AFTER months of inactivity on the water, rowing at Royal West Boat Club finally got off to a flying start this season.

Since May 17, crew rowing has been permitted in local authority areas in Level 2 and below.

This allowed crews to start back on the water in Inverclyde. Rowing restarted on May 18 and coaching of new members commenced a few days later.

Last weekend the club was involved in a major event postponed since last year, the Scottish Coastal Rowing Association’s Row Around Scotland.

The original plan had been for a baton to be passed between all the association clubs, starting on the Solway coast and circumnavigating the Scottish coast clockwise back to clubs on the south east coast.

The baton relay has already started but instead of being a continuous trip by a single baton there are currently two batons on the west.

Royal West were involved collecting the baton from Royal Gourock YC on Saturday afternoon.

The baton was delivered to Royal Gourock by Arthur Graham and Fergus Boyle of Firth of Clyde CRC, then passed to a Royal West crew who rowed it back to Royal West. The crew of Ian Clark, Karen Bennett, Angela Jones, Carron Mckee and Karyn Donnachie had some challenging conditions there and back but were excited to be involved.

Royal Gourock have not yet launched their St Ayles Skiff or they would have taken the baton to Royal West. Steve Scott of Royal Gourock was grateful to the event organisers for including them in this event.

Royal West’s rowing convenor, Karyn Donnachie, also arranged for a crew to take the baton to and from one of the newest clubs in the association, Royal Northern & Clyde Yacht Club in Rhu. At 12.30pm on Sunday the crew of Adam Graham, Angela Jones, Julie Evans, Carron Mckee and Karyn Donnachie set off to meet Royal Northern off Roseneath Point.

The two met at about 1.30pm and the baton was exchange between the boats, before Royal West followed Royal Northern back to Rhu Marina for coffee and cake.

Following informative discussion between the crews Royal West headed back to Greenock. The club have offered to assist Royal Northern grow their involvement in competition and invited them to their regatta in August.

On Wednesday, Royal West also completed a micro plastic trawl off the club as part of another SCRA sponsored national event. As the baton travels around Scotland, various clubs are gathering water samples that will be analysed by the Scottish Association of Marine Science near Oban. This will provide a snapshot of the water quality and specifically the micro plastics to be found in our coastal waters.

The crew of Adam Graham, Alex Patterson, Elaine Hunter, Julie Evans and Karyn Donnachie towed a trawl net over a distance of 1km and then transferred the catch into a special bottle for despatch to Oban.

The crew was surprised how dirty the net had become during the trawl and also at the visible contamination of the water. One unfortunate result of the trawl was catching a very small fish that it was not possible to release without a considerable lose of the sample. This will no doubt provide the scientists in Oban something else to analyse.

Rowing training and coaching of beginners continue in the coming weeks ahead of the Ccub attending a regatta in Lamlash on June 26.The first such event the club has been able to since October 2019.

If you are interested in rowing contact Karyn on rowing@rwsabc.co