Jersey - something fishy!

Getting ready for fish

On our first morning in Jersey, I would like to say we bounded out of bed, bright eyed and bushy tailed, but in reality it was probably bleary eyed and bushy haired!

 When we were packing our kit at home, Hubby dear announced we wouldn't need to pack our drysuits, we would be too hot! I eventually gave in, thinking he's possibly right (!) we would be nearer to France and all that sunshine and heat, than Scotland. So when we arrived at our first destination, Ouaisne Bay to have a try at kayak fishing, putting on our breeks and shorty cags, I was a bit concerned when a fair few, mostly local paddlers I have to say, donned their drysuits.

Fish!



We were all given drop lines, a few instructional do's and don'ts`and off we set. Once on the other side of the bay, we dropped our lines and waited. And waited. And waited! The fish didn't appear to be hungry. It was time to head back to the cars. Back at Ouaisne, I  pulled up my line and found I had caught 2 Pollock. I dropped 1 bringing them in and the other I let go. At the same time, another lady pulled her line in and found a Pollock and a Bream, both good sizes which she took away and had later that evening.

Our Scottish group portage!

Cracking sea colours

And they say women can talk!!!

One of the many towers 

Our afternoon session was over at La Rocque harbour for a nice we trip up the coast past Gorey and back, passing some of the numerous towers dotted along the Jersey coast.  This is when I got talking to Doris from Germany. I had this strange feeling I knew her from somewhere, but I knew I'd never paddled with her before. After much discussion, we came to the conclusion it was on a jetty on Skye a few years before where we had, had a bit of a chat. They had just been out round some of the islands and we had just been on a course down at Skyak. It's a small world indeed!

 

Jersey - eventually!

The day arrived when we were due to leave for the Jersey symposium, the car was packed to the gunnel's and I still had a night class to run!
I had to quite literally throw my students out of class, rush back to the shop to drop my work kit off, zoom home, grabbed a cup of tea, then leaving at 10pm, I was ready to take the first turn at driving down to Carlisle. We took turns doing 2 hour stints until we reached Poole, looked for somewhere for breakfast, except it was only 5.30am, no one else was up!
While waiting in the queue for the ferry, more and more kayaks were arriving. The weather was absolutely mingin' even in the shelter of Poole harbour. Once we were getting further out to sea the waves were getting bigger!!!, which the boat was crashing through. The weather certainly wasn't settling,  now the shop stock was crashing off the shelves, then a ceiling panel fell off, then the engines went quiet with the captain coming over the tannoy to announce the weather was bad (you're not saying!). They were turning back to Poole. The brochure says the boat has a lovely cruising speed of 35kn, but the wind was blowing up to 40kn. We weren't going anywhere! After we had surfed back, we found out the cars below deck had shifted as a result ours has aged somewhat with a few extra scratches!

Handfast Point, don't think we got this far first time!

The lifeboat leaving Guernsey (Take note, fancy paddling here!)

Sark (Take note, fancy paddling here too!)

We set sail again later in the afternoon in completely different conditions. After changing boats again on Guernsey, we eventually arrived in Jersey making it to the hotel about 8.30. It had been a long and very tiring journey!

Corbiere lighthouse  (Take note, fancy paddling here too! Oh I did!)

After a very welcome dinner (first things first!), we then met everyone and found out our choices for the next day, then crashed out in a very comfy bed!

Don't look back Alice!

Muirton Basin

Ref pontoon!

Throw in

Alice sorting the boys out!

Nairn Canoe Club recently did a fantastic job of organising and running the Highland Polo tournament which I am pleased to say FCAG won! It must have been my cheering on from the sides which helped them win!

The winners!

We stayed on up in Inverness and went for a wee paddle next day with a kind of tired Alice and Ansgar.

Big boat, wee boats!

Checking out the cave

We were leaving from Cromarty,  a place I've never been to before. Setting off for North Sutor, we then headed up the coast stopping for lunch just short of Balintore, before zooming back down with the wind behind us. We carried on for a short distance, back across the mouth of the Cromarty and round past Sutors Stacks. We had decided not to go too far due to the wind we were going to have to fight back into, that and the fact the polo had zapped the energy of my fellow 3 paddlers, perhaps they should take up cheer leading instead!

Couple of posers!

Peek a boo!

Heading back up, the waves were a fair size, breaking over the rocks which weren't that far below us. As we were turning into the firth again, I had a wee keek behind me. I shouted over to Alice not to look back. I assumed by her reply of "EEEK!" that she did indeed look behind her to see the massive waves which were now chasing us into shore! Thankfully, it was just huge swell and not breaking waves.

