On Monday, Dad and I sailed on the paddle steamer Waverley on her annual cruise from Oban to the island of Iona, where St. Columba set up his monastery in the 7th Century - the first such Christian place in Great Britain, said to have been chosen because on a clear day he could see Ireland.

Waverley approaches oban
The cruise took us out the "back entrance" from Oban harbour, down Kerrera sound and across Lower Loch Linhe to cruise off from the sheer cliffs and barren
beauty of the Isle of Mull

Southern coast of Mull
The atmosphere is really difficult to capture in photographs; it looks great when there, but reviewing pictures they look less like landscapes and more line linescapes - thus my letter box format. And then you have the boat bobbing about like a cork on a pond, and if you're in the cabin the windows are splishsplashed with salty water.

Mull from Waverley's bar
Iona was ... beautiful as ever; looked so serene across the bay. A huge shame that having travelled all that way, it was decided that there was too much swell to transfer us safely to tenders to get us ashore, so here's the best view I got:

Iona from Waverley
And we turned and headed back. The crew, bless them, tried to make up for the disappointment - took us closer in to the coast of Mull so that we could get some better pictures ...

Photographing Mull
... and then they carried on past Lady's Rock on the southern tip of Lismore and its lighthouse ...

Lady's Rock
... and past Duart Castle on the Easterly corner of Mull ...

Duart Castle
... then up the rarely-navigated (by passenger ship) channel to the West of Lismore seeing the Glensanda quarries that causes a huge stink when they were first proposed for this lovely spot ..

Glensanda Quarry
... until in the distance we could just make out through the rain and squall the shape of Ben Nevis, snowcapped still even on 1st May.

Ben Nevis, capped in snow, through the rain
Our thanks to the crew of "Waverley" - now the last seagoing paddle steamer operational in the world - for a magnificent day out. She'll be operating around the UK coast right through to October this year - why not visit the Waverley Web Site and see if she's going to be near you!
(written 2006-05-03 19:35:42)

 

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