pentland crossing 1967

8/8/2019 Pentland Crossing 1967

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/pentland-crossing-1967 1/4

Pentland Crossing

By Joe Reid The Paddler 1967

Closing the car door thankfully behind us and breathing inthe fresh sea air of Caithness gave us a grand feeling of contentment as we gazed over Dunnet Bay to Hoy in Orkney,the first goal of this years cruise, with the weather just right, asettled spell of calm.

We could hardly restrain ourselves from setting off thereand then even at this hour of midnight, but we knew wecouldn’t, because of the tide until 5.30 am, as this particularcrossing allowed for very little error of judgement.

Andy Carnduff, of Irvine canoe Club and myself had startedplanning this trip the year previous as we paddled our wayalong the North Coast from Ullapool to Thurso via Cape Wrathand daily saw the cliffs of Orkney loom higher and nearer.From Dunnet Head the distance is seven miles to Tor Ness inHoy, The Pentland Firth must be treated with the utmost

respect by any craft and more so by ours as we wereintending to cross to the Orkney Islands in our 23” widekayaks and then spend two weeks touring among thenumerous isles, camping each night at a different place if theweather was kind to us.

But there’s work to be done!... In the form of storing all ourequipment plus two weeks food in the canoes before catching

a couple of hours rest.It never ceases to amaze onlookers (and sometimes

ourselves) how such a huge amount of gear can be packedinto such small boats and still leave room for their occupants,but it always seems to be managed, and this occasion was noexception.

Being a fine night we spread our sleeping bags on a pile of

fishing nets in an open shed and relaxed, but not for long:First the local police paid us a call as they were anxious aboutus and let us know that they had informed Dunnet Head



Lighthouse to keep a lookout for us and they wished to knowwhen we were leaving.

The next disturbance came from courting couples whoobviously knew of the comfortable nets, but not of us and they

got the fright of their lives when two dark forms moved toavoid them.

3.30 am brought the police car back, though only on aroutine visit to the harbour this time, we soon realised thatthere was to be no more rest for us, so we were glad to beup,. After completing our packing and parked the car, we hadbreakfast, made all the more enjoyable by a beautiful dawnshowing up the gentle ripples of a light offshore breeze fromalmost due south, just perfect weather conditions for us, andon one of the few days of the year when the neap tide was atit’s weakest.

With a fine coloured photo of the dawn stored away inAndy’s camera we adjusted our anoraks and paddled out of the mouth of Thurso River at 5.30 am, exactly on high tide,and headed for Tor Ness in Hoy, which of course would leave

Dunnet Head about two miles east and give us fourteen milesto paddle to our nearest landfall, the cliff bound south coastof Orkney and without any possible landing till we reachedRackwick Bay six miles to the north west.

As the tide in the Pentland Firth turns two hours later in midchannel than at either shore, we did not reckon on beingcarried off our course until we were about the halfway mark,

and on throwing occasional glances over our shoulder andalways finding Thurso dead astern, we were satisfied that ourassumption was correct.

As we drew nearer due west of Dunnet, other land came intoview on the eastern horizon, South Ronaldsay, Swona, Stromaand finally Duncansby head, all treacherous areas we had nowish to be any nearer to

To the west lay sea and just more sea which now was a flatcalm, broken only by the ripples from our bows and theoccasional guillemot or Razorbill, such small mites , but



completely at home in this vast expanse of water, whether incalm or in storm, and ourselves in our kayaks, also at homeand enjoying it, but oh how different it could be for us.

Our nearness to Hoy was heralded, first by the leisurely

passing of a Great Skua and next, by the speeding wings of along tailed Skua whose marauding eyes were obviouslyfocused on a small gull with something in it’s mouth. The outcome of the chase we did not see, but could guess at it.

We had earlier altered course a bit to the East to allow forany effects of the ebb tide, but this was not noticeable andwe were therefore able to steer straight for Tor Ness and at9.45 am were gently rising and falling on the swell beneaththe impressive cliffs of the Orkney Islands, which we followedfor six miles to Rackwick Bay with it’s beautiful sand andboulder beach, edged with a white surf which today waspossible for us to land through.

Within minutes of stepping ashore we were greeted by twoof the very few people left here, one of whom was thecoastguard who told us he had been warned to look out for us

at 9.40. Am, after having watched us the whole way across,,all this attention for two holiday makers enjoying a leisurelymornings canoeing on calm waters, to work up an appetite fordinner! Maybe so, but on the other hand this was the firsttime that the Pentland had been crossed by canoe andalthough Andy and I got ideal conditions, it was only afterlong and careful thought on where, how and when that ourplan was made, though we still had to get perfect weather on

the right day, otherwise we would not have considered thisventure at all.

Bearing the above points in mind, the crossing of thePentland Firth by canoe in this area is well within the scope of any experienced sea canoeist. To attempt it in the area of Stroma and Swona is a different matter entirely. This wouldhave to be separately assessed with even greater care as ithas not yet been attempted: the tides here being particularlyfierce and definitely worse than between Dunnet Head andHoy.



Joe Reid

Taken from The Paddler Spring 1967.

pentland crossing 1967

Documents