There are plenty of distilleries you can visit as you cruise the west coast of Scotland but Jura was special for Claire and her sister Sue. Their father, Lothian, was an architect and designed the re purposed buildings in 1962, when the distillery was re-opened after being closed in the early years of 20th century. Sue and her partner, Richard, joined “William Tell” in Crinan. In the 1970s Sue and Claire had sailed these waters with all the Barclay family on board “Judith”, the 1929 black wooden McGruer ketch we used to own.
We motored down the sound of Jura, while the rest of Britain and Ireland were enjoying the hottest day of the year so far. In Scotland, it was pleasantly warm!! We saw a number of seals and passed many huge jelly fish, about 18 inches in diameter. Anchored up in the north end of Loch na Mile, a long way from the last sighting of jelly fish, we enjoyed a lovely swim and walk along the sandy beach, in sight of the spectacular and ever present mountains, the Paps of Jura.
We spent the night on one of the visitors moorings off Craighouse and went ashore for an interesting tour of the distillery and an extensive sampling session afterwards!
The weather was still very settled, with virtually no wind. Ideal conditions to visit Eileen Mor in the MacCormick Islands. It is a very tight anchorage, not for the faint hearted, opening to the north east.
This fascinating island is steeped in history. St Cormac had a hermitage in a cave at the south end of the island where there are 2 crosses carved into the walls. Outside this cave there are the remains of an old chapel. In the middle of the island is a later more substantial chapel dating from the 12th century. Over the years this has been a dwelling house and even a tavern, in the days when the seas off the west of Scotland were like today’s motorways, as much trade was by boat. The vikings certainly passed this way. At one time it was owned by the SNP, Scottish National Party but now it is under the stewardship of The Eileen Mor MacCormick Trust. It is a haven for wild life and we saw seals, geese and gulls. As we turned in, we watched an otter swim around the boat. Over the years, I’ve visited this anchorage on 4 occasions and seen otters on three of them!
At 5am, there was a little too much east in the wind for comfort, and we swung in too close to the shore, so we motored 2 miles north up into Loch na Cille. Dropped the anchor in good quality mud and went back to sleep before a good fry up later in the morning. That afternoon we headed back to the Crinan Basin, before transiting the canal.
