Five glorious days on Arran and Kintyre.

[Douglas Wilcox]

We were lucky enough to be able to take advantage of the recent glorious week.

Day 1


























To be continued...

[Curly67]

It looks fantastic Douglas. I`m jealous as I had to work knowing the forcast for this Easter weeekend was pants!

[soundoftheseagull]

That,s a wow!

[Yakdiver]

Cracking trip and photos well done

[Douglas Wilcox]

Thank you all.

Day 2


We didn't set off until nearly 5pm.












It was dark by the time we reached our camp site and the moon and Jupiter shone above our fire as Saturn had already set behind the high hills.

To be continued...

Douglas

[chillipepper]

sublime.. as usual :-)

[andreadawn]

Day two, fifth pic down; just gorgeous.

Looking forward to next installment.

Andrea Collins

[Douglas Wilcox]

Thank you Mike and Andrea.


Although this looks (and was) very tranquil...


...for about an hour before there was a very loud continuous low pitched beating sound coming from the waters of the Sound of Bute. This nuclear submarine was on the surface, we wondered if it was a test of some sort of sonar device. Whatever, we didn't see any ceteaceans...

Douglas

[Douglas Wilcox]

Day three...
























Still paddling at sunset but...


...we set up camp a little earlier than yesterday and the Moon, Jupiter and saturn all shone in the sky above us.

To be continued....

Douglas

[andreadawn]

I love that fifth pic down (again!) in the day three set, Douglas.

Looking forward (again!) to the next installment.

Andrea Collins

[Douglas Wilcox]

Thanks Andrea.


It was bitterly cold waiting for the sun to come up.


We soon warmed up once we got on the water.


In the middle of the Kilbrannan Sound , the wind dropped...


...away to nothing.


We made landfall at these caves, famous for a spider.




Not looking for us...








Finished before...


...sunset!


In time for langoustines and steaks.

To be continued....

Douglas

[tommfuller]

Fantastic as always!

Cheers,

Tom.

[nigelhatton]

Douglas,
your posts are the best as always that I read about. You could make videos of your trips and even sell them.

[Douglas Wilcox]

Thank you Tom and Nigel.

Day 5.

The day dawned clear as the sun rose behind this rickety basalt dyke but the forecast was for the F3-4 S wind to veer N F5-7 by the afternoon. So we wasted no time...


...as the flood tide swirled north east through the Sound of Pladda.


At Dippen Head we looked up...


...to see five golden eagles soaring on the updraft (only 4 in photo).


Once round the Head the wind freed enough for the sails...


...as we crossed Whiting Bay.






The east coast of Holy Island is a wild place.


We had made such good time back to Brodick that we nearly made the earlier ferry.


As we waited for the next ferry, clouds from the approaching cold front began spilling over the mountains.


Then the wind got up...


...as we caught the ferry home.

Five days and 140km of great seakayaking and camping, all within 40 minutes drive from the house. We are truly lucky here in the west coast of Scotland.

Douglas

[PhilAyr]

The first day was great, I know because I was there ! However the pictures from the remaining four days are simply breathtaking ! One thing for certain is that both Arran and Kintyre should be at the top of any paddler's to do list !

Brilliant photos as always Douglas !

Phil

[andreadawn]

Thank you for a very inspiring thread Douglas. It takes ages for it all to load on my weedy internet connection, but it's well worth the wait.

Andrea Collins

[Douglas Wilcox]

Thanks Phil and Andrea.

Phil we were really sorry you had to return to work after the first Sunday! BUT we will go again. The wildlife was amazing. We saw otters, golden eagles, peregrine falcons, buzzards and a huge number of porpoises. In calm conditions, off Carradale at sunset, we saw an amazing sight. A group of porpoises were circling a shoal of small fish on the surface and feeding on them. A huge number of sea birds including gannets were gathered round and joining in. I have never seen porpoises doing this before. We heard an entertaining discussion between an angry householder and the Norwegian captain of the live fish transporter Viktoria Viking on channel 6. The houselder was complaining about the number of helicopter flights over his house and demanded that they stop. The captain said that the pilot was very healthy and that the flights would continue until early evening!

It was a most beautiful and otherwise peaceful day and I did sympathise with the householder. The helicopter was making a hell of a racket, we first heard it 15km away. It is another aspect of the pollution caused by fish farming.

The rescue helicopter from HMS Gannet that flew over us waved out the open window and waggled his rotor as he flew over us.

My only regret was not going out round Pladda to play in the spring tide race on the last day. The weather forecast meant we did not want to end up paddling north into a wind of that strength so we wasted no time getting back to Brodick.

Douglas

[Kayaks'N'Beer]

Thanks for that, Douglas. I was toying with the idea of maybe heading out there for a week in the autumn. Those pics have just promoted it to the planning stage.

[Canoe-Cowal]

Douglas again all good

Dave all this is on my door step get yisrell up mate

[rockall]

A brilliant trip and superb pics from you, Douglas...as always!

By the way, did you scupper the sea-leg back to Bute & Portencross (shown on the map) because of the oncoming front? Looks like the sea got nasty pretty quickly!

[Douglas Wilcox]

Thank you Kayaks'nBeer I hope you have a great trip.

Thank you Canoe-Cowal you know what a magnificent destination Arran is.

Thank you Rockall.

The sea leg from Sannox to Bute to Portencross was actually done on the first day with another team. My original intention had been to keep going round the north end of Arran while the others went to Portencross but it was a Sunday and my daughter Sheena had got married on the Friday.


So I wasn't ready for a camping trip and neither were Mike or Jennifer who were also at the wedding. I drove back to Glasgow on the Sunday night.

We got ready for camping on the Monday morning then drove back to Ardrossan and got the 1515 ferry to Brodick. That is why we set off late on the second day. We never intended paddling back to Ardrossan at the end of the trip but enjoyed the curry and chips on the Caledonian Isles as the wind blew up

All in all a lot got packed into that week!

Douglas

[pete cos]

Great photos...looks a wonderful trip