With force 6 easterly winds due to come in mid afternoon, which would be blowing against the ebbing tide through the Gulf of Corryveveken, we had a real sense of urgency as we packed up in the morning. Neither of us had paddled through the Gulf of Corryveveken and with it's reputation we certainly didn’t want to be going through once the tide really got motoring.
We needed to cover 25km to hit the Gulf at slack water so we got an early start. The west coast of Jura is quite interesting but has a bit of a samey feel until Glenebade Bay, where it starts to get more rugged and broken. We didn’t have much time to stop to explore so we pressed on into the Gulf.
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| Approaching the Gulf of Corryveveken at slack water |
We reached the Gulf of Corryveckan a little later than we'd hoped to and ended up going through 30mins after slack water. We cautiously followed the north shore of Jura staying close to the rocky coastline not entirely sure what to expect. Despite being a neap tide, you certainly get a sense the power of the water through there, everywhere you look there's swirling eddies and areas of moving water. As we reached the east end of the Gulf the accelerating water was starting to be whipped up by the growing easterly wind, this created some roughness but thankfully nothing worse than we'd seen earlier in the trip.
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| The Gulf of Corryveveken |
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| The Gulf of Corryveveken |
We stopped on the tiny beach at Port an Furm for a well earned lunch and watched a boat bounce it's way through the rough water and into the Gulf.
Crossing from Port an Furm back to Crinan focused the mind! Within a few hundred metres of the Jura coast we were fighting with strong eddy lines, swirling water and all sorts of interesting tidal features. Despite aiming due west towards Sgeir nam Faoileann we ended up completely missing the south of Reisa an t-Sruith and after some eddy hopping and serious effort we eventually got to Eilean na Cille.
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| Crossing the Sound of Jura |
By the time we left Eilean na Cille as predicted the wind had got up so we go our heads down slogged our way the final 5km back to Crinan.
Back to Crinan
Final thoughts
If you get the opportunity to do this trip definitely go for it, if you get the weather it's a fantastic location with superb, memorable paddling. If you want any advise or further information on the trip just drop me a line.
Drysuit vs long john wetsuit vs split (cag and salopettes)
After lots of deliberation, we decided to not take our drysuits and go for a split system with a long john wetsuit for an emergency. The forecast was for hot weather and we wanted the flexibility to strip down to t-shirts, however looking back on the trip I think I would have been happier on days 4 and 5 in the drysuit. It's a difficult decision for on a trip like this, 80% of the paddling is relatively easy and because the distances are quite long you want to be comfortable and efficient, however a drysuit would be desirable for the headlands and surf landings. After taking a swim in my cag and sallopettes landing on day four, I switch to the wetsuit for the rest of the trip. It was impossible to dry the wetsuit and I found the dampness really unpleasant. So in summary if you squeeze your drysuit in I'd definitely consider taking it, if you can't it might be work digging out the old wetsuit for a backup.
Use the zoom to view 1:50000 OS Map
[osmap gpx="http://www.seakayaktrips.co.uk/osmaps/ji7.gpx"]
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