Today was the second last day of the expedition and the last night of camping.
I had stayed at Paul and Alison’s for the second night, thanks to their generosity. I had some muesli for breakfast, packed my stuff, said my goodbyes then walked to my kayak with my newly dried clothing. Everything was covered in sand and there was a message on the boat: “Hello from Stornoway Canoe Club! Keep on moving!!!” So that’s what I did. It took ages to pack the boat and get ready because I was out of the swing of things, but I eventually got on the water at 10.45am.
I was exploring west then east Loch Roag. It was great - flat water with no wind! I enjoyed the relaxation but after 15min of an open crossing got bored and had to put music on my mobile phone. Then I got to an island and found this great natural arch right through quite a wide point of the island, must have been 100m long and a good few meters underground.
After paddling under the bridge from mainland Lewis to Great Berneray, I paddled with the tide to Callanish, had a wee look at the stones and had some potatoes and chocolate cake for lunch. The stones are interesting to look and find out about, probably erected around 3,000BC. After that it was north to the hostel. Into a F3/4 again for a bit in mid-afternoon, but thankfully it died down almost completely after a few hours and I could enjoy exploring the coastline again. The coast is an abundance and maze of rocky outcrops and inlets that could provide hours of endless fun for exploring in a sea kayak, especially if there was a bit more swell. As it was there was only a foot or two of swell which increased as I got further out of Loch Roag. I had only glimpsed the second map (which the hostel was on) today, so I paddled off the first map then along the coast hoping to find the hostel. I knew it was a rocky beach and saw a few with big boulders for shores which worried me, but I eventually found it to be a nice shingle beach.
So I got to land, set up camp, cooked dinner in the hostel due to lack of any firewood or heather, phoned people, found sorrel and watched an awesome sunset. Another good day but I’ve got diarrhoea from the food poisoning and am a bit dehydrated due to that, so it’s not all good!
Food today: breakfast - muesli; lunch - potatoes + chocolate cake; dinner - fried potatoes/omelette/black pudding.
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