Wednesday would be our final full day of survey so we hoped it would be a productive one. As it turned out, however, the dolphins had other ideas and we could almost hear their clicks and whistles of manic laughter as they hid from view. Still, optimistic as ever, we set off from our mooring in Gunna in another beautiful still and sunny morning. Laura and Gandalf had managed to talk themselves out of their morning run on the beach which had been so enthusiastically planned the night before. Gandalf had been in the habit of planning exciting morning exercise activities such as swimming in the icy water, and running on the beach, none of which had materialised, mainly due to them being concocted after a couple of whiskies the previous evening.
We headed north from Gunna along the west coast of Coll. Along the way we saw more Basking Sharks, seals and porpoises and of course heaps of dolphins. Sorry, did I say heaps? I meant no dolphins of course. The varmints were really teasing us now. Apparently they were everywhere else in the Hebrides except where we were. We more than made up for it with the sharks though – in fact they were becoming slightly commonplace. “Another Basking Shark? Jot that down. Next!” One Fulmar and a Storm Petrel kept circling us to try to give us the impression that there were lots of them but we weren’t fooled- oh no!
Ted went up in the crow’s nest at around lunchtime and that would be the last we would see or hear of him for several hours. I think he shouted a few sightings down but we were all too busy drinking tea, eating biscuits and counting Basking Sharks to hear him. When he finally came down he was a couple of stone lighter and had a beard. He told us of his spiritual experience, as he had chance to mull over such things as what regurgitated fish tastes like and if someone had actually built a wall at the edge of the planet to keep the water in. We think he’d just nodded off on watch as usual. J
We chugged on in a northerly direction towards the Small Isles, the faint hope of exciting sightings almost extinguished, when suddenly there was a strange holler from on deck. At first we thought Flash (Gordon) had just spilt coffee down his pants but in fact he’d spotted a Minke Whale a few metres from the port bow. It rose to breathe a couple more times before disappearing again –and that was that. It was moving in the opposite direction to us and was really motoring but the sighting had given us all the lift we needed to keep going.
The open sea can often appear slightly barren and devoid of life and sometimes the monotony can dampen the spirits, but as we reached Canna the sight of its bird life, caves and stunning cliff faces, as well as the timely reappearance of the sun came to the rescue. Someone said we had egg on the port bow, which I assumed must have come from one of Dave’s butties earlier that morning. (Yes I know Eigg is an island!) Beyond Canna to the north is the island of Rum where we were to moor. We tracked its coastline, and took in the wonderful views. The island is virtually uninhabited by humans and long may it remain that way because it is a beautiful place and could only worsen were we to get our hands on it. One human impact of interest though is Kinloch Castle which sits overlooking Loch Scresort where we moored. Though not a castle in the traditional sense, it is interesting in that the internal décor has remained the same since the house was last inhabited by the owners over 50 years ago. Peering in though the windows brought back memories of earlier in the week when the rough seas had impacted badly on my insides.
Anyway, that evening I was introduced to vegetarian sausages which to the untrained eye (mouth) could actually pass for the real thing. Perhaps they were. Maybe the trays got muddled up the swaying galley. Well, what the mind doesn’t know… or whatever the expression is. After dinner, the evening’s entertainment was provided by Martha who would climb the mast to the crow’s nest without a safety net (although she did have the regulation safety harness and the crossed fingers of her fellow crew members to assist her.) We had all been up into the crow’s nest except Martha (and also Jackie and Flash, who had been on the trip the previous year and had been introduced to the pleasures of dicing with death then!) As we waited with anticipation for Martha’s act, she was already back down and safe. She was up and down the mast like a gibbon who’d overdone it on the espressos. Possibly it was due to the skipper chasing her up there with a lighted flare (only joking of course!)
A few glasses of wine later and it was time for bed. I’m not sure if I heard right but I think Gandalf was planning a mountaineering expedition before breakfast…