Wednesday 2nd July DRUMBUIE - DUIRINSH
- KYLE OF LOCHALSH – GLENELG – SKYE
Well, it’s been another huge day today! We woke up around seven
in our cosy little loft home, to another fine but cloudy morning. After
breakfast and a chat with Danny, Cait and Mikeal, we put on a last load of
washing (we have several stops with no washer coming up) and decided to pop to
the village next door, Duirinish, in hopes of seeing otters in the harbour.
Well, of course there were no otters, but there was a beautiful tranquil
harbour, and on the way back we saw a herd of highland cows down in the glen
below. I raced back with my camera, but by then all but a calf had disappeared
into the bushes. Happily, on the way back to the village, we also saw a deer in
the field of wildflowers, who seemed totally unconcerned by us!
Washing completed and hung out, we headed into Kyle of Lochalsh’s harbour for a 10.30 boat ride we’d booked online. We were half an hour early, so walked up to Hector’s Bothy (where we had lunch on Monday) for a cuppa. The trip, on the Sea Probe Atlantis, started right on time, and headed off under the Skye bridge first. By now, the storm clouds were looming, and it started to rain a bit. Fortunately it wasn’t really a problem for most of the trip, as they had a big covered deck area. We sailed around the Kyle past villages and the castle on Skye, and went down to their glass-bottomed area to see hundreds of jellyfish. We looked for otters, but there they weren’t. Again! However, we did hit the motherload of seals, quite literally – a lot of the seals have pups at present, and we saw so many of them in the water and on the rocks. It was so lovely to see them interacting. The tour lasted just over an hour and was pretty good value for 22 pounds really.
Once we were off the boat, we went for a walk to check out the railway station, where a train was waiting to depart. They also had toilets, which was very convenient! We’d decided to make our next destination Glenelg, a 45 minute drive away, so thought we’d better have lunch first. Right on the harbour was the Fisherman’s Kitchen, a small box of a café absolutely bristling with seafood, with outdoor tables next to it. Lex saw the 12 pound special – steamed langoustines with garlic butter and a side salad, and just had to have it. I had a cheese sandwich! Both were excellent. The rain pretty much managed to hold off while we ate our lunch.
Following lunch, we set out for Glenelg, which our dinner table companion, Owen, had told us about on Monday. It was a lovely drive over the mountains, almost all of it single lane. Glenelg is on the mainland, but we had to go right around Loch Alsh, then Loch Duich, and past the stunning Eilean Donan Castle. Then we drove over the mountains on the peninsula to Glenelg, is situated on Kyle Rhea. Coming into it, we travelled again on one of the Military Roads from the early 1700s which were built after the Jacobite uprisings, and passed the ruins of Bernera Barracks (1717) from that time. We arrived at the Glenelg Inn on the shores of the kyle, and went in to see if they’d give us a cuppa. Their specials board looked so good that Lex actually ended up also having the mackeral pate (which he rated very highly), and I had a bowl of chips.
Fully fortified, we headed south to see the brochs we’d been
told about. The first, Dun Telve, was the most complete we’ve seen. At 10 metres
high and sitting in the glen, it’s the second tallest surviving broch in
Scotland. It was actually pretty much complete until the 1700s when General
Wade’s men came along to rob out stone to make the nearby barracks. You can still
see the layers and the two walls, plus the stone stairs. They really are huge
constructions. Half a kilometre up the road we found Dun Troddan, this time up
high on the hill, with an excellent view of the glen. Historians can’t agree
why there are two brochs so close together, or even if they were existing at
the same time (400-200BC is usual for brochs.) Dun Troddan isn’t quite as high
as the first, but more of the stone circles are intact. It was broch heaven for
history tragics like us! Fortunately, the weather stayed beautifully fine for
our broch exploration.
Our last adventure for the day was a trip on the Skye Ferry from Glenelg across the sound to the island. It’s the last turntable ferry in operation; in other words, it doesn’t turn around, but has a moving shelf which is turned sideways for your car to board and depart. It cost us 20 pounds and saved a long mountain drive back, plus it was good to support it. It only took a couple of minutes and we were over on Skye, and heading up the mountain range between us and the bridge. We reached as high as 290 metres above sea level, which was fairly impressive! Of course, it was all single lane, which was interesting at times. Lex only had to reverse twice for oncoming cars. Anyway, we made it in one piece, and were soon back on the A road, over the bridge and back to Drumbuie by twenty past 4.
Since then we’ve sorted photos, had tea and started organising
packing, as we are off travelling again tomorrow. Unfortunately the weather forecast doesn’t
look good – according to the Met, we are in for 3 days of rainy weather, so we
are packing warm!
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