Caladh Harbour

While exploring the island a couple of years ago I encountered a couple of middle aged blokes camping on the southern side . They were a bit cagey and asked if it was "ok " to camp on the island and if I was the owner. Looking at the strewn litter and beer cans I replied something about the right to roam, responsible access , not leaving a mess etc . They were very pleasant and offered me a can of beer. We sat and admired the Kyles in the late sunlight. They had gone to great effort to find that spot.
Swung by next day. They had left their tent , all their litter and beer cans / portable barbeques and some delightful tangles of pink bog roll complete with buzzing bluebottles.
Always wondered why boats dont run a line ashore and lie with stern close to the island. There are rings,rocks and trees a plenty .The banks are near vertical rock walls. That would leave the pool and the northern shallow section free for conventional "swingers" and transit passage.
 
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MM5AHO said:
Bit of drift, but..
while in the area, and in the company of historians here, what is the meaning or story behind the "Maids of Bute"?
These stones on the hill south of Buttock point painted white and yellow, that watch as boats glide on past to and from the Burnt Isles?
Click to expand...

IX. THE MAIDS OF BUTE

Even the captain of a steam lighter may feel the cheerful, exhilarating
influence of spring, and Para Handy, sitting on an upturned pail, with
his feet on a coil of rope, beiked himself in the sun and sang like a
Untie--a rather croupy Untie. The song he sang was:

"Blow ye winds aye-oh!
For it's roving I will go,
I'll stay no more on England's shore,
So let the music play.
I'm off by the morning train,
Across the raging main,
I have booked a trup wi' a Government shup,
Ten thousand miles away."

"Who's that greetin'?" asked the engineer maliciously, sticking his head
out of the engine-room.

The Captain looked at him with contempt. "Nobody's greetin'," he said.
"It's a thing you don't know anything at aal about; it's music. Away and
read your novelles. What way's Lady Fitzgerald gettin' on wi' her new
man?"

The engineer hastily withdrew.

"That's the way to settle him," said the Captain to Dougie and Sunny Jim.
"Short and sweet! I could sing him blin'. Do ye know the way it iss that
steamboat enchineers is aalways doon in the mooth like that? It's the
want o' nature. They never let themselves go. Poor duvvils, workin' away
among their bits o' enchines, they never get the wind and the sun aboot
them right the same ass us seamen. If I wass always doon in a hole like
that place o' Macphail's dabbin' my face wi' an oily rag aal day, I would
maybe be ass ugly ass himsel'. Man, I'm feelin'fine! There's nothing like
the spring o' the year, when you can get it like this. It's chust
sublime! I'm feelin' ass strong ass a lion. I could pull the mast oot o'
the boat and bate Brussels carpets wi' it."

"We'll pay for this yet," said Sunny Jim. "Ye'll see it'll rain or snow
before night. What do ye say, Dougie?"

"Whatever ye think yoursel'," said Dougie.

"At this time o' the year," said the Captain, "I wish I wass back in
MacBrayne's boats. The Fital Spark iss a splendid shup, the best in the
tred, but there's no diversion. I wass the first man that ever pented the
Maids o' Bute."

"Ye don't tell me!" exclaimed Dougie incredulously.

"I wass that," said Para Handy, as modestly as possible. "I'm not sayin'
it for a bounce; the job might have come anybody's way, but I wass the
man that got it. I wass a hand on the Inveraray Castle at the time. The
Captain says to me wan day we were passin' the Maids--only they werena
the Maids then; they hadna their clothes on--'Peter, what do you think o'
them two stones on the hull-side?"

"'They'll be there a long while before they're small enough to pap at
birds wi,' says I.

"'But do they no' put ye desperate in mind o' a couple o' weemen?' said
he.

"'Not them!' say I. 'I have been passin' here for fifteen years, and I
never heard them taalkin' yet. If they were like weemen what would they
be sittin' waitin' there for so long, and no' a man on the whole o' this
side o' Bute?'

"'Ay, but it's the look o' them,' said the Captain. 'If ye stand here and
shut wan eye, they'll put ye aawfu' in mind o' the two MacFadyen gyurls
up in Penny-more. I think we'll chust christen them the Maids o' Bute.'

"Well, we aalways caaled them the Maids o' Bute efter that, and pointed
them oot to aal the passengers on the steamers. Some o' them said they
were desperate like weemen, and others said they were chust like two big
stones. The Captain o' the Inveraray Castle got quite wild at some
passengers that said they werena a bit like weemen. 'That's the worst o'
them English towerists,' he would say. 'They have no imachination. I
could make myself believe them two stones wass a regiment o' sodgers if I
put my mind to't. I'm sure the towerists might streetch a point the same
ass other folk, and keep up the amusement.'

