Tuesday 25 June

The forecast for today was light northerlies, tomorrow looks ok with southerlies again and then the outlook is grim with a deep low bowling in from the Atlantic. Westerly gales or near gales in the West Highlands means finding shelter is a necessity.

We’d thought of spending a leisurely day catching up on a few boat jobs as well as some online admin to do with the sale of our former Surrey home so a second night in Tobermory was decided upon. Wednesday we could motor sail north to Mallaig whose harbour would be fairly sheltered in a westerly blow. Kevin called the marina there to book a berth as at almost 14 m it’s often difficult in these parts. Good job we did as they couldn’t offer anything except possibly rafting. Not ideal given the weather forecast. Ten minutes later the decision was made, Temptress will stay put, albeit that the harbour master requested that we move around to a spot on the visitors pontoon which we did mid-morning. While we were ashore we booked a hire car. If the weather was stopping us sailing we could at least explore the island inland and perhaps get a ramble or two in.

The morning was overcast again with the sun breaking through at intervals, however as soon as a layer of fleece was discarded the clouds returned and the hapless worker had to pull a layer back on. The cockpit was given a wash and polish, the Raymarine software was updated and a few minor tasks ticked off the list.

A large cruise ship had arrived before breakfast and spent the day ferrying passengers back and forth. Most of them boarded smaller boats for a trip out to Staffa, some dressed for walking boarded a coach and another group gathered outside the distillery. Few actually seemed to wander around the town.

After lunch we took a walk round to the hardware store in search of white electrical tape to fix the sail wheels in place on the guard wires, promptly finding the stuff that had been secreted in the “wrong” box on our return. A second visit to the Co-op got the fridge restocked with things for suppers and lunches which along with the 2kg piece of gammon pressure cooked on passage yesterday should last until at least Monday. And we treated ourselves to Mull ice creams for the amble back to the marina.