I know, multi-award-winning blogs shouldn’t leave their readers on tenterhooks, so let’s start by reassuring you that I have made it back from Eigg with my good impression of the place not just intact but enhanced. In fact, I am still feeling a little guilty about not having visited it before, so I shall make up for it with a post all of its own which doesn’t have a bad word to say about the place. Mind you, the same could be said of the other Small Isles, with the exception of Rum, which I struggle to think of a good word to say about. How about ‘Mountainous’? ‘Striking?’ Er, that’s it. As if to illustrate the point, that’s Rum in the photo above, lurking menacingly behind Eigg. And that’s the problem with Rum, it dominates the Small Isles just because it is mountainous and striking, but as Neil and I discovered two years ago (A tale of two islands) there is precious little there except a decaying bonkers Victorian castle. Canna, on the other hand, has everything going for it and is probably my favourite destination of the trip so far, Muck was a delightful little surprise and Eigg? Well, I hadn’t really seen the point of Eigg. Its harbour isn’t particularly sheltered, it has a cafe that isn’t raved about like Canna’s and a tearoom that isn’t raved about like Muck’s, it has singing sands that apparently only squeak, and that very oddly shaped hill in the middle seems to be its only memorable feature, so I had sailed past it quite a few times without giving it much thought.
So when it comes to some final box-ticking, it was more out of a sense of duty than in eager anticipation that I found a day in the schedule when I could go and have a look. I seriously kept open the option of anchoring in the bay, deciding it was dull, and pressing on to Rum to give it a second chance. Rum does at least have a sheltered harbour with moorings, where Eigg has a few vaguely outlined and rather exposed anchorages and what is described as a ‘yacht wall’: a stretch of the new ferry pier where you can tie up and watch the tide drain away, if you happen to have the right kind of boat for such drying-out antics. This sounded like a lot of faff for not much reward, so I resolved on Plan A, with PLan B (the Rum plan) very much on the table. I’d mentioned the possibility of visiting Eigg to a few people in Oban. “Oh yes,” came the reply every time, “they’re very friendly there.” Perhaps it wouldn’t be quite so bad.
Now Cumbernauld enters the story, and the sorry tale of the paddleboard pump. I had stored the latter, as always, in the cockpit locker. It’s a nice one from Decathlon and it is essential not just for blowing up the paddleboard but also getting the dinghy nice and rigid once the electric inflator has done its bit. Unfortunately I had let the pump hose get a bit close to the boat heater, and when I took it out to blow up the dinghy to go to Iona it had turned into a lump of molten plastic. Luckily I have a spare pump but it’s rubbish, so I had ordered a new one to be sent to Kerrera. Being an island, even though I paid for next day delivery, I was warned that it would take 2-3 days, which meant Friday, so I had planned to leave Kerrera whatever time it arrived and see how far down the Sound of Mull I got before stopping and heading on to Eigg the next day.
This plan went horribly wrong. UPS’ tracking (one of the worst of a very bad bunch) showed that it had got as far as Cumbernauld on day one and had not got any further. ‘Because you are in a remote location we are having to take extra steps’ it said. Extra to the ones you planned to take when promising delivery in 2-3 days? I have no idea where Cumbernauld is and I don’t want to know as it is the place where I have to send tax returns so it has a horribly negative set of associations in my mind, which have now been made much worse because I woke up on Friday morning to be told that the package was still there. I did know that Cumbernauld is nowhere near Oban, and there was no chance of it being delivered before Monday when I was due in Mallaig, so in a rage I resolved then and there to clear off ASAP and sail all the way to Eigg. That way I would at least be able to go somewhere nicer the next day if I didn’t like it.
I daresay this annoyance at the SUP pump (it was only £20, and the delivery was only £6.95, but it’s the principle) contributed to the melancholy I referred to previously, but not half as much as getting halfway down the Sound of Mull only to have my phone ping and announce that the pump had been delivered – yesterday! I hadn’t thought to look in the marina post box as the app had clearly said it was in Cumbernauld awaiting further steps. However, astonishingly, this is where the sorry bit ends and the silver lining appears, because by then I was on my way to Eigg, past Ardnamurchan Point sob sob etc, you know this bit, and I felt I ought to take a stand and make the day more memorable so invesitgated the possibility of the Yacht Wall. The tides were almost perfect: it would be High Water just before I arrived at 1630,, then Low Water (six hours later, surely even non-sailors know that) would be at 2230 so I could check that Blue Moon had settled on the bottom safely before going to bed.
Tying up on a purpose-built wall was a novelty, and I must say they must have had some pretty solid yachts in mind when they built it. It is literally a 50-metre stretch where instead of large rocks the pier is made of concrete, with a few ladders, some rather rusty bollards and a large collection of what turned out to be fender-eating shellfish. Nothing daunted I came alongside, rigged every fender I could and some nice long mooring lines, pulled up the keel and the rudder and settled down to admire my surroundings.
