Skye

The Isle of Skye is just off the mainland, now accessible by bridge as well as ferry. It’s 50 miles long with a population of 10,000. Crofting, fishing, fish farming and tourism are its biggest economic drivers.

Tourism has increased exponentially over the past several years, making life irritating for island residents and clogging up roads, endangering delicate environmental areas, and filling up restaurants and B&Bs. Danielle said she felt slightly guilty even being here and I know what she means. Making matters worse, and I’ve heard and overheard so many conversations about this (all over Scotland), is the dire post-COVID labor shortage exacerbated by Brexit. Tourism industry employees from EU countries now need a visa to work in the UK, and these folks are critical.

PRO TIP/RESTAURANT DIGRESSION: Speaking of which, if you are headed to the UK this summer book all of your restaurants in advance. All of them. Otherwise no dinner for you! Big bummer especially since you have traveled 4,500 miles and there are three Michelin-starred restaurants on Skye alone. I wrangled a booking for two of them – The Three Chimneys and Edinbane Lodge. Both were completely excellent. And you don’t want to miss out on the fabulous and fresh cuisine of Scotland in general. Seriously get online now and book, book and book.

A wee word about our accommodations. We booked an Airbnb near Staffin situated between the mountains of the Quiraing and the sea from a delightful guy named Ian. He was incredibly responsive and patient with our American questions. I’m so used to Airbnbs in the states where there is a giant notebook full of detailed instructions, including a list of chores you must do at the end of your stay. You know the notebook I mean. There is not one piece of paper in Ian’s place, although there is a leprechaun in one of the kitchen drawers. We have too many rules, too many instructions and too little trust in people in the States. Much more laissez-faire here. They sell whisky in grocery stores and you can take your dog into a restaurant which all seems very advanced.

And we have a washer and dryer yay! But that situation is so different. No Tide pods. Instead, there’s spectacularly over-fragranced powdered soap that goes into a drawer just like olden times. The dryer is in the detached garage and isn’t plumbed so you have to dump out a water tray after every load. Settings include “cupboard dry” and “iron dry.” This makes sense to me. At times the weather was so aggressive that trips back and forth to the garage made us feel like frontier women, braving the elements to accomplish household chores.

Anyway, back to teeming hordes. I was pretty shocked to see that Skye’s popular sites are simply inundated with people. Those beautiful photos of iconic locations you see on Instagram? Faerie Pools, the Old Man of Storr, etc etc? Imagine those lovely photos, which must have been taken in the middle of the night, in the wee hours or in winter, only packed cheek by jowl with hordes of tourists. Cruise ships dock in Portree and disgorge thousands of people who are then loaded onto buses and taken on a whistle stop tour of the top destinations. Dreadful.

You can still easily find solitude though. Get up early, take a few steps down a trail or make after-dinner plans when the roads of Skye are empty.

VERY WEE DIGRESSION ABOUT NIGHTTIME. Speaking of getting up early, in early summer you can rise really early and, lo, it’s not dark. Or stay out late same deal. There’s only about four hours of complete darkness. Scotland’s latitude is similar to Northern Canada and Alaska. Really really cool and I never stopped marveling at it.

So the weather on Skye is particularly changeable and can be kind of crappy to be honest. Wind, rain, fog, all the things you imagine and generally all in one day. Every item on your body must be waterproof. Not water-resistant – Scotland throws back its head and laughs at “resistance.”

The weather was true to form for us, but we never regretted ignoring it.

My first trip to Skye with Backroads, we stuck to the Sleat (pronounced Slate) peninsula in the southwest, which was fabulous. Ian’s place is northeast on the Trotternish peninsula. It is gorgeous, and home to many of the tourist sites on Skye, including the Old Man of Storr, Kilt Rock, the Quiraing, the Fairy Glen and the Skye Museum of Island Life, a highland folk museum near Flora MacDonald’s grave.

On our first day we drove across the north coast of Trotternish, dropped down into the Waternish penininsula and then over to Duirinish all the way to Neist Point, the most westerly part of Skye.

