Twister’s
Adventures on the Caledonian Canal.
Tuesday morning,
August 20, we start our way down the Caledonian Canal. The locks open at 8am so
we head on into the first lock with 3 other boats including our friends Mark
and Maria on their 27 foot Mare Liberum.
Lars met them in Tonga and I had met them in Durban, South Africa. The locks take a little bit of practice to
master smoothly tossing and holding lines as we go through the locks, but we
get lots of practice as the first mile of the canal through Corpach has 9 locks
including 7 locks back to back to back in what’s called Neptune’s Steps. Each lock moves the boat probably about 2- 4
meters (6-12 ft). The Caledonian Canal
built in the early 1800s connects the east and west coast of Scotland running
66 splendid miles from Corpach to Inverness.
The canal is 30 miles man made canal that connects the 36 miles of 3
natural lochs, including world famous Loch Ness. The first day in 10 hours we complete 20
miles, through 14 locks, lots of swing bridges and a sail across Loch
Locky. Scotland is lovely land for a
sail with green hills, trees, and canal sections that are winding little rivers
through lush forests. We spend the night
tied up on a wall in Fort Augustus with Mare Liberum. We are at the top of 5 locks that will lower
us to Loch Ness in the morning and we can see Loch Ness waiting in the
distance. Fort Augustus is a nice little
town full of friendly folks. We enjoy a
dinner of fish and chips and haggis at a local pub.
Wednesday, August
21 we awake to a beautiful sunshiny morning! Amazing. We brew up some coffee
and head into the first lock at 8am. The
locks are full with 7 boats and there is not enough wall space for everyone.
Therefore, to fit us in we have Mark and Maria of Mare Liberum raft up to
us. The morning is gorgeous and
warm. We are able to be in t-shrits and
smile at the sun. Maria and I are on the
lock wall walking the boats from lock to lock and Lars is on the boat fending
off the wall if we get too close. Mark down in Mare Liberum cooks up the most
delicious egg, bacon, and tomato sandwiches, which we manage to carry along.
The simple things in life that seem so magical; coffee, sunshine, bacon,
sailboats, good friends, and smiles! There
are plenty of tourist snapping photos as the boats head through the locks and
Lars gives them a show by climbing Twister’s mast steps to the top in his
Wellington knee-high rubber boots and boardshorts to get some photos himself of
the views of the locks and Loch Ness.
After 5 locks we
motor out onto Loch Ness, which is the largest (30 miles long) and a deepest
(1000 ft) of the lochs. The sunshine is
not meant to last and after a few miles on the lake we head into some thick fog
although from above a bit of sunshine still sneaks through. We head on down the loch and Lars asks if I
want to surf Loch Ness. I’m hesitant,
because I’m already a bit chilly and the loch temperature is 12C (53 F). But, I tell Lars I’ll pull him behind
Twister. Lars pulls out a board and
screws in the fins. To surf we surfed sat on the edge of the boat as the boat
was underway and put the surfboard in the water under our feet, then stood and
slowly worked one’s way along the boat with a line in hand until you are
surfing behind Twister. Lars is incredibly successful and gets a long ride
along Loch Ness and manages to pull himself back onto Twister with only his
feet wet. I’m up next and I’m not so
good and end up falling all the way into Loch Ness and got a chance to paddle
around on the board. Lars picks me up and
we continue on our 11 mile trip (about 2 hours) to our first Loch Ness stop at
a Urchacht Castle, where supposedly where the monster hangs out. We anchor both boats and everyone jumps in
for a refreshingly chilly swim. Lars and
I wear our masks and snorkels, but no luck spotting Nessie. On we travel down the length of the Loch and
back into the canal for a sunny evening to our final destination on the
Caledonian Canal, Inverness.
We arrive and have
a little happy hour celebration in Twister’s cockpit with the local favourite
Scotch Whyte & MacCay before heading into Inverness for an evening of
Indian food and live music and a local pub.
Scotland is fully of interesting characters and we met a number of them
on Wednesday evening. Lars carried his guitar and was requested to do some
singing at the pub and he inspired a few others to play us some songs on his
guitar.
On Thursday
morning we only have about a ½ mile of the canal to cover, which includes 5
locks. We have now completed 28 of the
29 locks of the Caledonian Canal. We tie
up for a day of showers, laundry, water tank filling, and other little boat
projects, so we are ready for the North Sea.
The evening is spent sharing a meal and great conversation in the
cockpit with Mark and Maria. We have a
lovely sunset and a clear night with a nearly full moon and stars shining down.
Also, across the canal we watch as folks let a large Chinese lantern float away
into the night sky.
Today Friday,
August 23 we head on toward the Shetland Islands (about 200 miles) on our way
to Bergen, Norway (another 200 miles).
The GRIBs look good so on we go.
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