Everyone was a bit nervous about the Corryvreckan, we'd seen it the day before and it looked terrifying. Most nervous of all were the two guides and Duncan the boat pilot. Stuart kept just repeating to anyone who would listen "Look, you don't have to swim it all, if you want to get out that's great just get on the boat. If theres any reason at all you feel you want to stop it's no problem at all just get on the boat."
Duncan wasn't happy with the conditions, it was too rough and the current was running too strongly. We saw 2 sea eagles. Duncan said he was going to wait and see if the conditions improved, he thought they usually did but this was nature we were dealing with and you couldn't second guess nature.
Duncan is a "character". He is really nice guy but is 70 years old and quite set in his ways and opinions. My sister asked him where we would start swimming from and the only reply she got from Duncan was
"I pointed that out yesterday didn't I. Weren't you listening ?"
The Alpha males couldn't see what the problem was, to them it all looked fine. Duncan told them it probably would look like that to idiots who have never been there before and didn't have 20 years experience sailing in the area.
Eventually, after much deliberation Duncan and the guides agreed it was safe to go.
"Remember" said Stuart "You can get back in the boat for any reason at all whenever you like. Basically there's no landmark to aim for, it's pointless the current will drag you all over the place and you can't swim against the current so just keep heading for the other side and don't stop"
Duncan said it would be very rough as we got in but it would improve as we neared the far shore ( which did look a long way off ).
We were off, the first two Orange hats hit the water and immediately sprinted off. I followed suit desperately trying to catch them up. It was rough, ridiculously rough every time I breathed gallons of water blasted down my throat and I swimming at all angles as the waves slammed into the side of me. I caught up with Lucy and we then stayed together with Simon ( the other Orange hat ) not far away and we began to plough our way across. After a while the breaking waves and chop did subside and we left with just big rollers coming in from the left. At the bottom of the trough you couldn't see a thing except a trench of water towering above you on either side. No boats, no other swimmers. It was only a the tops of the waves you could look around and get you bearings. Lucy and I stopped to laze on our backs half way across just to soak in the scenery but Henry appeared on his rib shouting "Come on ! You've got to keep swimming if you want to make it !"
We kept swimming, heading generally towards the far shore and a little bit towards the bobbing pilot boat in front of us. Eventually we saw the pilot boat hugging the far shore begin to pick people out of the water as they completed their crossings. Lucy & I ended up around 15 metres from some sheer rocks on which we could see, and hear, the waves crashing. Simon, the other Orange hat, was still going a hundred metres or so away but headed off on a bearing that looked like it might take him out to sea. The main thing though was that our little group was more or less together, or at least within sight of each other. We bobbed about congratulating ourselves for a bit until Duncan arrived to take us on board. "Hurry up ! Get on ! What are you hanging about for ?" yelled Duncan as we hauled ourselves up the ladder. We'd done it. It was very exciting. No one cried.
With his flippers on my brother George had made short work of the crossing and floated leisurely across on his back for most of the way. He reached the boat first but as he was taking off his fins the first Alpha male barged past him to clamber up the ladder announcing "Winner !". George quite rightly pointed out that he was the winner having touched the boat first which sent the male into a bit of sulk.
Stuart & Duncan unanimously agreed that that was the toughest crossing they had ever seen and we have video evidence of them saying this !
The plan for the afternoon was for us to be dropped at the destroyed campsite on Scarba so Stu & Henry could collect the remains of the tents and we could go for a walk up to see another Maelstrom called the Grey Dogs which is even more extreme than the Corryvreckan. The big tent was still in the sea so we spent some time hauling the remains of that back onto land and all the other smaller tents had been completely flattened and all the poles broken. We had an impromtu lunch and set off to see the Grey Dogs. This was a lovely walk with a great view from the headland down onto the Grey Dogs, no one has ever swam across this tidal race and by the looks of it you would have to utterly mad to even think of it.
Duncan had taken his boat off to pick up some sightseeing passengers which left us stranded on Scarba for 4 or 5 hours. The walk took up a couple hours so we spent the rest of time huddled in what shelter we could find from the wind looking across the channel to Luing where we were supposed to be swimming next when Duncan came back. This was supposed to be the longest swim of the tour - over 2KM across a very rough and wind battered looking channel. Mostly in the afternoon it was quite sunny but every now and again the sky would just suddenly darken, the wind would whip right up and it would piss down. I did not fancy being in the middle of the channel in those conditions.
The afternoon wore on, we were just about warm enough sitting about in several layers of clothing on the shore but the thought of putting the cold wet suit back on again was just frightening. My neck had by this point almost been sawn in half from chafing somewhere on my wetsuit and was really painful. In general I just did not fancy this swim. After a particularly violent mini storm Duncan hove into view with his boat and Stuart said it was probably going to be too dangerous to do the Island crossing so we may have to do an alternative swim instead. Before we could go swimming though we would have to change on the island, help lug all the stuff onto the boat and then sit on the boat for half an hour whilst we drove somewhere else to swim. This made my mind up, that all sounded far too cold and I decided I had had enough swimming for one day, Lucy & George also decided to keep me company on the boat.
Duncan agreed the crossing would be suicide but now that the sun had come out again and the water looked reasonably calm the Alpha males weren't happy at being denied the 2KM swim. They tried to argue with Duncan about his misreading the conditions and it being fine but he basically told them to shut up and refused any more discussion. Instead the others went for a swim down the sheltered side of one of the islands, the sun had properly come out and it looked like a nice swim in the end. It was interesting being on the boat though and seeing how far away it was from the swimmers most of the time.
When the lead swimmer ( the most annoying Alpha male ) reached the end of the Island Stuart blew his whistle which was the signal for the swimmer to stop and rejoin the boat. The Alpha male ignored the signal and carried on. Duncan then blew the horn on his boat which was the signal for a complete evacuation which did stop the Alpha male briefly until he decided to ignore that too and carry on. Duncan said
"Stupid bugger, I've had enough of these bastards they're a bunch of fucking idiots. If he doesn't stop now I'll let him swim back to the mainland".
Lucy was recording videos at that point and caught this comment but stupidly she deleted the clip so it wouldn't get Duncan into trouble.
Back at the house the Alpha males disappeared into the pub to eat their meal before the rest of us turned up to eat and ruined their evening and then roared off to their hotel. The rest of us had a lovely meal in the pub and listened to Duncan explaining that if he has to put up with another day of those stupid fucking morons talking absolute shit in his cabin he will probably kill them all and feel good about it. He also told us these were the roughest conditions he had ever let anyone swim the Corryvrekan in and it was a really tricky decision as to whether to let us go at all. In the event he says he was really proud we all made it and listened to his advice and stuck together.
