Good times in Inverness

The kindness of the Inverness community just hasn’t stopped. Roddy from Highland Taxis arrived on Thursday to give us a tour of Inverness. We managed to get to the RAF base in Lossiemouth and went on a tour of the Search and Rescue unit where Flight Lieutenant John Rowe was very informative and showed us round the ops room, hanger and the Sea King helicopter. It’s amazing that these machines were built in the 60’s but are so reliable that they are still in use. It was also really helpful to see how the rescue services operate. Big thank you to both Roddy and John for a great day out!
The crew spent the evening being very creative and acting out their pirate movie. OF course, Karen and I couldn't resist the opportunity to spice up the production a bit and 'invaded' the set with big water guns - this of course started a massive water fight. All good fun, but mid water battle we were also visited by two brothers, Peter and Dennis, who are currently riding their motorbikes round Britain to raise money for Help the Heroes. They at least got a glimpse of what our trips are all about - lots and lots of fun and laughter!
We went to Inverness Hospital on Friday for our hospital visit. The crew did incredibly well with their presentation, and the video they produced for the leg was brilliant! They were all really confident and full of laughter, always a good sign at the end of the week.
Sadly, as per usual, the leg came to an end far too soon and we had to say goodbye again. Well done to Steve, Ben, John, Laura and Emma – what a great week we had! Also a big thank you to Piers, Kim and Felicity for all your help during the week.

Saturday was the official opening of Inverness Marina, which Ellen came down to open. It was a hugely successful day with 100s of people around, a great display by the fire department and RNLI as well as a flyby of the Coast Guard helicopter. We were blessed with a beautiful sunny day with hardly a cloud in sight. The Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society were also there raising awareness of the work that they do to protect these beautiful animals.
Later in the afternoon we had our new crew arrive for leg 9. This leg is being run as a Scottish Summer Trip so we are sailing with young people new to the Trust. They are all from Scotland and will be spending the next four days with us, then swapping over with another Scottish group for the second half of the week. The first group is Graham, Fraser, Mandy, Emma and Shadab and we are joined by Fran from Skandia, who will be helping us for the week.
After the beautiful sunny day yesterday we now have the complete opposite – rain, rain and a little more rain – Bbut, we have good kit provided by MUSTO so we will again be putting it to good use. We are heading into the Caledonian Canal today which is very exciting. So what if we get a little bit wet? We are getting quite used to that by now…
Cheers, Cath