Lord Of The Isles - Jura

Breakfast on Gigha consisted of convincing Kim not to stand downwind when the jar of petrol syphoned out of a microlight was poured to 'encourage' combustion of the breakfast fire. The resulting explosion fortunately missed Kim who stood watching the explosion heading towards her like a rabbit in the headlines. Boiled eggs and soay sheep sausages went down well.

A walk to the hotel toilet and a wander around the lovely gardens (beside the lovely B&B which we missed due to camping) and a walk back to pack up. The campsite was now mobbed with three axis aircraft who flew in with the rescuer of Grahams carburretor. All assembled we took off heading to Jura on a bright sunny day.

Jura is a tricky place to get to normally - there is a ferry from Islay and a lot of the island has no roads. The Paps of Jura are a rough set of hills with an annual race across them. Jura is also the place the KLF decided to burn a million pounds of cash in the name of Art. There is a grass strip beside a gorgeous white beach nestling against a tempting blue sea, so tempting that after missing the foliage on landing and paddling I decided to strip down to my punders and do a Reggie Perrin into the sea.

Refreshing with a fantastic view of the paps of Jura as I swim through the floating seaweed. I swam back and disrobed under the wing hanging towels and punders on the flying wires. So what is it about the naked form that causes everyone to become a papparazzi photographer. With their wide angle lenses they 'accidentally' caught both sides of me (backside and a 'Forgetting Sarah Marshall' moment) whilst Kim dries my goolies.

A wee girl appeared from the beach asking about flying and if we had been camping we could have done fun flights for anyone around - but we had a schedule so we took off with dogs running around the strip chasing sticks over the bouncy grass strip and took off before the large ditch at the end.

Over the 'George Orwell' typed here house where in 1948 he wrote 1984 (transposition typos were common even then) and hence over the Corryvreckan whirlpool which didn't look inviting even from 3,000 feet. Over the sunken slate quarries near Seal Island and over the Bridge over the Atlantic (no not under it!) to cross the Sound of Mull and tracking into Glenforsa on Mull.

Kim decided to do an interesting approach dropping down below the tree line before emerging in a heartstopping drop and smooth landing to roll up to the others. We set camp under the planes and headed into the pub, which is run by pilots. Splendid dinner and lots of lubrication meant we all headed back to our respective tents tripping over Richard's tent lines set out to trap the unwary traveller. After the third person tripping over Richard's lines he suddenly realised that Mike was still to trip over it which could be catastrophic for everyone but Mike had his head torch and managed to stumble over his own tent instead.

I managed to sleep well although managed to disturb everyone else who ill advisedly camped in earshot of splendid sonic snoring.

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I’m sure that I will always be
A lonely number like root three

The three is all that’s good and right,
Why must my three keep out of sight
Beneath the vicious square root sign,
I wish instead I were a nine

For nine could thwart this evil trick,
with just some quick arithmetic

I know I’ll never see the sun, as 1.7321
Such is my reality, a sad irrationality

When hark! What is this I see,
Another square root of a three

As quietly co-waltzing by,
Together now we multiply
To form a number we prefer,
Rejoicing as an integer

We break free from our mortal bonds
With the wave of magic wands

Our square root signs become unglued
Your love for me has been renewed

David Feinberg
from Harold and Kumar Escape From Guatanamo Bay