For Argyll’s gift to ARSN is Kintyre Express 2 inaugural and night at Craigard Hotel

Today (27th May 201) saw the inaugural trip of Kintyre Express 2 – the new fast passenger ferry service from Campbeltown to Ballycastle on the north coast of Ireland.

This wonderful scenic route just had to be seen and experienced in the great new boat, commissioned by Kintyre Express, like their first boat, from RedBay Boats in Cushendall.

For Argyll has been concerned for some time at the depth of human wear and tear thrust upon the campaigners  for schools currently threatened with closure by Argyll and Bute Council. This continuing stress affects the members of the Argyll Rural Schools Network (ARSN) as they  work to support all of the schools and their host communities fighting, literally, to live.

The stresses are compounded by the knowledge, shared by the wider public, that the cases against the schools are profoundly flawed – even at this second attempt; and by the frankly dishonest means routinely employed by council officers and administration councillors to get their way.

We tried to think of a gesture we could make as a conduit for Argyll’s obvious appreciation of the campaigners endless high calibre  work in this necessary cause.

On the basis that a change is as good as a rest, we decided to put together the best experience we could think of in the ‘something completely different’ genre.

We bought two seats on the inaugural trip of the Kintyre Express 2 (KE2) this morning – piped on departure by Campbeltown’s champion solo Piper, Lorne MacDougall – who also piped for the boats naming ceremony at the glorious Portavadie Marina complex (KE2 pictured top coming in to the marina at Portavadie for the event, Lorne piping from the stern).

Then we bought dinner, bed and breakfast for two for last night – in a lochview suite with a four poster bed at the Craigard Hotel on Lower Askomil, on the north shore of Campbeltown Loch.

Then we  handed the gift over to the Argyll Rural Schools Network (ARSN) to manage for us.

We don’t need to know who’s having a night and a day to remember. ARSN know better than anyone where this gift should go. We wish we could have sent everyone but we pushed the boat out for one symbolic gesture of support for the inspirational ARSN and we hope every school campaigner across Argyll and Bute  will know they are a part of this.

Everyone knows what this fight is taking out of them – and seven schools have had to endure this twice without cessation – moving from one campaign to an immediate second as they have been listed again to close after the late withdrawal of the first set of duff proposals.

No one should think that this is because the case against them is a good one. Proof of how random a process it is lies in the fact that in the council’s first effort, Clachan School in Kintyre was named to receive pupils from other schools proposed for closure. This time Clachan itself is down to be closed.

This has been little more than a mindless exercise of ‘Pin the tail on the donkey’.

The campaigners are suffering and there is an unconscionable degree to which the council is counting on this – on simply wearing them down.

The reality is that, however incompetent the closure proposals have been, they have the weight of a juggernaut local authority process behind them. This campaign has shown Argyll that there are no effective checks in the system. Not one body has the authority to step in or would actually step in to save an area from damagingly inept management.

It has been a cruel process and an unworthy one upon which the Argyll electorate will pronounce in the local authority elections of May 2012.

But in the meantime the victims need a break.

We hope that a night of good food at the Craigard, a four poster view of the expansive Campbeltown Loch, an early breakfast (for a 7.30am start)  and the fresh salt air of the KE2′s passage really will be the ‘other world’ that will refresh these campaigners.

The KE2′s leaves from the shore end of the pontoon opposite the Royal Hotel, goes out of the loch by the deep shipping channel north of the loch;s guardian, Davaar Island; then south between Sanda Island and the Mull. By then, the dramatic headlands of the north west of Ireland are in view, with Rathlin Island off the north coast, well known to Robert the Bruce. After that, it’s into the cliff top Ballycastle, host to the annual legend of the Oul’ Lammas Fair and the starting place for some of the great walks and bike rides in the region.

Within easy reach is the world renowed Giants Causeway, a physical link to Argyll in the subsea basault causeway that runs to the Isle of Staffa with the Fingal’s Cave that inspired Mendelssohn’s Hebridean Overture.

And there are fabulous golf courses to be played – like Royal Portrush.

Our ARSN guests may not play a round today but we hope they come back refreshed, reinvigorated and ready for the continuing battle that must be won.

We hope that the lovely Craigard Hotel with its great food and the secure and scenic ride on KE2 will work their magic, whatever the weather. and maybe because of it.

Lynda Henderson

The last photograph above shows Kintyre Express 2 off Cushendall, with company owner, Colin Craig, at the helm and members of the company team, Mairi Johnston and Dougie Martin in the stern.

They had just collected the boat from her builder, RedBay Boats and were about to put her through some thrilling choreography for the cameras.