On three of the coldest days of the worst winter for 30 years Fred MacAulay and Dougie Vipond set out on a Sport Relief Challenge. Their challenge was to paddle a tandem kayak the length of the Caledonian Canal from Fort William on the west coast to Inverness on the east coast of the Highlands of Scotland. Unfortunately at 8am on day one [22 Feb] they found the Canal at Neptune's Staircase near Fort William was frozen solid with thick ice so they had no option but to carry their 25 ft boat and paddles and walk alongside the canal. They covered more than 7 miles by lunchtime mainly by foot and managed to pitch their tent near Loch Oich for the night. On day two we just caught sight of them as they passed our house in their kayak with a TV crew in the parallel orange craft.They made better time than we expected and nearly caught us out. Above them was a TV crew in a helicopter filming scenes of the Great Glen for the forthcoming TV programme. Although the temperatures were well below zero day and night the sky remained a clear blue so the Great Glen and Loch Ness should look spectacular in the film.
Unbeknown to us they actually camped on Farigaig Pier for the night...we thought they would stay in Dores village or camp on the beach - so Farigaig Pier could be famous at last!
This TV programme is called 'Up a long Creek' and is to be shown this coming Wednesday 17th March on BBC1 Scotland from 9 to 10pm - so do take a look.
We do have guests coming to Aspenwood later in the year who asked if they could bring their kayak to launch in Loch Ness during their stay. We informed them that they can easily walk down the grass track from Aspenwood Cottage to Loch Ness beach with their craft or drive down and then leave their kayak at our house overnight for safety and convenience as we are nearer the shore of Loch Ness.
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