The Sound of Islay is another of those places in this part of the world with tides strong enough that you can't go though against the tide in most small (or many big) yachts, but it is one of the easier ones with straightforward pilotage and no serious over-falls.
I arrived with a couple of hours of the favourable spring tide remaining and went through very easily despite the wind increasing to more than 15 knots.
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The "Paps of Jura", the 85 metre coaster was heading to
Port Ellen with grain (barley) for the malt whiskey distilleries. |
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| Bunnahabhain Distillery, Islay. |
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| Ardnahoe Distillery, Islay. |
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| Caol Ila Distillery, Islay. |
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The CalMac ferry berthing at Port Askaig, going into 5 knots
of tide in the channel with >15 knots of wind behind. |
Making 4.8 knots through the water and 10 over the ground:
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| McAuther's Head, at the southern end of the Sound. |
Naturally as I came out of the sound expecting a nice reach along to Port Ellen but the wind died then came round to the southwest until I was only a coupe of miles from the offing so I did not get much sailing 😒 but I did get a good lift from the tide for over an hour.
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Port Ellen from the offing. The factory looking building is a malt
house for those distilleries that don't do their own malting. |
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| Port Ellen ferry terminal and berth for the grain ships. |
Ardalanish to Port Ellen, 51.8 miles over the ground in a little over 11 hours.
Slide show of all my pictures through the Sound of Islay to Port Ellen, page through by clicking the arrows or click in the centre of the pic to view from Flickr in a new window or full screen:
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