‘A forest is for life, not just for Christmas’, Continue reading
Tag Archives: Tighnabruaich
Christmas 2009 Exhibition at Tighnabruaich Gallery
This year’s Christmas Exhibition at the often innovative Continue reading
Adventure walking on the Cowal Way
The Cowal Way – 6 days, 57 miles and 5670 ft of adventurous walking – Continue reading
Camanachd Cup 2009 result
Today, the 2009 Homecoming Camanachd Cup, the blue riband Continue reading
Winner of ‘guess the location of the photograph’ – and the answer
We said there was a twist to this one. and there was.
It’s the Yacht Cub at Rothesay at New Brunswick in Canada – the other Rothesay. We were struck by how easily it could be here and wanted to find a way of seeing if you felt the same.
You did. We were offered: Kerrera, Tighnabruaich, Colonsay, Tiree, Strachur and some others too impossible to mention.
Unsurprisingly, no one got the right answer.
But Margaret Purdie from Lochgilphead came up witih a series of surprises. She rang up rather than email and just said: ‘Is it Port Bannatyne?’ Anyone who knows Bute knows that Port Bannatyne and Rothesay go cheek by jowl. When we said ‘Sorry, it’s not’, Margaret then demanded: ‘Well, is it Bute?’
Wherever her inspiration was coming from, she was at once the farthest away from and the closest to the answer – and she is the winner.
She will now tell us what she would like to see us feature or whose life story she would like to see us write and publish. We’ll let you know what she chooses – and we’re looking forward to finding out ourselves.
And below, to show you how close the Tighnabruaich answers also were, is a photograph by Phillippa Elliott of boats at their moorings there. Phillippa was also the photographer behind our recent photo-journalism on a contemporary lost township in Argyll – Polphail.
Both photographs are reproduced here with permission, Copyright to the Tighnabruiach photograph (just above) is owned by the photographer, Philippa Elliott.
Three rescued from capsized fishing boat near Dunoon
Earlier this afternoon (11th February) at around 2.00pm, a fishing boat capsized near Dunoon. Clyde Coastguard have confirmed this, saying that the cause of the capsize is not yet known.
A lifeboat, a police helicopter and a Royal Navy helicopter were scrambled to help the sailors but they were picked up by another fishing boat.
The three men were then taken by helicopter to Dunoon General Hospital but were not thought to be seriously injured. A Strathclyde Police spokeswoman said: ‘They all appear to be fine, just a bit cold’.
UPDATE 12th February : The fishing boat involved was the 40ft Belfast-registered Jubilee Star which works out of Troon with a Scottish crew. She was prawn fishing in deep water south of the Gantocks rocks off Dunoon.
The capsize seemes to have been caused by the boat’s nets snagging. She sank in minutes and her three-man crew had to jump into the water to escape. An RN Search and Recue helicopter (SAR) from HMS Gannet, Helensburgh’s inshore RIB lifeboat, and Dunoon Coastguard team joined other ships and rescue services at the scene.
The nearest boat to the Jubilee Star when it capsized was the Guide Me, registered in Kirkcaldy in Fife and skippered by Matthew Currie from Tighnabruaich in Argyll. The Guifde Me was also prawn fishing in the waters around the Gantocks. The Guide Me picked up the three men, one who had got on to the Jubilee Star’s life raft which had inflated normally, the other hanging on to the side of it and the third further away in the water.
The three men were taken to Dunoon & District General Hospital suffering from mild hypothermia. All were released last night. Mathhew Currie from Guide Me knew the skipper of the Jubilee Star as Gary McKinnon and Robert Jack as one of two crewmen.
The Marine Accident Investigation Branch is likely to investigate the incident.
Cowal Schools Gaelic Music Tour from Lochgoilhead Fiddle Workshop and Fèis Cheann Loch Goibhle
The month of February will see a tour of Cowal schools by Lochgoilhead Fiddle Workshop and Fèis Cheann Loch Goibhle.
The schools will be Dunoon Grammar School and ten Argyll Primary Schools, including Strachur, Tighnabruaich, Kilmodan, Innellan, Sandbank and Lochgoilhead and the tour will involve them in Gaelic music and storytelling.
It is rare that school recitals are arranged for our schoolchildren, but more than 700 Argyll children will be involved in this innnovative project. The idea behind this tour is to explore our inheritance of Gaelic culture through music, song, and stories.
Lochgoilhead Fiddle Workshop and Fèis Cheann Loch Goibhle has already given more than two thousand five hundred local children opportunities to play and hear music at its Schools tours, free Come and Try sessions, its regular classes at local schools, fèisean events and its concerts at community venues around Cowal and Argyll.
The success of last year’s tour was enormous, with schools and children clamouring for more. ‘Part of the difficulty is that such events fall between what is seen as a responsibility of the education departments and cultural funders”, Elizabeth Bain, the tour organizer said “ but we are pleased, on behalf of all the local children who will benefit, that Fèisean Nan Gaidheal is supporting us to tour again’.