We stopped at the Skye Museum of Island Life, which is a wonderful spot. It features replicas of Croft buildings from back in the day and a lot of detailed historical information, including from the Jacobite period since Flora Macdonald is buried nearby and Skye was where the Bonnie Prince finally was able to catch a ride to France after Culloden. You have probably heard the story, but he dressed up as a woman named Betty Burke, and traveled incognito as Flora’s maid.

Next we visited the Fairy Bridge, slightly off the main road and sadly all alone without a single visitor. This being Scotland, there’s a legend behind the bridge. Once upon a time, a chief of the MacLeod clan married a fairy and they lived together on Skye. She was only allowed to be with him for a year, after which she had to return to her people. She bid the clan chief farewell on the bridge and left her son wrapped in a silken shawl. This is the famed Fairy Flag, which allegedly could be used three times to save and protect Clan MacLeod. Very Lord of the Rings, is it not? #AragornArwyn. That exact same flag just happens to be on display at our next stop, Dunvegan Castle, which proves that the legend is true.

Dunvegan Castle is the oldest inhabited castle in Scotland, and always by the chiefs of the MacLeod clan. The MacDonalds are the other main clan on Skye but were not so settled. In the 16th or 17th century they moved from Sleat to the tip of the Trotternish peninsula, and their castle, Duntulm, is now barely a ruin. In the 1800s they moved south and built Armadale Castle, now a tourist attraction for its gardens with the castle ruin (in better shape than Duntulm) as its centerpiece.

I would be remiss in not mentioning the bitter feud between these two clans. There were tit-for-tat massacres and suchlike. Worth a google.

The castle has been visited by many luminaries over time, including Samuel Johnson, James Boswell and Sir Walter Scott. It also boasts a fun Jacobite collection including a lock of hair plucked from the head of the Bonnie Prince which he bestowed on Flora MacDonald. Her daughters also donated a vest of his.

And of course, the Fairy Flag is displayed within the castle. It’s pretty threadbare, but no doubt still quite powerful even though Clan MacLeod has long since called upon it the allotted three times to protect the clan.

Another fun item on display is Sir Rory Mor’s Drinking Horn. Successive clan chiefs throughout history have proved their worthiness/manliness by drinking a full measure. You can buy a replica in the gift shop for only £150 but it’s for ornamental purposes only which seems pointless.

Next we visited Skye Weavers. There are craft artists all over Skye but this particular weaver was called out in travel books. Their looms are bicycle powered. We met Paul, who showed us how it all works and gave us a go. I hope he didn’t have to undo what I did. Also it must be hard to be trying to work while constantly being interrupted.

Finally we did a cracking hike to Neist Point Lighthouse in spectacularly crazy weather. (Dipping into British adjectives because running out of American ones). At one point my foot got sucked into a bog up to my ankle. I fell to all fours, afraid I’d never see my boot – or perhaps even my foot – again. I was able to yank it free with a supremely satisfying sucking sound. Best thing is that nobody witnessed it. At this point I was laughing rather maniacally, but the crazy lady got some superb photos.

I arrived back at the car covered in mud after walking through a torrential downpour. Just half an hour later after a change of shoes and using my hiking socks to wipe away visible mud, we were sweeping into The Three Chimneys, Michelin stars notwithstanding.

For our last full day on Skye we decided to tackle the Quiraing. Weather be damned. And the weather was indeed damnable. To avoid crowds we arrived at the car park around 7:45, joining just one other crazy person. It was raining sideways, windy and foggy. We communed with our inner intrepid selves and just did it, as the shoe says. The weather changed about 100,000 times during our three hour hike through rivers, waterfalls, mud, along the cliff edges, all the things one’s mother would rather not know about. (Hi, Mom). And it was SO glorious and only occasionally miserable.

Tomorrow, we’re hitting the Fairy Pools early and then heading to Glencoe. We are nearing the end of our trip and how can that be?