Sailing Round the Top

Wow! After so much thinking and planning and buying a yacht and upgrading it and sailing (almost) round the UK last year, today was a fantastic day. We motored out of Stromness to catch the tail end of the westerly-going flow, just so that we could escape from the Hoy Sound without a roost (rough water overfall). We motor sailed for a couple of hours in a feeble east south easterly breeze. It was brilliant to sail past The Old Man of Hoy, one of the most famous, exciting and inaccessible rock climbs in Britain. But then the wind picked up and backed to become an east north easterly blowing around 14 knots and gaining so we ran for eight hours at an increasing speed. By the time we came close to our destination of Loch Eriboll we added a bit of tidal flow in our favour and hit 9.1 knots of speed. This is comparable to a fast runner but us sailors get excited whenever the speed goes beyond a fast walk.

As we sailed into the wider section of Loch Eriboll, Mark was enjoying himself on the helm and dismissed Pete’s suggestion that we perhaps ought to reef in the mainsail. Ten minutes later, as we shot up the narrower section of the loch, the wind picked up to 22 knots plus gusts and the water was frothing around us. Mark suggested that we ought to reef in the mainsail, so we did. We are working together well as always, but perhaps Pete is beginning to think of himself as co-skipper rather than knowing his place as crew – maybe a mutiny is building below decks. We continued more at a more sensible speed along the loch to anchor behind Ard Neackie, a kind of neck of land protruding into the loch that offers shelter from the north. At the anchorage we joined another yacht, but we are not sure if they are heading to Stromness or to Cape Wrath. We did notice that they are a much bigger yacht, not that being the smallest boat in the north is worrying us. We tried to lay our anchor three times, and sure enough were third time lucky, we hope. The anchorage seems sound, and we triple checked by using the GPS to make sure we were not dragging the anchor in the lively east wind.

For me it seems incredible to sail into Loch Eriboll. I have visited this place several times during landlubber holidays, and it is great to revisit the spot but by sea. The famous potter Lottie Glob lives on the west shore of the loch, and we can see her house and garden from our anchorage. My partner Toni and I bought half a dozen blue glazed tiles from Lottie about 25 years ago when she was in a co-operative art studio near Durness. We were strapped for cash and could not afford on of Lottie’s larger creations but picked out the tiles from a ‘seconds’ bucket. We got a local blacksmith to make some simple frames and the tiles have had pride of place in our little conservatory since then.

Just a stone’s throw from our anchorage is the coast road. This is part of the now well known ‘500’ of northern Scotland. This road route has become very popular, some would say too popular. It is now completed, generally starting and finishing in Inverness, by a multitude of people travelling in campervans, sports cars, motorbikes and push bikes. Some previously quiet spots such as Durness have now become busy hives of activity in the summer season. Best wishes to all those people doing the 500, but if they want to do something a little less crowded then I can recommend following the same route round the top but 1 to 20 miles offshore. Once we left Hoy Sound we have seen no other boats all day until arriving at out anchorage.

After a brilliant day of journeying and sailing, tomorrow is the final third step in going round the top. it is biggest step. We will sail about 15 miles to reach Cape Wrath and round it then south for fifteen miles to reach the first safe haven on the north-east coast, which is the harbour of Kinlochbervie. If conditions are favourable then we would like to take the inside passage round Cape Wrath, but the wind is forecast to pick up so we will suck it and see.