Loch Etive entrance?

Seagreen

Seagreen

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Watching Secret Britain on spaceTV got me musing. I (well, Cleone) has a draft of 4'8" and a total mast height of 30'. What would be my chances of getting into the loch? (assuming I ever get the chance to sail her up there. Its on my bucket list, anyway.)

My Reeds is on the boat.
 
Pretty good actually. The CCC sailing directions give full instructions and although I do not have them to hand, I have a reference to an air clearance of 15 metres and I recall that at HW there is about 3 metres in the right place going under the bridge. The trick is to take it near HW, just before on the way in and just after on the way out. You do need the directions however to know which strut of the bridge to aim at to avoid the ledge.

The stream rate is terrific and watching from the shore is enough to put most people off I think. Always wanted to try it myself however.

Go to Google map for Connel and you can see streetview photos of he tricky bit. In one of the views, a motor boat is approaching looking as if it is about to pass under the bridge
 
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Thats good to know. I have no terror of the Swellies, Corryvreckan or anywhere else at slack water, just wanted to know if I could actually fit under the bridge and over the ledge. BTW, are there at really good pilot books for the small harbours and anchorages for the Western Isles and west coast of Scotland? I'm going about on Google Earth looking for likely places to visit.
 
No problem. Just follow the Clyde Cruising Club SDs;

20090701003_edited-1ConnelBridge.jpg


Also, you can safely pass under the electricity cable at Bonawe Narrows - more here - Cruising on Loch Etive.

20090701010_edited-1BonaweNarrows_e.jpg
 
Great photos from Sgeir show the way. I was not sure of the available depth as the pilot books are at the boat.

While Haswell-Smith's book is a great book for background on the Scottish Islands, for pilotage you need either Martin Lawrence "Crinin to Canna" or the Clyde Cruising Club Sailing Directions (Kintyre to Ardnamurchan). The CCC Directions are ppublished in parts and I think that part is "Part 2". I have both aboard, along with another of Haswell- Smith's, "Island Journey (?) -- In the footsteps (?) of Martin Martin." (I am unsure of the exact title.) The CCC books are available (as are the rest) from most chandlers up here, and probably from Nancy Black in Oban. The CCC books are also available via the CCC web site http://www.clyde.org/index.php/content/blogsection/9/49/ and you could try Amazon for the rest.
 
Bin there, done that. No t-shirt or photos tho'.

When I sold my first yacht (a Westerly25 bilge keeler) the new owner had set up a mooring on Loch Etive & I delivered to his mooring. But my air draft would only have just been 30' & draft was about 2'6". At HW slack we actually sailed through (with the engine running - just in case).

On the previous evening, during a demo sail with the new owner, we approached the bridge from Dunstaffnage on the flood to see the power of the current - and it was nearly the last thing we did!

Even from some distance you could see the slope in the water surface & I needed to start the engine sharpish & use full power to pull away. Another lesson learnt that will never be repeated. But follow the CCC directions & you shouldn't have any trouble.
 
Seagreen said:
Thats good to know. I have no terror of the Swellies, Corryvreckan or anywhere else at slack water, just wanted to know if I could actually fit under the bridge and over the ledge. BTW, are there at really good pilot books for the small harbours and anchorages for the Western Isles and west coast of Scotland? I'm going about on Google Earth looking for likely places to visit.
Click to expand...

Have a look at the Anchorages link in my .sig for Inner Hebrides ideas.

CCC sailing directions and Imray (Martin Lawrence's pilots) are the standard texts. You can find more candidates in the pre-1980 hardback versions of the CCC sailing directions.

Alisdair
 
Sorry about the brevity of the earlier post but was pushed for time. Just a couple of points to follow up;

  • Charts: it used to be difficult to locate a current chart for the north end of the loch, so we used the cancelled UKHO chart 2378 from Marine Chart Services. £3.25 well spent. However I believe that new chart 2388, Loch Etive and Approaches, was published in 2006. The north end of the Loch also appears on the UKHO/RYA CD-ROM "Area3, West of Scotland", as well as on the fabulous MemoryMap disk.
  • High Tension cable at Bonawe: the cable has a charted clearance of 13 metres on Chart 2388 (the SDs say 12m at high water). The lower of the three cables clearly drops considerably, so it is possible for many yachts go through safely by sticking to about 20m off the north bank, all in safe water. The red dots on the photograph above were photoshopped on to the original full size image.

Every thing else is all pretty straight forward. Well worth a visit imho.

EDIT: Just checked the current chart - air clearance at Connel is 14m, so needs to be slack at the LW end to go under the bridge for yachts with taller masts. Just one thing, the best time is not actually exactly at HW/LW Oban, as the Loch never quite empties, and never quite fills, to the levels you'd expect in Ardmucknish Bay on the seaward side. The SDs advise going through in slack water, and explain that because of the rock barrier that create the "Falls of Lora", slack water is HW Oban +0200 and LW Oban +0230. Then there's also the effect of very heavy rain... Best to check the CCC SDs or Lawrence.
 
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Sgeir
Did you ever read the report by the guy who sailed a trimaran out of there with a bit of tide running?
I think he reckoned to be doing about 20Kts SOG
Its in a Royal Cruising Club book I think.
 
claymore said:
Sgeir
Did you ever read the report by the guy who sailed a trimaran out of there with a bit of tide running?
I think he reckoned to be doing about 20Kts SOG
Its in a Royal Cruising Club book I think.
Click to expand...

My wife dived the Falls on the ebb, said it was scary but exhilirating .. then she taught the dive leader how to read tide tables correctly.

Alisdair
 
afte using ccc guides for 30 years, was pleasantly surprised at how much extra info there is in the admiralty pilot to west coast scotland. dry as dust, but good. expensive, but try ebay...

loch etive is great, and worth pushing all the way up to the end
 
It looks exciting enough to take the Harrier through there, it's a 25' mast and 4' draught but that can be altered.

Where do I launch? Dunstaffnage looks close enough. I have had a good report about the slip at Ardfern though, it may be a better bet.
 
A truly impressive section of water when the tide is running. I always try and stop and watch it for a moment or two when passing by car.

If you ever have time, stop and visit the Bonawe Ironworks, (Historic Scotland). They used to sail brigs loaded with iron ore up from Cumbria through the narrows to Bonawe, then take the smelted pig iron back down for finishing! :eek:
 
I looked my reference up last night
Three Cheers
Mike McMullen
20 - 25 knots SOG

Sadly the story doesn't end there as he took part in the OSTAR as the quotation below indicates.
Three Cheers :
There were many other sea survival stories to be told after this race but the most tragic is that of popular British yachtsman Mike McMullen Only 48 hours before the start of the race Mike’s wife Lizzie was electrocuted and killed whilst helping her husband polish the bottom of Three Cheers ... They had worked as a team to prepare Three Cheers for the event and Mike felt it would be her wish that he start with the fleet. Apart from being spotted off Galley Head on the 6 June, Mike was never seen again. Several pieces of Three Cheers have been washed ashore or dredged up over the years but no one knows for sure what happened. Competitors, the RWYC and the Observer contributed to a handsome silver-plated model of Three Cheers, the Lizzie McMullen Memorial Trophy, which has since been presented to the first multihull to finish
LOA = 46 ft
Beam = 30 ft:
 
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