Sweden: Santa Anna archipelego

 We finished our Scandanavian trip with 4 days kayaking in the Santa Anna Archipelego, about 1hr south of Stockholm. We hired everything apart from our personal sleeping kit from the excellent company Do the North.  They even did the food shopping for us before we arrived, then we set off to explore.

Having a free standing tent was important, on these rocky little islands!

 

 

 

Having been used to the big tides along the Scottish coast, it was a pleasant change to be kayaking in the Baltic, with negligeable tides, and only mildly brackish water. 

Then when we finished, Do the North collected us and delivered us to Norkopping, with time to go and look at the Bronze age Himmelstralund rock carvings of ships....

 

 before we got the sleeper home. 

 

 

Norway: From Honefoss

For our holiday in 2023, we went interrailing: from Cambridge to arctic Norway, then back south through Sweden.  Wonderful trip

With our Norwegian friend Jan we paddled down the river from Honefoss into Nordfjorden

Camped out on the Island of Frognoya

 then continued the next day to land at Steinsfjorden

Home

After an amazing trip, we came home to start the process of washing and drying everything and packing it away, with the help our our nephew Tamlin.

 

CalMac

 CalMac take kayaks for free, and we had a lot of gear to upload

Unfortunately, trying to load all gear onto the ferry in a hurry (to avoid delaying the already late-running ferry) I sprained my knee.

 As I couldn't put any weight on my knee at all, it rapidly became clear that it wasn't feasible for us to disembarg on Eigg.  

The CalMac crew were very helpful. They loaded the kayak and everything into their truck and took us to Malaig, where one of them stayed late to help Tom put the kayak on top of our car.

After trip to A&E in Inverness the next day, we started the journey home.

Very pleasant overnight stay in Appleby Manor

Samhnan Insir Beach, Rum

 From Rubha an Dunain, we paddled the 12km, past gambling dolphins to the delightful Samhnan Insir Beach on Rum

 

A chance to relax and do some washing, while being careful to avoid disturbing the deer (which are part of 50 year research programme)

The next day we paddled past an apparently abandoned fish farm to Kinloch to get the CalMac Ferry to Eigg

Rubha an Dunain.

 Rubha an Dunain is a stunning place, thats been used as far back as the Mesolithic

We camped beside the harbour and dry dock complex, that was built by the Vikings, using facilities that have clearly been used and refined by users of small boats for 1000s of years.

 

 

  Above us was a Dun, built of massive blocks defending the headland looking over to Rum

 

At high tide, in the evening light, we saw at least 100 dolphins feeding on a shoal of fish.  Gannets and gulls fed on them from above.

To Rubha an Dunain.

 We spent a few days paddling round the S west coast of Skye to Rubha an Dunain.  Lots of brilliant views.

 

 Having found ourselves battling an unexpected force 4+ headwind, we paused a few hours in the little cleft of Rubha a' Gheodha Bhuidhe under the Cuillins, waiting for the winds to decline (luckily they did) 

The coast is quite committing, because its not always easy to land, even for a pee.