Wick to Helmsdale to Loch Ness to Dunstaffnage 25th to 30th July

That afternoon in Wick was spent looking at charts, tides and the weather for the next few days. I found a great help from Ian (Corrie) Cormack at the lifeboat station. He's the full time mechanic, manager, coxwain and general doer of stuff for the lifeboat. He cheered up my mood by agreeing that I'd made the correct call that morning and turning back had been my best option. This from a man who knows the Pentland Firth like his back garden, was all I needed to realise that it wasn't me being chicken. A word about the Pentland Firth - as I've said before it has a reputation as the most dangerous stretch of water around Britain and some of the things I've read about it whilst doing my homework make the toes curl. In "Tidal Streams of the Waters Surrounding the British Isles" the Admiralty warn the seafarer of the great differences in direction and rate of the tidal streams over small distances - "streams run very strongly, eddies of great extent and strength form, and there are races and overfalls of tremendous violence"! They add cautiously that no chart or description of the tidal streams can be correct under all circumstances, and that accurate measurements and observations are impossible. William Lithgow, one of the most widly travelled men of his time, said in 1628 .... Forsaking Cathnes, I embraced the trembling surges (at Dungsby) of struggling Neptune, which engorgeth Pentland or Pictland Firth, with nine contrarious tides; each tide overthwarting another with repugnant courses, have such violent streams, and combustious waves, that if these dangerous firths be not righly taken in passing over, the passengers shall quickly lose sight of life and land for ever....! ( From "A wild and open sea" by James Miller) However, the forecast for the next day was perferct for going through the Firth but the outlook for the long run across the Northern coast was not looking good. As you may appreciate, my faith in the weather forecasts we have had of late has been a little dented so I had to err on the side of safety and assume that it would be either as forecast or worse. I called a crew meeting - well, we went to the pub - and after discussion with the lads it was decided to call it quits and head back down the Moray Firth and take the shorter route through the Caledonian Canal, which links the East and West coasts of Scotland through canals, locks and Lock Ness. A difficult decision for me as I set out to circumnavigate Britain and now feel that I'll be the guy who failed to circumnavigate Britain. I don't feel that anyone can knock me for that in the light of the weather we are having and have had, and many have already said that it was a wise and sound decision based on safety rather than a gung-ho attitude (and the fact that the last thing we want to do is to have to call out a lifeboat). For those of you who have donated money to the RNLI on the strength of our attempt then Pete and I have already said that if at all possible we will return again next year or the year after and do the bit we haven't done in a chartered boat. Ok? Deal? We spent the rest of the day resting, clocking up another couple of pubs and getting a reasonably early night. Off the next morning at about midday after getting fuel in a 25 litre drum from a bloke called Willy in a shed and managing to spill plenty over the boat and Bob trying to get it into the tank. As we left we had the bizzare sight and sound of one of the four young blokes on the French boat next to us seeing us off with a fanfare played on no less than a tuba! Where do you find room for a tuba on a 30ft boat? We had also noticed that after they arrived they managed to bring out of the boat 2 tandem pushbikes and go off for a sightseeing ride round Wick. Nutters!We pushed out of the harbour under grey skies and a fairly big sea. Quel suprise! But after an initial beat out to sea we tacked and managed to hold a reasonable close reach for about ten miles SW along the coast towards our destination of Helmsdale, a small harbour on the Northern coast of the Moray Firth.The sun came out and we had a good sail that was spoiled a bit by the still big sea. God, I'm so fed up with waves. I know it's something that goes with being on the sea but just for once could we have a bit of calm water and a nice sail? Is it really asking too much? Oh and, while I'm whinging, perhaps a 24 hour period without rain would be nice. Pete and I discussed this recently and we realised that since we've been gone we haven't had one day in which we haven't been rained on. So far we've managed all the elements of nice sailing, flat sea, sun, gentle wind on the beam, good scenery, fair tide etc etc but never all at the same time.The big sea abated but so did the wind and what little was left went round onto the nose - see what I mean? - so we ended up motoring the last 10 miles into Helmsdale, a very pretty little village with a small fishing