Is Alice that worn out?

It did get bumpy

But not all the time!

Alice testing out the new drysuit!

 I'm not quite sure what I was expecting of the area. It was a lot cleaner than I thought it would be with the tankers in the area but the water was lovely and clear. Another thoroughly enjoyable paddle, of course finished off with the compulsory ice cream! 

Summer Isles again

Altandhu

After our trip up to the Summer Isles with Ansgar and co last year, I have been wanting to get back, so when I decided to organise a club weekend away, the Summer Isles was my destination of choice. The sign up went up on the website and after the usual can come, can't come, we ended with 10 of us up for it.

I had booked into Port a Bhaigh Campsite in Altandhu, deciding on a base camp as opposed to wild camping. We had a variety of paddling abilities and families coming along so this seemed the best option, folks could sit out a day if they wanted.

"Rubbish" statue

Lovely conditions!

Trips were planned, cars packed, dances to the Sun Gods made and off we went. Some of the group had left earlier on in the day, were well settled by the time we arrived and were already on their way down to the water with their boats. The evening we arrived was absolutely stunning, had my dance to the Sun God worked?

After a rather yummy meal in the bar above the campsite, we discussed the next days plans over a pint or two.

 

The Motley crew!

Next morning was still nice when we set off from the campsite. We had been chatting to another couple of paddlers who had organised a beach clean for the day, I felt a bit guilty for not staying and helping, but we didn't know it was going on until we were on the beach with our boats and kit!

We all got on the water, well I say all, Aline was at her usual pace, still on the beach wondering if anyone had packed paddles for her! They were in her boat, she just hadn't looked!

Off we set across the bay to cut through between Isle Ristol and the pier at Old Dornie, before heading over to the big bay in Tanera More where we stopped to post a card back to the Kayakey Kid and Wee Sis with a Summer Isles very own postage stamp.

 

Our next section was round the bottom and over to Tanera Beg  which we paddled round before cutting back down between Tanera Beg and Fada to have lunch on the coral beach. Unfortunately the tide was quite far in, so there wasn't much coral to be seen, by the time lunch was over it was a bit more exposed. We carried on round Eilean Fada Mor and up through the skerries before heading back over to Isle Ristol. Some of the group decided to call it a day at that and headed back up the channel to the campsite, the rest of us carried on along the south of Isle Ristol where we were treated to the weird and wonderful sound of a Loon (Great Northern Diver) which I have to say is much better than the sound of a cuckoo which seemed to be round every single corner, no matter how far out we were or what time of day it was.

 

Along the end of Isle Ristol, we decided we would pop over to Eilean Mullagrach to what we thought looked like a big cave, it wasn't, just a big dark area! Further along, we came across a narrow entrance which we had a wee keek into. It was rather stinky, but wonderful once you were in, the best cave yet! We decided to name it forever more as "Stinky Crack"!

 

 

 

As we came back to the beach, we could see what a difference the beach clean squad had made. Lined all the way up the side of the path were black bags full of rubbish. Speaking to one of the beach cleaners later, she said they had collected over 500k of rubbish. It's not a big beach, it worked out at 300k per 100m. It's great they cleared up so much rubbish, but sad that so much rubbish ended up on the beach in the first place, most of it being rubbish washed in from the sea, not dropped by visitors.

 

Achnahaird launch spot

Young Trevor cutting through from 1 cave to another

Back at the tents, dinner, then up for a bit of debriefing (aka a couple of pints!) in the pub up the hill.

Forecast for the next day was for wind, rain, fog, everything but sun, obviously the sun dance wasn't that good!

 

 

We decided to take the cars over to Achnahaird and paddle up the coast a bit. The caves up this section were wonderful and took us out of the rain! We then made our way across the bay and round Eilean Mor before stopping for lunch at Cuil Lochain. Then it was back into the drizzly rain, round the coast and back to the car. A welcome hot shower was had before our next "debrief".

 

Although Monday's forecast was better than Sunday's had been, there was still a southerly "breeze", so we decided against our planned trip to Priest Island, instead we packed away our kit and headed for Ardmair where we could paddle over to Isle Martin which would be more sheltered and also on route for heading home.

Poser!

 

One thing that really did stick out about the weekend was a distinct lack of seabirds. Having Inchcolm in the Forth as one of our regular paddling areas with the number of different species and quantities out there made us very aware of how few birds were on the west coast.

Pretty Wheatear