Gairloch and Rona.

This is our anchorage in Rona, one of our favourite islands so far.

It has a population of one, Billy the island manager but has a few holiday cottages. We saw onl one other couple as we walked across the island to a cave that due to its vaulted roof was used as a church when the island had a population. It is now used for one service a year, on Good Friday though other services can be arranged.

David has a better camera than us so managed to get these pictures of eagles as we left Portree, Skye. For most of his week we had beautiful weather but on the Thursday it threatened to break so we decided on 

returning to Stornaway via Loch Torridon and then hiring a car to explore the Isle of Lewis.

 

Isle of Lewis

Waiting for David to arrive in Stornoway, we went to Highland games and show.