The Cuillin Mountains on Skye in the evening from Portree Harbour.




Portree at dusk.



Wednesday:
Jean says: It was Bob's birthday today and we spent most of it getting from Mallaig to Portree. It was not the most exciting birthday he's ever had, but it was different, and I did make a nice salad for lunch on the hoof. We went out to eat tonight, but all the good restaurants were fully booked. It's Wednesday in a small Scottish Highland town - what's going on? Luckily, the cleverly camouflaged so that nobody knew it was a restaurant Cafe Arriba, did eventually manage to squeeze us in for Mexican style salmon and a glass off Vino Verdhe??!!??

Thursday:
It was beautiful when we left Portree this morning. The moon was still in the sky, and the sea was calm and glasslike. The early start at 5.00 was to catch the best tide to take us North, but strong winds were forecast for the early evening and we wanted to be safe inside Lochinver harbour by then.

The Cuillin mountains at dawn just before leaving for Lochinver.




Looking back towards fluffy clouds over Skye on the way to Lochinver




Reaching Lochinver feels like quite an achievement. We are thirty miles away from Cape Wrath and could see it in the distance as we approached Lochinver. We're almost certainly going round the top now.
There's one more stop for us at Kinlochbervie and then the next passage will take us round Cape Wrath and across to Stromness in the Orkneys.
We've bumped into two boats we came across a week or so ago.
Dawn Treader is another Hallberg Rassey, and Guillemot is a barge type boat similar to Timothy Spall's boat The Princess Mathilda. There are three guys on the Hallberg, and a retired Dutch man with his English wife on the barge. They're both planning on going round the top. Maybe we should form a flotilla and then we can pretend that it's all jolly good fun.
We can't pretend that we're not keyed up about doing this, but we've done all our research and had some great advice from many different sources. We are keyed up, but in a good way, and that's how it often goes when heading into unknown territory. We'll log our passage with Stornoway coastguard and let them know when we arrive, so that we know they're aware of us, and where we should be.
The plan is to leave early on Sunday morning, round the Cape at just before 10.00, and then from there, spend 12 hours getting to the Sound of Hoy to enter the Sound at slack water. We can't arrive earlier because it's a major tidal gate and the tide would be against us, and we have to get the timing right for rounding the Cape for the same reasons, so we need to take our time.
Lochinver is a very active fishing port with a small pontoon area for visiting yachts. Despite being so far North, there's a lot going on here. There is even a five star hotel/restaurant here with one Michelin star and a seven course gourmet menu. It must be a destination place because it doesn't seem particularly sophisticated in Lochinver, but perhaps international trawler men have high dining standards. There is a very smart looking seamen's mission as well, which serves good wholesome food and you can take your own wine.
We're having a much needed day off today after three days of being constantly on the go. I wonder if the five star place does lunch? It's a 45 minute walk away which could be just the right amount of exercise to work up an appetite.