"Wan day the skipper came to me and says, 'Are ye on for a nice holiday,
Peter?' It wass chust this time o' the year and weather like this, and I
wass feelin' fine.

"'No objections,' says I.

"'Well,' he says, 'I wish you would go off at Tighnabruaich and take some
pent wi' ye in a small boat over to the Maids, and give them a touch o'
rud and white that'll make them more like weemen than ever.'

"'I don't like,' said I.

"'What way do ye no' like?' said the skipper. 'It's no' even what you
would caal work; it's chust amusement!'

"'But will it no' look droll for a sailor to be pentin' clothes on a
couple o' stones, aal his lone by himsel' in the north end o' Bute, and
no' a sowl to see him? Chust give it a think yersel', skipper; would it
no' look awfu' daft?'

"'I don't care if it looks daft enough for the Lochgilphead Asylum, ye'll
have to do it,' said the skipper. Til put ye off at Tighnabruaich this
efternoon; ye can go over and do the chob, and take a night's ludgin's in
the toon, and we'll pick you up to-morrow when we're comin' doon. See you
and make the Maids as smert as ye can, and, by Chove, they'll give the
towerists a start!'

"Weel, I wass put off at Tighnabruaich, and the rud and white pent wi'
me. I got ludgin's, took my tea and a herrin' to't, and rowed mysel' over
in a boat to Bute. Some of the boys aboot the quay wass askin' what I
wass efter, but it wassna likely I would tell them I wass goin' to pent
clothes on the Maids o'Bute; they would be sure to caal me the
manta-maker efter it. So I chust said I wass going over to mark oot the
place for a new quay MacBrayne wass buildin'. There's nothing like
discretioncy.

"It wass a day that wass chust sublime! The watter wass that calm you
could see your face in it, the birds were singing like hey-my-nanny, and
the Kyles wass lovely. Two meenutes efter I started pentin' the Maids I
wass singin' to mysel' like anything. Now I must let you ken I never had
no education at drawin', and it's wonderful how fine I pented them. When
you got close to them they were no more like rale maids than I am; ye
wouldna take them for maids even in the dark, but before I wass done with
them, ye would ask them up to dance. The only thing that vexed me wass
that I had only the rud and white; if I had magenta and blue and yellow,
and the like o' that, I could have made them far more stylish. I gave
them white faces and rud frocks and bonnets, and man, man, it wass a
splendid day!

"I took the notion in my heid that maybe the skipper o' the Inveraray
wass right, and that they were maids at wan time, that looked back the
same as Lot's wife in the Scruptures and got turned into stone. When I
wassna singin', I would be speakin' away to them, and I'll assure ye it
wass the first time maids never gave me any back chat. Wan o' them I
called Mery efter--efter a gyurl I knew, and the other I called
'Lizabeth, for she chust looked like it. And it wass a majestic day.
'There ye are, gyurls,' I says to them,' and you never had clothes that
fitted better. Stop you, and if I'm spared till next year, you'll have
the magenta too.' The north end o' Bute iss a bleak, wild, lonely place,
but when I wass done pentin' the Maids it looked like a lerge population.
They looked that nate and cheery among the heather! Mery had a waist ye
could get your arm roond, but 'Lizabeth wass a broad, broad gyurl. And I
wassna a bad-lookin' chap mysel'."

Here Para Handy stopped and sighed.

"Go on wi' your baur," said Dougie.

"Old times! old times!" said the Captain. "By Chove! I wass in trum that
day! I never saw finer weather, nor nicer gyurls. Och! but it wass chust
imachination; when we pass the Maids o' Bute now, I know they're only
stones, with rud and white pent on them. They're good enough for
towerists."
 
Homer Simpson's Lovechild said:
Always wondered why boats dont run a line ashore and lie with stern close to the island. There are rings,rocks and trees a plenty .The banks are near vertical rock walls. That would leave the pool and the northern shallow section free for conventional "swingers" and transit passage.
Click to expand...

Surely if one yacht is moored for and aft that will lead to problems when another neighbouring yacht swings on the tide? Immediate pyjama party ensues?
 
If you arrive at Caladh and find no room I can recommend the anchorage behind 'One Tree Island' just a little way up Loch Riddon on the east shore. Used to be one of my favourites when I sailed the Clyde.
 
Yes, that's the one. I think it actually has a couple of trees on it, also a rock about 50 M off its north end so needs a reasonable offing. Southern entrance is shallow but usable with a reasonable rise of tide.
 
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