Fall Scottish Trip, Part 4

Luib Waterfall, Isle of Skye

Isle of Skye. The last post had us on the Isle of Skye and that’s where we pick up the story. On our first full day on the island we planned to expore the peninsulas of Duirinish and Waternish. Our first objective was Neist Point Lighthouse, the most easterly point on the island. 

Neist Point

To get to the lighthouse we drove about twenty miles of single-track roads, battling sheep the whole way. The last five miles of road narrows even more and there are fewer pullouts or passing places. I ended up backing up three times and had others back up a couple to get out to the parking area for the lighthouse. 

From there it is a three-quarter of a mile path down to the base of a small peninsula and then back up and finally down to the lighthouse. The lighthouse, like Buchan Ness where we had stayed a couple of days before, has converted the keeper’s cottages to self-catering. The wind, always strong here, was mild for the point—only 25-35 mph. 

Neist Point Lighthouse

Brave or Foolish Sheep

I hiked down to the point where I could view the lighthouse and then back while Anne huddled in the car out of the weather.

Portree Harbour

The Car. Next on our agenda was lunch at the Stein Inn, the oldest pub on Skye. Just as we approach the finally turnoff to the pub, the car started acting funny—actually, there was no humor in it—when I would brake the car would lurch and clunk and the same thing happened with each turn of the steering wheel. We were miles of single-track road from the main highway and about 25 miles from our B&B in Portree. I got the car turned around and nursed it back to Portree at 30 mph with flashers on. I didn’t dare pull off to let traffic by because I never knew when the steering would go completely out. Back in Portree I called our rental company, Arnold Clark, and they said they’d send a repair truck out in an hour or two to evaluate. The repair guy arrived in about 45 minutes, listened to my story, drove the car in the B&B parking lot, and said, “Wow!” We took the car to his shop (about 3 blocks away) and he put it up on the rack. The diagnosis was that front suspension bushings had fallen off and we were lucky to get back to Portree. 

Our Broken Car on the Tow truck

Arnold Clark told him and us to tow the car to Inverness in the morning (a three hour trip one way) and we’d receive a new car which we could drive back to Skye. There goes our second full day on Skye.

The next morning at 8:00AM we climbed into the cab of the tow truck with our car strapped to the truck bed and headed to Inverness. 

It felt like we were being tailgated the whole way.

The tow driver was good, but he was used to being thrown around in the truck on the narrow road—we weren’t. It was a rough ride. When we talked with the dealer in Inverness, he said this problem happens often with the Peugeot 3008 and they should all be recalled. 

Our new rental -- only the color was different.

He then gave us our new rental, another Peugeot 3008.  We transferred our remaining stuff to the new car and took off to salvage our time on Skye. 

The Storr

Meal Falls

Sligachan and the Red Cuillins

Our last day on the Isle of Skye was almost a total washout, heavy rain most of the day.

On the Way East

Aviemore. We left Skye and drove across the north part of the country to Tain and Dornoch. 

Dornoch Cathedral

Grotesques -- Like Gargoyles without the Spout

Pagan Greenman

After golf at Dornoch we took the opportunity to walk around the cathedral in Dornoch, but the sky shows we got the two nights we were in Tain were real highlights. The first night as we drove out to the Tarbat Ness Lighthouse we saw a spectacular rain squall with rainbow on the North Sea. 

The next night when we drove out of Tain to a local village pub a few miles away, the sky was on fire with a gorgeous sunset as intense as I’ve ever seen.

The next day we started our week of timeshare in Aviemore in the Cairngorm Nat’l Park. We had planned to play golf if the weather this late in the season would cooperate. Luck was with us and we had good rounds at Grantown-on-Spey GC 

Grantown-0n-Spey GC

and at Moray New in Lossiemouth

Moray New GC

NATO jets fly directly over the course.

The jets are LOUD!

—both excellent courses that we enjoy. Our non-golf time was spent continuing to look for fall colours. We were especially successful at Loch an Eilein Castle and the area around Aviemore. 

The road into Loch an Eilein

Loch an Eilein Castle

Old Scotch Pine

The End of the Trip. Finished with our Highland adventures, we ventured back to Crieff and Edinburgh to get ready to come home. We still had some chances for stunning photos in our last few days 

Rumbling Bridge Falls

Sma'Glen

and then enjoyed an afternoon in the capitol city. The trip had been the latest we’d ever been in Scotland and yet we only got rained out of golf once and had to change plans only a couple of other days. 

Veteran's Day Memorial in Princess Gardens

Sitting outside with a cider first week in November. Not too bad!

We had had the most trouble with a rental car of any of our trips, but even that made a good story. Looking back on what we did with this late 2700 mile trip in Scotland and the fantastic photos we brought home, it’s easy to say the trip was huge success.

Strathearn

NEXT: Rest and Happy Holidays.

Scotland Spring 2016 #4: Back on the Mainland

After an uneventful ferry crossing from Stromness on Orkney to Scrabster by Thurso on the Scottish mainland, we faced a long drive to our lodging for the next week—Scandinavian Village, Aviemore in Cairngorm National Park.  Our first break in the drive came via an eight mile detour from our main route to visit Grey Cairns of Camster (aka Camster Chambere  Cairns). 

