Turn around.

 

July 25 2017

0600 up tea time. Check the weather. Forecast terrible in the next couple of days to go any further North. Decision made to begin the journey back to our winter home.

0700 weigh anchor and we’re on our way. Again we follow Christolyn. This navigation stuff is easy! We see a bunch of seals sunning themselves. When they’re out of the water they are either stretched out flat or they curl like a banana on it’s back.

We exit the loch, get some sails up, turn on the auto pilot because it beats hand steering hands down. Only! It doesn’t want to work!! OH MY what to do?

I go and dig out a spare. Hook it up,turn on the electricity. Nothing, el zippo, nadda. Change the connections. Still nothing. Fewy (insert bad words of your choice. As many as you think necessary). Give it a shake and a bang. Still nothing. Decide it is probably not going to wake up any time soon so unconnect it. I go and get another one.(You all thought we were out of luck didn’t you?) Ha triple redundancy in the auto pilot department. (Have I mentioned how much I don’t like steering a boat) Hook up number 3. #3 is different from #’s 1&2 I just figured out how to use symbols on the keyboard J The difference is that it still has the big plug still attached. So I root around in my electrical bits box a recycled fishing tackle box green and beishy in keeping with the boat colours. I find a couple of test leads with alligator clips on both ends. They just happen to be green and unwhite white. I clip one on each of the prongs on the plug and one onto the ends of the wires going to the motor on the steering wheel. Turn on the electricity OHOH!!! Instant memory recall I change the wires,,,,, beep, flashing red eye, push the buttons, wheel goes one way then the next Now will it hold a course? Tighten the belt (on the wheel as this is an old belt driven wheel auto pilot) Push the auto button, steady red light one beep and,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,Viola, Bob is your uncle and we’re heading somewhat West South West. Which is the direction we want to go until we turn South but that’s later in the story. Happy days I celebrate with Sally. She is much pleased that she doesn’t have to listen to me bemoan our state of having to steer. Much easier to push buttons and enjoy the scenery.

Back to the story if your still with us? We head Westish until we come to Ardamurcharan Point(Say that fast three times)  Sail past the point (We don’t want to hit it) push the minus 10* button 7 times. The Auto Pilot beeps at each push of the button Good so far. The wheel begins to turn to port. Still looking and sounding good. It stops after we have gone through 70*s (* what I have to use for a degree mark as there isn’t one on this keyboard. We’re talking degrees of a circle not degrees earned or not in school). The wheel then moves back to starboard then back to port and soforth and then stops on our new course of South Eastish. After a couple of hours we repeat the above and turn on to a course more Southerly and then we turn Westish again and enter the Port of Tobermory. No mooring this year as a Blow expected so we head right to the pontoons and snare one at 1100. We are here for at least another day as Bad weather tomorrow. We go walk about and have Fish and Chips off a truck for lunch.

Wednesday July 26 2017.

Wake up at the usual time. Hammering down rain, Wind is howling. So I roll over wake Sally up She smacks me I go back to sleep.

It stays miserable all day so we go over to Christolyn where Dave and Dawn teach us how to play Canasta. I lose.

Thursday July 27 2017.

0800 up Not so bad out but not really good either. I fix the wiring on the auto pilot. I cut off the plug and put spade connectors on that matched the one on the control box. Sally checks the tides. We go and wake D&D up. 1000 We get under way in the rain. We have a window to get further South to Oban 20 miles further South. Gales are forecast for later in the day. It’s a Motorboat ride but we make it and are tied up at 1400 on a pontoon on Carrerra Island. Across the bay from the city of Oban.

Friday July 28 and Saturday 29 2017.

We stay put. The Gales forecasted actually happened! Both miserable wet windy days. D&D decided to take the tour to Iona that we took on the way up. They had even worse luck than us. At least we were able to see Iona and Staffa.  Their bus got rearended by another bus resulting in a lot of minor injuries and no tour but money back. Sunday we all took a bus tour to Edenvale on the slate Islands Pouring Rain but it got us off the boats. Also did walk about around Oban.