Rowing club to welcome Scottish skiff visitors

The Alnmouth team in action a few years ago.

A Northumberland rowing club plans to welcome visitors from Scotland for a special rowing event, which includes a circumnavigation of Holy Island, this weekend.

A skiff, a light rowing boat, will be coming down from Collieston to Alnmouth Coastal Rowing Club on Saturday to join other skiffs from Amble and Alnmouth to take on the 11-mile expedition, weather permitting.

David Cant, from the Alnmouth club, said the large-scale event would be a “first for everyone” after meeting Collieston at last year’s world championships in Northern Ireland.

He added: “The trick with this is to time the second half of the row so that the skiffs row over the causeway exactly at high tide, 4.26pm, and then head round to St Cuthbert’s Island and back to the harbour.”

On Sunday, they plan for all the skiffs to row from Craster down to Alnmouth, where all skiff crews will have a social and a barbecue lunch on the beach before the Collieston crew head back home.