Filed under: Scotland, Travel | Tags: blogging, Calgary, Clan MacLeod, Dunvegan Castle, Faerie Pools, Fairy Flag, Isle of Skye, jim downey, Mallaige, Scotland, travel, Wikipedia
Being a photo-heavy travelog of our 2018 trip to Scotland.
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Tuesday, May 8.
A driving day. Just as we loaded our bags into the car, rain started falling. It persisted for most of the next 3.5 hours as we drove NE to Invergarry, then NW to the Isle of Skye. Because of the geography of Scotland, this sort of back & forth to get somewhere is typical, and you quickly learn to just enjoy the scenery or it’ll drive you nuts. This probably explains a lot about the Scots and Scottish history, now that I think about it.
Anyway, yeah, it rained while we drove. And I discovered something about our rental car (a new Vauxhall Astra): it had a ‘rain sensor’ setting on the windshield wipers. Yeah, it would vary the speed of the wipers depending on how much rain you had on the windshield. Handy, for driving in the UK, I imagine.
The rain started breaking up when we got to Skye, and wow, is that island beautiful in its stark emptiness:
We crossed the island to the west coast to Dunvegan Castle. While the current appearance of the castle is largely due to Victorian-era renovations, parts of the castle itself date back to the early 1200s.
It is home to the Chief of Clan MacLeod. It’s been the home of the Chief of Clan MacLeod for over 800 years. And the history inside the castle shows it. Here are a few glimpses:
Martha thinking: “… hmm … yeah, I could live here.”
Trinkets!
Weapons!
The Faerie Flag!
And a whole lot more. Seriously, spend some time poking around their website, or peruse the Wikipedia entry.
After a light lunch in the castle cafe, we thought we’d see if we could find the Faerie Pools. Getting there wasn’t a problem, though the last section of road (about 5 miles) is one-way, with passing areas. But it was a popular enough that parking was a bit of a nightmare, easily 5x the number of cars parked along the narrow road as were in the small designated parking area. But we lucked out, and got a spot in the gravel lot.
While the rain had passed, there was a stiff cold breeze blasting across the landscape. We dressed appropriately and set out. It was about a mile to the first pool, and we kept going for about another half mile to see some of the higher pools. Just an incredible landscape and a lovely walk:
After the walk back, we climbed into the car and drove to our B&B in Ardvasar on the SE corner of the island, just across the bay from the fishing village of Mallaig. We had a very yummy dinner at the hotel restaurant just down the road.
Jim Downey
