Paddlers: Myles, Jamie, Derek
Weather: Good but cold at night
Report:
We arrived at Port Appin and packed the boats in the Pier Hotel car park, then left the cars in the public parking just behind the beach (basically a good place to set off from). The sun was shining and we crossed over to Lismore at a fair pace and cruised down the coast until lunch.
After lunch we headed to the islands in the Lynn of Lorne and had a look about then back to Lismore and headed to the campsite on the southern tip. As we turned the corner there was a noticeable tiderace between the main island and a smaller one just off shore, it was probably flowing at about 6knots, something to look forward to in the morning….
The campsite was good but you had to look hard for fire wood, probably as this area is very popular with sea kayaks. We went and had a look at the tiderace after eating and decided it was probably a little too much to get through, but decided to wait till morning before making any decision.
In the morning we decided not to go through the race as it didn’t seem like a good idea to risk a swim first thing in the morning, this meant we had to go round the small island and tackle the lesser flow on the this still turned out to be about 4 knots, we all made it round without incident.
The rest of the day was spent exploring the north coast of Lismore, lunch was at an abandoned quarry, with a tea break at Port Ramsey. We had our hopes set on an ice cream, however there appears to be only one shop on the island about an hour walk way, so we had to make do with coffee and snacks.
The final part of the trip was a crossing over to Castle Stalker and then back to Port Appin against a fair bit of tide. All in all a good trip in good weather, if a little cold over night (for me anyway).