Glen Feshie

After a few days wild camping, and with a wet night forecast, we drove up to Kingussie and installed ourselves in a B&B. We'd plannned to take the train back to Blair Athol and cycle back up Glen Gaick but discovered that we should have booked spaces for the bikes days ago. In a rapid change of plan we cycled up Glen Feshie instead: another classic. The head of the valley is a wonderful parkland of mature scots pines.

Glen Tilt

Having driven up from Cambridge, we camped on a hillside above Blair Athol on the southern edge of the Cairngorms, with a great view of Cairn Liath. We then spent a day and a half cycling round Beinn a Glho: up Glen Tilt, over the tops to wild camp near Glen Loch,then back for lunch in the Blair Athol chippie. A super ride.

Finishing repairs

We decided to assemble the kayak frame to makes sure it all went together OK after the repairs following our Cornish epic last year..... Good thing we did, because some little plastic plugs needed a little fettling with the sander before the frame could be assembled without the muscles of a gorilla.

Thank goodness we weren't trying to do this on some midge infested scottish beach, while racing to catch the tide.

To scotland again!

After a year without scottish kayaking, we'll soon be off up north again. This year we've decided to explore Orkney and northern Scotland.

We'll decide precisely what we do depending on the weather, but this year we're taking the bikes as well as the kayak.. Orkney is very exposed to the weather and there are strong tidal streams, but it looks like there will be some great mountain biking to do, even on days when if its too windy for kayaking.


As usual we're finding that Pesda press have published a great kayaking guide to the area: This one is The Northern Isles: Orkney and shetland sea kayaking by Tom Smith and Chris Jex

More weather

At the end of the summer we headed down to Cornwall with the kayak. Unfortunately we misjudged the strength of the surf while setting off on a beautiful looking trip under the cliffs of Tintagel. We discovered that

• 2m high surf is too much for us.
  
• Lifeguards can be very useful.
• The locals call our chosen launch spot "the washing machine"
• A leaking thermorest is a safety critical issue (poor sleep leads to poor decisions)

Weather and Weddings

2010 was a great year, but not for our kayaking. In May we headed down to Malta for a family wedding. It was a brilliant wedding, even though the strength of the winds meant that we hired bikes instead of a kayak to explore the amazing Gozo coastline before the wedding.

We'd planned to hire a kayak from Malta Outdoors, who seemed OK as far as we could tell, tho the kayak would have been a sit-on which would have been quite hard work in comparison to what we're used to.

Tech Notes

Here's some notes on gear & techniques that helped make this trip a pleasure:

Turbo Barbie
A home-made wood-burning camping stove with a battery-powered fan, giving contollable, intense heat, with easy fire-starting. A 5V, 60mm fan is powered by 4x AA NiMh cells, which last for many days of intensive cooking & heating washing water. Switching in a resistor reduces fan-speed for simmer.
The picture shows a 12V fan powered from 2x AA cells via prototype electronics.

The inner fire-chamber is stainless steel to resist the heat, with holes angled to swirl the air from the fan. The outer is aluminium with pan-rests attached.


Turbo-barbie's use has been evolving for about 20 years:
Fire-starting: put small dry wood or charcoal (see below) in the chamber, near the fan, filling up with fairly dry wood. Meths, wax, etc make starting easier. Ignite with full fan. Use blowing tube if damp fuel won't catch. Once it's going, damper wood can be used. Can also use charcoal, coal, peat or dung. A folding pruning saw helps.

When finished, covering the embers with a light aluminium disc makes charcoal for fire-starting next time.

Using on a bag of fire-blanket material, containing sand or vegetation stops it scorching the ground. Or put it on a flat stone.

There's increasing concern about seriously poisonous dioxins produced when salty wood is burnt. DEFRA quotes studies showing releases "20 to 90 times higher than from normal wood" http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/chemicals/pdf/dioxinsdomestic-final0605.pdf I suggest minimising salty driftwood use and seriously avoiding breathing its smoke. I favour wood that's not been in the sea or from high up the beach, where it's likely to have been rinsed by rain, but I don't know how much this helps. At least stoves like turbo-barbie use much less wood than open fires.

Cooking
Most evening meals were pasta, rice, couscous or potatoes with a delicious "sauce" from real ingredients.
We'd bring the carbohydrate to the boil, carefully seal its pan in a plastic bag and thoroughly nest it in a sleeping bag. It's normally ready to eat when the cordon-bleu sauce is done. Rather than plates, we use stackable 2-pint mixing bowls with lids - much better at keeping food hot while you eat. Also for nesting hot food in a sleeping bag.

Basha
We've 3 sizes of these shelters, made from lightweight sil-nylon. For this trip we made one with split paddles for poles and anti-midge net-curtains, that can be furled when not needed. Sometimes we sleep under it, with lightweight bivi-bags made from pertex aqua-block, but retired to the tent to sleep in bad weather or extreme midges.

Why would one want a basha as well as a tent?
* A place to cook & hang-out, enjoying the view, protected from wind, rain & midges.
* You feel more connected with your surroundings.
* It's spacious compared to our tent. Good for cooking & fire-wood storage
* under 1kg, including pegs & guys.

The disadvantages are:
* vulnerable to a strong wind from the opposite direction when you pitched it. We pull out the poles & peg it flat at night: very quick to re-erect.
* Less shelter than a tent - but suprisingly good!

If you're persuaded, try NRS-99 Sil-nylon & MM34-09 Midge Mesh from www.profabrics.co.uk This basha used a 1.9m long fabric rectangle with 45° wings. Also see www.cleats.co.uk for cleats & dymeena string.

Stuff Bags
Invaluable for containing & organising. Pertex makes strong, breathable, soft bags. Sil-nylon good for "sealed" bags for dirty clothes. Same supplier. Instructions:
http://thru-hiker.com/projects/silnylon_stuffsacks.php

Dymeena String
exceedingly strong string: great for guys & washing lines. Same suppliers.

Wine Bag
Remove the cardboard from a wine box & put the bladder in a pertex bag. It always seems to squeeze in somewhere in a kayak!


Snow Pegs
Terra Nova's extra large alloy Snow Pegs are great for tethering kayaks, as tent pegs in sand or, importantly, for digging those holes for a poo with a view.
http://needlesports.com/acatalog/Mail_Order_Tent_Pegs__Poles___Anchors_73.html

Feathercraft K2
A sea-worthy kayak-in-a-bag. We usually swear at some time during assembly, but then it's a delight. Beautifully designed. Expensive, but what double kayak can you keep in your attic or take on a bus? http://www.feathercraft.com/kayaks/traditional/k2/index.php