These are neolithic tombs or passage tombs built between 5000 and 6000 years ago—they are among the oldest buildings in Scotland.  The site is a set of two cairns; one called Camster Long and the other called Camster Round.  

The Long tomb is about 200 feet long with two burial chambers and two passage entrances—at one time they may have been separate cairns which have been combined for some reason unknown.  The two tombs are each about 15 feet tall and are about 50 feet apart.  If you have a torch (flashlight) the tombs are accessible, 

but it’s almost a crawl and is definitely more fitting for younger more agile explorers.  The other tomb, 

The Round Cairn

Camster Round, is a single cairn about 60 feet in diameter and 12 feet tall.  You approach both the cairns, which are in the care of Historic Scotland, by a wooden path over the moor.  An interesting and photogenic stop.

After a stop for a quick bite of lunch and a walk around the small harbour at Lobster, 

we checked into our digs for the week, Scandinavian Villege Unit #1, a two bedroom villa unit (villas have the bedrooms upstairs).  

This is a timeshare unit we exchange into on more than half our trips to Scotland; it’s become our second Scottish home after Merlindale B&B in Crieff.  

The view from our unit.

The mountain village of Aviemore, a base for hikers-climbers-skiers, is centrally located in the Highlands.  From here we can get to the North Sea coast in an hour, 

Hopman Harbour

have easy access to the Whisky Trail (more than twenty open distilleries are within an hour and a half), have numerous castles available for touring (including Brodie, Cawdor, and Ballindalloch),  

Loch an Eileen Castle

and have plenty of historic tourist attractions nearby (Culloden, Clava Cairns, Highland Wildlife Park, Cairngorm Mountain Funicular, and Strathspey Steam Railway).  And most importantly, it’s perfect for reaching some outstanding Scottish golf courses—Royal Dornoch, Nairn, Tain, Boat of Garten, Granton-on-Spey, Moray Old and New, and a couple of dozen more.

Relaxing on our patio with computer, whisky, and crisps.

   

One of the interesting villages nearby is Cromarty on the tip of the Black Isle, 

On the Black Isle--rape seed fields and oil rigs.

a peninsula with water on three sides and separated from the mainland on the forth side by rivers.  The name (in Gaelic t-Eilean Dubh) most probably refers to the black soil of the rich farmland of the peninsula. Cromarty is a small seaport at the mouth of the Cromarty Firth.

Looks like the fishing wasn't so good this day.

It used to be a ferry terminal for the smallest commercial sea ferry in the UK—the ferry to Nigg—and a fairly major fishing port.  

The small Cromarty harbour and oil rigs.

Now it’s known for its work on building and repairing off shore oil rigs.  

For us, Cromarty is a quaint harbour and beach with some nice shops and plenty of photo opportunities, including the local lighthouse.   

One of the highlights of our stay in Aviemore this trip was a visit to the Cairngorm Reindeer herd.  

The herd is Britain’s only free-ranging reindeer herd.  Records indicate that reindeer along with red deer were hunted in the 1200s, but reindeer were extinct in the UK by the 1900s.  Mike Utsi and his wife Dr. Ethel Lindgren co-founded the present herd, importing seven individuals from Sweden in 1952.  The present herd, ranging in two areas of the Cairngorms, is made up of 150 deer (all named).  The current managers, Mr. and Mrs Allan Smith, took over the herd in the 1980s and maintain the herd with a small but efficient staff of herders and volunteers.  Hill trips to the herd leave the Reindeer Centre at 11:00 year round.  First, is a one mile drive to a specific parking area, 

followed by a guided 20-30 minute hike (not too strenuous) up to the herd. On the tour, we met about thirty deer who gathered round to get fed by the guide, Abby, 

and then hand-fed by members of the tour (about thirty of us).  

The deer know there's going to be food.

The deer are not really pets and don’t care for much handling, but they are sort of friendly and some were interested in us, though mostly they were interested in the food.  

Abby spread out some grain to attract the deer.

Anne is hand feeding a yearling some special grain.

One of the interesting facts we learned was that reindeer and caribou are the same species.  The Reindeer Centre maintains and enlightening Blog at www.cairngormreindeer.wordpress.com.  Anne and I thoroughly enjoyed our hike and our visit with the herd.  The next story, from The Rambling Adventures of A Traveler and Golfer (2014), also relates to the reindeer:

They Do Exist.  Ailsa, our adopted Scottish niece (daughter of our B&B hosts), spent three days with her schoolmates at an outdoor camp near Aviemore in the Highlands.  She was only thirteen and this was a big adventure—camping out, cooking out, special wildlife experiences.  She returned exhausted, starving for her favorite foods, and angry.  Exhausted we understood when we heard all that she had done.  Starving was also understandable, after all she had had to cook for herself on a campfire.  But the anger surprised us.  After a shower and at dinner she said, “We saw reindeer at the reindeer farm, and they were real.  

I felt so stupid.  I thought they were just made up in the stories.  Nobody ever told me they were real!”  It took several minutes for all of us to stop laughing.

River Luinaeg in the Cairngorms--on our way down from the reindeer herd.

Next: Some great golf on this spring trip.