Today worked out rather differently than we had expected. We were waiting in Port Ellen on Islay for the weather to improve for our next hop South. The forecasts at the moment generally seem to be for strong winds coming from wherever we want to go, and looked set to be set contrary for a while.
Port Ellen is a lovely place, but apart from visiting distilleries (it has three, but you can have too much of a good thing!) there isn't much else to do.
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| Port Ellen |
And then, suddenly this morning the wind swung round to the North West. Granted it was also a force 5-7 which is stronger than we would normally consider, but it would be behind us and so off we went. And we were so glad we had! Goldfinch picked up her skirts (well, the big genoa actually) and raced southwards in bright sunshine, surfing at times down the big rollers racing in behind us from the Atlantic. Exhilarating stuff!
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| Rathlin Island |
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| Mike, lowering our Saltire courtesy flag. |
And so Scotland was left behind in a trice and we said farewell to this beautiful country. We loved your scenery, but perhaps not your weather.
We covered the 25 miles to Ballycastle in Northern Ireland in less than four hours, coming in past the beautiful scenery of Rathlin Island. This is the most westerly point of the trip.
The weather is about to turn again, so a touristy day is planned for tomorrow. The Giant's Causeway is a must, as is the conveniently located village of Bushmills.
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