Arran

We sailed from Kirkudbright at 11 am Friday arriving at East Tarbert Bay in the evening. The bay is tucked in on the east side of the Mull of Kintyre about a mile from the headland. It is a very good spot to await the tide to turn in your favour in the north channel. It is very lovely and feels quite remote, however it being weekend there was a contingent of Geordie family's who were camping and fishing (there is a very basic campsite on the beach) they were quite noisy, obviously fishing and alcohol seem to go hand in hand.

We weighed anchor around midnight and motored around the Mull, it was a very dark night due to cloud. The over falls were abscent, but there was obvious tidal movement with large boils, however a remarkably calm strip was evident close in to the cliffs. We shot around into the North channel at about 7 knots.

With a fair tide all the way and a gentle southerly we actually arrived at the mouth of the Clyde at 4.30 in the morning and a couple of hours early to catch the first of the flood. The wind increased to force 4 and we had a bit of a wild run to Lamlash on Arran arriving at 10.20 in the morning. We picked up a mooring and tried to get a few hours sleep. The rising southerly south westerly wind made the mooring uncomfortable, forecast was for the wind to veer to the north west. This proved to be the case and after we had slept for 11 hours straight on Saturday night on Sunday morning we moved about 5 miles along the coast to Brodick.

Brodick Bay Arran

Bit of a selfie, taken at Lamlash, do I look short of sleep?

Dark Tarn on the visitors moorings at Lalash

Holy Island Lamlash, directly behind Dark Tarn is a great anchorage just of the buddist monastery, ( Holy Island is now owned by a buddist community) if I get the chance I will pop onto the anchorage and row ashore and ask the monks to bless the boat, you can never be too careful! Any excuse to re-visit Arran!