common dolphin | Musiewild's blog

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Arisaig, Camusdarach, common dolphin, common seal, Cuillins, Jacobite steam train, Loch nan Ceall, Loch nan Uamh, Mallaig, RNLI, Road to the Isles, Skerry, Skye

Another journey on the Road to the Isles on Thursday, 15th September, and this time we went right to the end, Mallaig. Jon had been disappointed to tell us that we would not be able to do the three-hour wildlife boat trip he had planned, as the company had just announced its end for the season, but he would find us a boat trip of some sort.

*Arisaig. The three-hour boat-trip would have departed from here.*

*Walk along Camusdarach, near Morar, the weather as cold as it looks*

*The Cuillins of Skye in the background in this zoomed photo*

*The van which sadly will likely be out of service, as Glenloy Wildlife anyway, from the end of the year*

*Our boat, the Western Isles, in front of the Mallaig RNLI lifeboat*

*The lifeboat full on. I’m a great fan of the RNLI, and the TV programme, ‘Saving Lives at Sea’.*

Shortly after setting off on the hour-long boat trip, we saw dolphins, Jon also reckoning he saw a whale. This was fairly typical of my efforts to get photos of the dolphins. To be fair to myself, I had a poor position in the boat, not near enough to the edge to get, for instance, good views of the bow-riding creatures, let alone good photos.

We sailed towards the Knoydart peninsula, the Isle of Skye over to the west, on our left, and Loch Nevis, nothing to do with the Ben, on our right.

We hoped to see both common dolphins and the whale on our way back. The latter did not co-operate, but when we saw a crowd of gulls, we knew that fish must plentiful there, and therefore hopefully dolphins.

We did see the dolphins, quite a lot of them. My photography was limited for reasons already given. But I’m quite pleased with this.

As we were leaving Mallaig to start the return journey, Jon kindly stopped the van for a few seconds on a main road for me to be able to take the Jacobite, before it started its journey back to Fort William, via Glenfinnan.

We returned to and beyond Arisaig, and had our rather late lunch, sheltering as best we could from the strong and cold wind.

*Looking across Loch nan Ceall to Arisaig*

We walked along a small no-through road in changing light conditions. No particular wildlife was to be seen, bar a distant redshank, but we were invited to squeeze the leaves of bog myrtle between our fingers. My response was to say I wanted to bottle it and take it home, so sweet yet sharp and fragrant it was. I was told how I would be able to on Saturday. (I see that residents of Dumfries and Galloway are blessed with the plant.) I took no photos of it though.