Welcome to my Sea Kayaking (b)log
A message popped up on the WhatsApp DCKC Sea/Loch Peer Group: "Meeting 10.30 this Saturday at Divers' Layby, Finnart, for paddle to Ardgarten, Arrochar and back . Winds low and tide assist. Let me know if intend coming. Iain." I let Iain know I would be there, afterall the diver's lay-by is all of...
A good friend of mine, Dave, is looking at buying a sea kayak. He asked me what he should buy, to which I replied, “You really need to try as many boats as you can for yourself.” Having established that he is looking for a general-purpose sea kayak, one that will do for one...
I finally managed to get a lap of Bute in last Friday/Saturday, 21st/22nd August, paddling my fully laden Taran, “Disco Boy”. I also managed two laps of the Perch Beacon: one on the way to Bute and another on the return journey. For some crazy reason, I set off from the slipway near where...
Tuesday night was club night with Helensburgh Canoe Club. According to the earlier email, we would be meeting at the Royal Northern and Clyde Yacht Club (RNCYC) at 19:00. I decided to paddle down the Gareloch from my house and meet the club at the RNCYC. The tide was on its way out, which...
It was raining when I left home to travel the 6 miles to the "A Frames Dive Site" at the now-disused Finnart Oil Terminal on Loch Long. By the time I reached the car park, the rain had eased off a bit, but it was all a bit misty. At least it was nice...
Having spent the morning with my chainsaw and chipper, chopping trees and processing the branches, I decided to take the afternoon off and head out in the Taran. It was a beautiful day, after all. With no particular plan in mind, I headed across to Clynder to gain some shelter from the wind blowing...
What a wet day. It did nothing but pour down all day long. Consequently, when I arrived at the HCC boat containers at the RNCYC, I wondered if anyone was actually going to turn up. But then Steve arrived, closely followed by Kate. With a club boat loaded onto Steve's car, we set off...
Russ was keen for another paddle the following evening. I nearly said no, but I was so glad I didn't! This evening we decided to head around Loch Scridain in a different direction. It was a gorgeous evening. The ever present wind was still blowing though, creating a choppy swell with hard going into...
We were having a lovely relaxing afternoon on the Port Nan Gael campsite, when I saw another camper van with a Rockpool Taran on its roof come into the campsite. This is not something you see every day, so I went to say hello to the owner, explaining I also own a Taran, but...
With the passing of our Greyhound Gemma, we decided to get away from it all and headed for a short break on Mull. We stopped for a couple of nights in our campervan at the rather excellent Port Nan Gael campsite on the Ross of Mull, next to Loch Scridain. The weather was brilliant,...
Having been awoken in the night by the hum emanating from the ship in the bay, I surfaced from my tent. Looking at the MarineTraffic app, I looked up the ship's details. It was a wellboat called the Inter Alba. The Inter Alba is basically a salmon farm within a ship. It is Scotland's...
Waking up at about 4am in the morning, I stuck my head out of the tent – it was already light. The view of the Sound, "Caol Rona", didn't look great from a paddling perspective. Looking at the wind and swell coming through the Sound, I could see that going around Rona would be...
After a four-and-a-half-hour drive in my campervan, I finally made it to my destination: a John Muir Trust car park near Torrin on the Isle of Skye. I opted for this car park because: a) it was only a 20–25-minute drive to the ferry port at Sconser; b) the car park had toilets open...
As I needed to have a chat with Gordon regarding a trip I'm planning, I decided to meet Gordon down at the Royal Northern and Clyde Yacht Club (RNCYC) at the Tuesday Evenings club session. Rather than faff about with putting the roof rack on the car, loading my boat etc I decided it...
A flat calm and very wet training paddle out in the Taran, from the Kirk Brae slipway on Gare Loch to Helensburgh and return. 7.8nm (9.3 miles) 1 hour 46 minutes (Average speed = 5.3 mph) GPS track...
At Tuesday's DCKC Loch Lomond session I told Iain, I probably wouldn't make it on the Maidens trip planned for Thursday. I have been having a few car issues of late, with my car mysteriously going into limp mode every now and again. Wednesday morning, out of frustration with the garage "who will not...
When I was paddling at Luss a few weeks ago, Drumchapel and Clydebank Kayak Club (DCKC) were out in force. I decided to join the club as they all seemed very keen and a nice group of people. I was also reading at the time, Robin Lloyd-Jones book called Argonauts of the Scottish Isles,...
This trip was led and organised by Stuart. We set off from the now redundant Finnart Oil Terminal, also known as Finnart Ocean Terminal. With Loch Long being a deep water loch, this oil terminal could take oil tankers up to 324,000 tonnes. The oil was discharged here and pipped all the way across...
It was one of those days when you seem to be constantly battling into the wind and swell, regardless of the direction you are travelling. Setting off from the Kirk Brae slipway, I headed into the wind and swell. By the time I'd reached Rhu narrows, the wind was coming at me from the...
I missed out on the HCC Tuesday night paddle and as such I was itching to get out on the water. I also fancied trying to see if there were any Mackerel in the loch, so I took along my hand reel and some Mackerel lures. I paddled my Romany Surf as this boat...
