  Tuesday : another fairly wet and wild night and this time we had to be up and packing up wet tents at 5.30AM. Drive round to Ard Mhor for kayakers to get ready (Nonie today) and rest of teams in ferry queue by 06.45. Ferry set off first, kayakers soon after. We were set off in reverse order of times from day before – they weren’t sure where to put me as I hadn’t paddled day before so I was set off with Moira from All Over the Place. We were allowed to paddle straight across the Sound and I could almost see the ferry terminal on far side (Eriskay) from the off. Fabulous paddle – almost flat calm, glassy seas, quite a swell in the middle but still possible to paddle almost as if on flat water and not worry too much about staying stable. Shoals of auks – guillemots, black guillemots, lots of razorbills, flighting around and on the water.
Chased the ferry across, watched it go out of sight round sea wall and then 20 minutes later, the return ferry coming out towards me. Not sure what to do, headed left as I thought the ferry might have to take same coast-hugging route it had on way across. Ferry headed right towards me so I paddled faster, keeping left and eventually ferry gave up and we passed left to left (probably I was meant to go right and pass right to right?).
Feeling strong and came in ahead of the field – good feeling with all the teams waiting to be tagged by their incoming kayak. Set Gordon off in the lead on bike across causeway from Eriskay to South Uist. I ended up third equal time on that leg – pretty chuffed, beaten only by James Block and Callum Urquhart – nice boat!! Meanwhile, G raced on road bike across causeway, up to a checkpoint on south side Loch Baghasdail and then to tag mt bikers (L and P) to set off on a S Uist machair ride and H on a run over Triurebheinn, Stulaval and Trinival to the east of the machair. We got kayak loaded and jumped in bus to take L, P and H to their respective start points. I collected G after he tagged H (slight hiatus when my brain stopped and we missed turn off while G was tanking up behind us on bike!). Drove north up main red road (spinal route) to another check point to await incoming bikers (L and P). Glorious weather again – stripped off kayak gear, hung clothes all over bus and ground to dry. Eating, rehydrating etc. G resting before big Beinn Mhor run. L and P (and lots of other teams) came tanking in on mt bikes. I then set off on road bike – back down red road and on to side road to meet H coming off her run. Scooter on my back in a rucksack to help H out. Lovely ride down shores of Loch Eynort and then sat in the sun watching various runners come in off the hill and chatting to Gordon from Heb Hash House Harriers also waiting for his team runner. H arrived and I tagged her and set off racing back on road bike to tag G at bus to set off up Beinn Mhor.
We decided to ditch the next stage (swim across causeway at Loch Bee) so as not to miss kayak leg later in day. (In fact, looking back, we could probably have managed both if we’d had swim set up, with H and me in place in advance of G coming down off Beinn Mhor – but it’s hard to judge these things when none of us is a good enough hill runner to judge our finish times at all accurately).
G was pretty quick in fact – he came in, tagged P again for another mt bike machair section, then rest of us with bus moved up to end of swim causeway. P came in, then went out straight away again with L and H for long road bike section (P on mt bike!!). This road section took them up on to N Uist, followed by a run across the bog to bag Eaval and Burrival (G, H and P). This meant mad Pyro doing 3 hard sections in a row – mt bike, road bike, run – nutter but then he does have 20 years on the rest of his team! L then met them with bus at end of run to do road bike along Loch Euphort and final tag to G to go up last checkpoint and bike in to Carinish Hall for end of day.
Meanwhile, G took bus, kayak and me up to Grimsay for start of next kayak section. Managed to get that bit wrong – meant to drive anti-clockwise round Grimsay and I forgot and thought we were to go clockwise – result was I saw Catriona and Mike’s croft though, which was nice! To Kallin to pier to launch kayaks. Long, lovely cruise paddle around Ronay, out to sea and up main east coast of North Uist. Some swell but again almost windless, calm, sunny and beautiful. Sea like molten chocolate. Rainbow out to sea. Sociable, chatting, RHIBs chugging alongside. Up off Floddaybeg and we regrouped to be set off racing again in reverse order of day before times, Moira and me at the front.
Tough paddle up the coast, quite hard to read coastline, so I was very glad when James and Callum overtook me and could let them work out how to spot the very narrow entrance to Loch Euphort into which we had to turn (saw James ahead disappear a couple of times up blind “inlets” – and then re-appear!). Beautiful moment when porpoises suddenly appeared about half a km ahead and we were able to paddle up right through the middle with them porpoising and playing around us (12 or 15 including at least one tiny one). Saw some runners coming down off Eaval to our west, lovely evening sun. Slog up Euphort – paddles slapping and slurping off unpleasant concentrations of large jellyfish all around. Anthony and Matt finally reeled me in on the long haul (oh so long) up the Loch and I ended up fifth on that leg – very good to finish, in a light refreshing rain shower, and see team there waiting to help with kayak onto roof and back to hall to find Gordon and food and massages awaiting. Go to urlLink Day 3 . 
