Mallaig - 57° 00' 18" N 05° 49' 36" W

Loch Morar, the fifth largest loch in Scotland and the deepest freshwater
 lake in Britain, reaching depths of 310m

Under glorious blue skies, we had another motor to the town of Mallaig.  For those Harry Potter fans, you may recognise this as where the Jacobite Steam Train used in the film as The Hogwarts Express, terminates.  Lucky Marie caught the train to Glasgow and while it wasn't the steam train, the regular West Coast Rail service uses the same line so she got to travel over the famous Glenfinnan Viaduct all for the price of a standard ticket!  

Marie and Sean enjoying the weather on the Crinan Canal. 

Thanks Marie for being such an awesome crew mate and for all the yummy food you cooked.  We will miss you!

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Mallaig was not the tranquil, quiet experience that the Crinan Canal was.  Being amongst so many other yachts called into play our social skills.  Having such an obviously different yacht attracts the looky-loos that pace the pontoons and who should we see aboard their big, beautiful Hallberg-Rassey 44 but Sara and Phillip who we met at the OCC party.

My goodness ... look at all the other boats!

A very social setting - Marie, Ken, Phillip, Kate (in mid-explanation) and Sean

We all ended up in the cockpit of S/V Ginny in the glorious, uncharacteristically sunny and warm spring weather of northern Scotland, enlightening each other and sharing wisdom.  It turns out Sara and Phillip have cruised through much of the same areas in southeast Asia that we have - Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia.

We somehow found more stories to tell after not seeing Sara and Phillip for only a week.  We also met our pontoon neighbours, Marie and Ken from S/V Star Sapphire.  

We had a riotous evening aboard S/V Ginny, during which Phillip offered to drive us south to Morar Sands to scope out a place to dry out.  The next day, we piled into Phillip's car and had an impromptu tour of Loch Morar before pacing the sandy area where we could bring Chinook to dry out.

Some passers-by and then Phillip and Kate on the right, selecting a potential landing spot for Chinook.

Although Chinook can be set down anywhere the tide has a big enough range, we prefer to have her on a mostly-level spot and a place that is mostly sand.  Drying her on mud makes for a messy time if we have maintenance to perform on the hull or undersides and if there is a protruding boulder that the 14 tonnes ends up balancing on ... well, that could leave a dent.  It is ideal if you can survey the area you plan to beach your boat during a prior low tide. 

Potential landing perimeters marked.

We walk the sandy, boulder-free beaches with our phones out and used our navigation app to mark the precise boundaries of a gently-sloped landing area.  We then did the same thing on the other side of the bay so we would have another option, based on the wind direction during the drying out.

Tomorrow will be an exciting day.

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