fleet and a nice Harbour Master called Alec who interrupted his birthday supper to come and see us in. The only other thing of note in Helmsdale was the shower. We all agreed that the huge infra-red heater on the wall made it the best so far. Strange that something so small can have a huge boosting affect on morale.Away at 9 the next morning at the top of the tide after having watched a couple of fishing boats come in after a night at sea, and sort their catch. Those guys must be just about scraping a living as it seemed thay didn't have much to show for a hard nights work. A few boxes of langoustine or something similar. No wind at all today so we set out under power for Inverness, about 40 miles away. A reasonable day - some sun interspersed with heavy downpours. We saw a few dolphins as we neared Inverness who put on a brief display of jumping about 100m away. Inverness is where the Caledonian Canal starts, with a sea lock as the first thing. The canal locks only operate between 0800 and 1800 including this one so we had to put into the small yacht haven in Inverness Docks. The place was just an industrial estate with extra cranes. Great if we had wanted to do a bit of DIY from B&Q or a tile wholesaler, or even taken on board a few thousand gallons of diesel from the BP depot. All we wanted was a loo and shower but it appeared this was asking too much for our £13. A stroll into town for a ruby and a couple of pints watching an excellent jazz band. The trombonist could do really good triple-tongueing and, boy, did he like to use it.0700 revielle to get to the lock gates for 0800. Through there and stopped at the marina further up the canal to sort out paperwork and refuel. John, the British Waterways Board bloke there, allowed us a 50% discount as it was for the RNLI and a passing sailor on the towpath donated £20 for the bucket as the lifeboat in Ireland had come out to meet him when he was having trouble getting into a harbour there in a storm.Up through a series of locks and swing-bridges and we were out into Lock Ness. The mood all morning had been one of relaxed excitement as we were about to do something a bit different with the promise of an easy day through the 25 miles of canal and Loch to Fort Augustus at the Sw end of Loch Ness. However, as I write this, we are under power only. bashing into 25 to 30kn of wind, once again right on the nose, some steep little waves which stop the boat in her tracks and making a measly 2.5 to 3.5kn through the water. My poor little engine! Pete said that when we got to Loch Ness the sun would shine and he was going to put on shorts and T-shirt which, to his credit, he did, but only for a minute, long enough to have his picture taken and get hypothemia.A lovely evening at Fort Augustus. You wouldn't have thought it was the same day - the sun came out and the water was still. Some beautiful views down Loch Ness and the surrounding mountains. Off at 0730 next morning to get into the first run up the next set of 5 locks. Hey we were a tourist attraction. All the visitors gathered around the locks to watch and take pictures. We later realised that we'd missed an ideal opportunity to shake the Lifeboat buckets. They soon realised that locks are quite boring once you've seen the operation once so they drifted away. We motored on down the canal and through various small Lochs, under swing bridges and past some stunning scenery. Ben Nevis was to our left but the top was obscured all day by the clouds that regularly rained on us. A day of gentle relaxed motoring which was needed by all. We reached the end of the canal too late to go down the series of locks called Neptunes Staircase, to get to the sea, so moored up and said goodbye to Bob and Ray and welcomed Mark and Jon aboard. Ray has taken about 600 photos during his time on board and will be putting a selection up on his website in due corurse, so watch this space for the address.Once we reached the sea next morning after a fairly tedious procedure through 7 locks we ended up having the best sail we've had so far on the trip. The sun shone, the wind was on the beam, the sea was flat but of course we had a couple of really big downpours just to stop it being perfect. We were heading for Dunstaffnage Marina just outside Oban where Terry Saunders an ex-sound engineer from Autograph, and his wife Jackie have set up Alba Sailing, a very successful and busy charter company and sailing school. They arranged a berth for us which was a small miracle due to the fact that there were about 150 extra boats in the marina due to it being Scotsail week - an annual sail-fest on the west coast. Thanks to Tim and Mike at the marina for waiving the fee. A perfect evening in the pub to shake the buckets at all the visiting sailors and we must have collected at least £150!Today is a day off and I've handed over skippering duties to Jon who is going to take us for a sail later and we'll go where the wind takes us rather than where we have to go.