The grand voyages of Pixie: Under a cloud

We had a lazy start today (16th) and by the time we got out of bed around 9ish most of the other boats in the anchorage had left. The were probably heading off to the West coast of Mull. The forecast didn't look great for them, and there are north or north westerlies forecast for the next few days, we decided to head off to Loch Sunart when the tide went north at around 3 this afternoon. So we had the morning to waste. I actually managed to sit down, relax and read Yachting Monthly for a while, I read about a couple's trip across the Pacific, which put our 28 hour trip from Newlyn into perspective.

We then went ashore to see the "Bridge across the Atlantic" an impressivly solid stone bridge that links the island of Seil to mainland Scotland.

It is possible to get a boat under there, not one like Pixie, but something with a shallow draft and a mast that can be lowered...or a motor boat.

The weather was a bit drizzly and foggy in the distance, but we thought we'd walk the 2km along the road to the shop. First mistake was thinking the road was quiet, second mistake was thinking it was only 2 km. The road was quite busy for a single lane road, with cars coming and going quickly in both directions. We gave up on the shop after walking over two miles down the road, and eventually ran out of time, so we headed back to Pixie as the weather began to warm up.

We retrieved the anchor, (the Lewmar electric windlass is working wonders, and saving my back!) and headed off out into the Firth or Lorn, to our left a big fog bank was rolling in, but it looked to be dispersing. Looks can be deceptive. It wasn't. About a mile from the anchorage the fog surrounded us. On with the Sea~me, on with the radar and nav lights. Initally there was enough wind to sail, and as we were sailing we noticed our usually well behaved Garmin wind sensor started acting up. It stops sending the wind data briefly every couple of minutes or less. I had a look at all the wiring, but couldn't see anything wrong. It seems that as soon as one problem is sorted, another one is waiting to take its place. There is no reason for the wind sensor to act up, it's worked faultlessly since I installed it last year. It chooses now, just when we've finally fixed our engine trouble to act up? Its timing is unbelievable. It's not essential, but it's handy to have.

Anyway the fog lifted as we approached the coast of Mull, and the tide took us nicely up the Sound of Mull, well the tide and the engine as the wind had died, and what wind there was, was funneling down the sound on the nose. Looking behind us I could see the fog had cleared and had been replaced by bright sunshine, the hills and moutains were glowing. Unfortunately that was behind us. Where we were, it was grey, cold and cloudy. And it stayed that way most of the way up the Sound of Mull. Only as we approached Ardnamurchan and Loch Sunart did the sun break through from the west, as we turned east.