It was of course silent, being on an island in the middle of nowhere, but it was also very beautiful. There were white sandy beaches all around and underneath (the water was as clear as anywhere), the harbour was surrounded by gentle hills and – very unusually – proper woods rather than forestry plantations, and there was a range of smart cottages dotted about. But most prominent of all, towering over it all like some giant guardian, was the weird hill that looked huge sideways on, but from this angle suddenly became narrow and even weirder.
Any thoughts of clearing off to Rum were banished as I put the kettle on and spent an hour just gawping at the view.
Then I heard the sound of a car and remembered that at the head of the pier the pilot book had mentioned a cafe/shop so I thought I would wander up and have a look around. If it was anything like the other Small Isles it would probably have handmade nick-nacks, perhaps some local produce and an honesty box. I turned the corner from the pier and was met with the sight of several large, brand new buildings with a collection of cars outside, Cars! On a Small Isle!
I headed for the door and came across a group of people sitting in the sunshine outside. “Hello”, one of them called out to me., “you look as if you have some questions to ask. Come and take a seat.” He gestured towards a wooden chair oddly sitting on its own facing the group. I sat down, thinking I had better try and be friendly, or at least not seem rude. “This feels a bit like an interview”, I quipped, given that they were all facing me. “All right then, said someone else, laughing, so it is. Now, who are you, and why are you here?” I explained that I had tied up on the yacht wall, solo, because Eigg was the only Small Isle I hadn’t yet visited. “We’ll you’ve saved the best till last” they variously roared, and “if you’ve not got any friends to sail with you’d better sit and talk to us” and “you’ll take a dram now” as someone indicated not one but two bottles of Old Pulteney they had clearly been enjoying in the sunshine for some while. I couldn’t face whisky that early, and tried to suggest that I shouldn’t be drinking today but that plan was a non-starter. “If you’ll no take a whisky then have one of these” and someone opened a can of Guinness and handed it to me. I couldn’t very well hand it back, could I?
So I came to spend the next few hours sitting outside the really very smart community building, in the sunshine, with Colm and Marie, who was the only one born on the island, their friend Sam who lives in Fort William but came to fix the electricity once, loved it so much he stayed two years and now comes back to visit, his friend Chris who had been in the Navy but retired here, a grizzled man who used to be the Coastguard and spoke with an accent so impenetrable that the others had to translate for him, and in due course their son Stephen who drives a fish farm boat in Shetland and his friend Kieran who was proudly introduced as the island’s Head Teacher, his partner Jean (I think) and a few others whose names I never caught. I was quizzed about every aspect of the trip, especially what I thought of the other Small Isles, life in London, where to get the best fish and chips in Oban and whether the bakery in Mallaig would ever open when someone not from Mallaig was visiting. In return I learned that Eigg is by far the most populous of the Small Isles (150 people), one of the first and most successful community buyouts, has a growing population particularly of young people moving here to start businesses, is entirely energy self-sufficient, has a school with 11 pupils (Kieran proudly explained), has fast broadband everywhere, and rocks that have a habit of jumping in front of cars on the way home from the pub. Mainly, as far as I can recall, it was laughter though, and a bit more Guinness as people headed in to the bar and bought me more without asking.
Eventually I felt I had to repay the hospitality and went in to buy a round, in spite of protestations from the locals that I was a visitor and shouldn’t. “Ah, here you are at last” said the (English, I noticed) manager and bar keeper, “you’ve finally made it in. Most people don’t get past the door”.
By now it was 2100 and I suddenly remembered the boat. I made my excuses, mumbling about the tide, and tried to hurry back without falling over any jumping rocks. I was just in time, the tide had dropped and the mooring lines were playing various notes on a musical scale. I managed to get everything sorted without providing a case study of the dangers of playing with boats after an evening in a pub, and the boat settled onto the sand in the dusk.
Next morning I set out to explore. The island was buzzing: the community centre has a couple of shops and some businesses hiring bikes, paddleboards and the like (they didn’t have any spare pumps). The cafe was doing a roaring trade in late breakfasts and I was welcomed in for coffee and given advice on where to walk. I headed off to climb the weird mini-mountain which I learned is called The Sgurr of Eigg and it was a great walk through very un-Scottish woodlands, soft pastures full of sheep and cows,…
…up some rugged but easy climbs…
…to a stunning view of Skye, the mainland and the other Small Isles…
…but best of all, one of those ‘boat from mountain’ views, and this one I could enjoy more because I could see that the boat was still sitting on the sand, so unlikely to have dragged her anchor and drifted away.
As I made it back down various people who I may or may not have met the night before waved cheerfully. The new shower block had blistering hot water heated from its sustainable biomass boilers (so it said). Inside the cafe I was again invited to join some other parts of the family but the wind had picked up and I had made a firm resolution to take more care of the boat, so a quick pint with a stunning view…
…and it was back to the boat for an early night so I could leave on the tide in the morning.
I felt bad to be ducking out of the fun but I spent the evening watching mooring ropes and fenders until the boat settled back onto the sand, which was a lot easier slightly sober. And I do have an invitation to go alongside a fish farm boat in Shetland for a wee dram and some supper, and that’s not something many English yachtsmen can say.
Blue Moon's trip around the UK 
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