The performers on the schools tour will be acclaimed Gaelic singer Anne Martin and clarsach player Ingrid Henderson. Their performance at Celtic Connections was reviewed as: ‘The bards and tunesmiths of Skye have been chronicling the march of clan Donald for centuries, and in Anne Martin and Ingrid Henderson, the island’s lore is in good hands and voices, indeed’.
In the experience of the Workshop, such recitals play a vital role in the cultural life of the area, and in inspiring the next generation. ‘Over the last five years we have tried, wherever possible, to encourage parents to attend concerts with their children. Most of our public concerts are free to schoolchildren; we vary the venues to minimise travelling time, and we have put on a series of Sunday afternoon concerts, which have been very popular with families’, Elizabeth continued, ‘but the best way we can ensure that the culture is passed on is to go direct to the schools’.
Reporter: Mark Morpurgo
Photograph: by Derek Prescott – of musicians playing on a previous Gaelic Music Tour to Cowal schools
Bute’s STIFF campaigners finger two more fish farm applications connected to Inchmarnock
For Argyll reported recently on the campaign by an doughty group in Bute – Stop The Inchmarnock Fish Farm – or STIFF.
The group has fully engaged in a consciousness-raising event – with art demonstrations on the beach by Ian M Scott and Alison Clark, to attract potential fellow objectors. STIFF secretary Christine McArthur has also sent local newspaper, The Buteman, details of an application by Offshore Farm Developments Ltd (OFD) for two more fish farm sites.
The company is the same one STIFF is already at odds with over the proposed Inchmarnock Fish Farm – which is to go to a Public Inquiry on 24th February 2009. The new applications include another site off Inchmarnock, at Carrick Point; and a third site, near Glecknabae at the north of Bute, at Clate Point.
OFD’s original statement in support of the two applications explained that the Clate Point and Carrick Point sites would be used in rotation, along with the site north of Inchmarnock which will be the subject of February’s public inquiry.
These two proposed fish farms were submitted in July 2003 as a single application – because OFD planned to use them in rotation, along with the Inchmarnock site which will be subject to the Public Inquiry. Clate point and Carrick Point were also slated to be serviced from Portavadie or Tighnabruaich.
Donald Fowler, OFD Director, has now told The Buteman that the company has withdrawn the Carrick Point application and ‘parked’ the one for Clate Point until the outcome of the Public Inquiry is known.
OFD’s appeal against Bute and Cowal councillors’ earlier recommendation that the Crown Estate turn down the Inchmarnock application states that the company feels that the impact on tourism and visual amenity by the proposed farm has been exaggerated. In its view, the positive economic benefits of the project for Bute have also been ignored.
February will see both sides of the issue make their best case to the Inquiry.
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Permission for sale of Acharossan Forest at Tighnabruaich to Kilfinan community
The Kilfinan Community Trust in Cowal has just been given permission, under the National Forest Land Scheme, to buy Acharossan Forest at Tighnabruaich for the community. They are working with Forestry Commission Scotland and Highlands & Islands Enterprise’s Community Land Unit to develop plans. There is over £30,000 to be raised by February 2009 and they are about to submit a funding application to the Big Lottery Scotland’s Growing Community Assets Fund.
Extensive search rescues two men and their boat after Bute Games
Last night (Sunday 24th August) two men were found on the Isle of Bute, with their boat, after a major search managed by Clyde Coastguard who brought in Coastguard Rescue Teams from Dunoon and Rothesay; lifeboats from Tighnabruich and Largs; a military rescue helicopter; the Strathclyde police launch and police officers. A yacht, the Rough Diamond, contributed to the search.
The two men involved, thought to be from Dunoon, had been at the Bute Highland Games. One of them made an emergency phone call to Clyde Coastguard around 10.30pm, asking for help as their RIB (rigid inflatable boat) had broken down near Rothesay Pier. An hour later, while they were still attempting to identify their position, the battery on their phone died. After the extensive search, the Tighnabruaich lifeboat found them at Ardmaleish Point at 2.55am. They had drifted on to the Bute shore and had sensibly lit a fire which signalled their location.
John Griffiths, Clyde Coastguard Rescue Co-ordination Manager says: “We were very pleased to find these two men, particularly as one was not wearing a lifejacket. It has been raining heavily tonight, with south westerly force 6 winds, making for a search in choppy conditions.”
He reinforced the rules of survival when setting out to sea in small boats like the 5 metre RIB invovled here:
- always wear a lifejacket
- take a reliable form of communication – a vhf radio is ideal, make sure that you know how to use it
- take other forms of attracting attention such as flares
- make sure that you tell someone at home where you are going and when to expect you back.
These guys were lucky, not least because such a resource-heavy search was mounted for them over bank holiday weekend with the Coastguard Service across the country stretched by strike action.