Trip Log: Loch Shiel
 
Day One:
It’s Easter week and we are again heading North up the now familiar route: Scotch Corner;  Penrith; Annandale; Loch Lomond; Rannoch Moor. After seven and a half hours on the road, we pull in to Fort William to buy a new Thermarest from Ellis Brigham. The last one succumbed on the loch side to a thorn near a seam and is now rather unpredictable. This year we have come up a month early to escape the midges which, on our more usual early May trip, are already becoming unbearable.
Its getting too late in the day now to start out on the water, so we drive back to Fort William and have a meal in the restaurant next to the campsite. They are desperate for business this early in the season and we get £5 off.
 
 
Day Two:
Its been five years since we were last here, but we manage to remember the whereabouts of the secret track that leads down to the river, just before Glenfinnan, and this makes a perfect launch site. It is only a few hundred yards paddling down the river to where the horizon begins to spread out and, suddenly, we are on the loch proper.  We stick to the left bank with a gentle tailwind. As Sue is lighter than me we are well trimmed for the breeze and steering is easy. After the relative claustrophobia of the city, the sense of space here is almost overwhelming.
Round about 4pm it’s getting time think about stopping to give us plenty of time to set up camp. We’ve been heading for a place we’ve camped before, in a perfect hidden sandy cove. We round a last point and there it is, looking just as inviting as ever, and we pull in.
We like to try out something new each trip, and this year’s innovation is a wooden box for our collapsible sheet metal stove. The box doubles up as a food chopping board and has just enough buoyancy to stop the stove sinking to the bottom of the loch should we have a mishap.
For tea we have potatoes baked in a sand oven. One hour on the stove with steam issuing out of the sand and they are done to perfection. As usual, we have a wine box hanging from a tree as our “bar” and make frequent use of this as we sit around a small fire in the wood stove minus its lid. We need this for warmth because this early in the season we have traded midges for quite intense chill once the sun goes down. Not once do we think that we are getting the poor half of the bargain.
The light strip in the distance, which we hope will be a beach, slowly gets larger during the morning. Our guess turns out to be right and we pull in for lunch. We haul out the plastic wannigan, find a little spot behind a bank sheltered from the wind, and get the kettle on.
Day Three:
 
This trip we also have with us a new touring sail, which fits on our light canoe pole as a mast. We make use of this today when we reach the burial island. We have been fighting a stiffening headwind for a couple of hours and after looking around the island, decide to turn around, hoist the sail and hitch a free ride back down the loch.
Back
Our poles have a small hole and nylon tie at each end. These attachment points are very useful not only for attaching the sail, but also for rigging in various configurations with the tarp. The poles are hexagonal (made on a simple jig that fits onto a planer) which makes them easy to grip.
We stop for the day at another delightful sandy arc of  beach, which leaves us an easy paddle for the final day. Soon we have the stove going, with the wind that has powered us up the loch now flowing into the door of the stove and intensifying the flames to an almost alarming degree. We make toast on a wire clip that fits across the fire door.
Day Four:
 
It’s always very cool starting off early at Easter time, and we pack quickly to keep warm, eager to get paddling. Within a couple of hours we are back at our starting point and we retrieve the Landrover from its discreet parking spot. We pass a couple hitch-hiking and stop to give them a lift back to Fort William, and after a short break set off on the long drive home.