Scottish anchorages

Canna is not just a magnificently safe and attractive anchorage (but watch the kelp), and easy to get in and out of, it is special. It has been special for me, right from the first time I sailed into Canna Harbour on a chartered yacht in 1975. What a wonderful serene and scenic anchorage on a quiet evening in summer sunlight. Outside it may be blowing hard, but inside it is pastoral, you are surrounded by the farmland so lovingly tended by the MacInnon family. It also was special when I sailed my first young family there in our newly acquired Contessa 32 in 1988. And it was very special for family holidays in the 1980s and 90s when Ben, Margaret and Oli were growing up. Year after year we rented Tighard, first from John Lorne Campbell who had owned the island from 1938 until he gave it to the National Trust for Scotland in 1981, sometimes just the family, sometimes with friends. It is the Edwardian house peeping through the trees above the big house. There are not many places on the west coast where you can rent a place to park the family with easy access to a safe anchorage for day or longer trips by boat, and Canna must be the best. But alas, Tighard is now a bed and breakfast establishment – which may have its uses for a cold, wet and disgruntled crew member who wants a comfortable night ashore (the couple running it are apparently leaving in 2011 so the future is uncertain). We made up Canna Tig around Tieghard; the hunter stands at the front door with their eyes shut to the count of 20 while everyone else disperses to hiding places around the outside of the house, but within range. The idea is that one has to get to the front door without being caught by the hunter. Great fun on a summer evening.

Notwithstanding the tiny population of around 20 people, there is a surprising amount to see and do on Canna and the immediately adjacent island of Sanday connected by a bridge, but maybe this is a bias because I know the place so well.

First up from the anchorage is the small church with the round tower – not as old as it looks, completed in 1914 and used for occasional Church of Scotland services. It is rather pretty inside, but I am not sure about the ornate gate to the churchyard. Currently funds are being raised to restore it - so please help.

The larger late 19th Century Roman Catholic Church of St Edward the Confessor on Sanday – a seamark if ever there was one - has been sadly neglected for years but the National Trust has been trying to restore it and make it into a Gaelic Study Centre. Notwithstanding a grand opening by Princess Anne in 2001, the roof leaks, it has never been used, it has been vandalised, and there is dispute between the National Trust, the Hebridean Trust and the contractor over the responsibility for this terrible waste of nearly £1million.

The only active church is the small Roman Catholic Chapel on the track to the farm; it has been lovingly restored and is quietly attractive.

Behind the chapel a track runs up to an old burial ground and the remains of an 8th or 9th century Celtic cross, and the so-called punishment stone - in it is a small hole into which the thumb of a wrongdoer was apparently wedged.