Scottish anchorages

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"For my part, I buy and read every record of actual cruising that I hear of or see advertised. The interest of such publications (which are astonishingly few in number) very largely depends on their simplicity and good temper.....constant grumbling, generally at the weather or the natives is another characteristic that spoils them". The Log of the Blue Dragon, CC Lynam. 1907.

Useful books

Books 2nd page
Book shelf

'Pevsner' is my generic term for all those wonderfully detailed books about the buildings of England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales which were originally written by Nikolaus Pevsner, the architectural historian, between 1951 and 1974. The two volumes you need for these anchorages are Argyll and Bute by Frank Arneil Walker, 1992, Penguin Books and Highlands and Islands by John Gifford, Yale University press, 2003.

The Scottish Islands Hamish Haswell-Smith, Canongate, 2nd Edition revised 2008 is the bible, albeit not by definition of the mainland of Scotland. The drawings, by the architect author, are charming and the information encyclopaedic. It is has to be on the boat really.

Scotland the Best Peter Irvine, HarperCollins, London, 2011, now in its 11th edition, is quite simply the best guide to Scotland - beaches, walks, pubs, hotels, everything. It is specific rather than sensitive as we say in the medical trade, in other words there are some good places missing but those that are mentioned are almost invariably excellent. I don't think there is anywhere in this book within reach of an anchorage that I have not mentioned. However, beware, some of the numbers on the maps do not correspond with the correct entries in the text, and some are in the wrong position - a bit of sloppy editing.

There are many very useful and even wonderful books out there, worth having on the boat if you have the room; they have certainly been a great resource for writing this website (click here for Sailing Directions).

Logs

The Log of the Blue Dragon 1892-1904 C C Lynam. AH Bullen, London, 1907. Amazing and amusing account of cruises in the Hebrides, often in winter and sometimes single handed, with many groundings, cock ups and near misses. The 25ft centre plate engineless yawl was built in land-locked Oxford, sailed down the Thames, round Lands End and up to Scotland, and the author "never had a paid hand on board, and never but once signalled for a pilot"! He was an unconventional and no doubt inspirational headmaster and founder of the Dragon School in Oxford, which is why his cruises were all in the school holidays (these days I like to think he would have taught in a comprehensive school). He didn't like Cowper's Sailing Tours (see below) at all "His knowledge of the west coast and its people is gathered from two hurried cruises and merits rather the name of ignorance....contains nothing useful that is not taken from the official Sailing Directions."! He was also much troubled by migraine.

Leaves from Rowan's logs; cruises on the west coast of Scotland R.B.Carslaw, Robert Ross and Co Ltd, London, 1944 is the account by a Glasgow surgeon of how in the 1930s he introduced his wife and 5 children to sailing on the Clyde and up sometimes to as far as Torridon. He also had a dog aboard. While he doesn't tell us all that much about the places he visited or the family dynamics it is certainly interesting to read about cruising in what were then empty seas; he anchored in Ardfern, Craobh Haven and Dunstaffnage long before there were any marinas. Puilladobhrain was clearly a great favourite but he didn't seem to walk over the hill to the pub. And so was the Brandy Stone, a large lump of rock on the shore just south of Oban Sailing Club, an area now occupied by moorings. He seems to have had far worse weather than we have today, or maybe he was just exaggerating as the book was written from his logs 10 or more years after the cruises.

General guide books

Cruising Scotland, the Clyde to Cape Wrath: a companion to the Clyde Cruising Club Sailing Directions Mike Balmforth and Edward Mason. Clyde Cruising Club Publications, 2010. This lavishly illustrated book celebrates the centenary of the Clyde Cruising Club with a description of many of the places on this website, and more - the whole of the west coast in fact. For the coffee table as well as the boat library.

 

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