A Dreich Day with a Bonnie Finish

We had opted for the 8.30 sitting at breakfast this morning so we could get an early start on our drive around Skye. We were also keen to try to get a little ahead of the weather which started out grey but was reported to get gradually worse all day. ( and the weather guys were spot on with this one!) Dreich is an old Scots word for a dreary day and Dreich is what we got.

The set up for breakfast here is one table for two at the window and a large table of 6 for the remaining guests to share. There are four rooms and they cater to 8 people maximum. Nobody else showed up for the 8.30 sitting so we had a prime spot at he window for our outstanding breakfast. With apologies to Neil’s ancestral home, the breakfast here in Skye beat Dalmally hands down! I’d asked for the full Scottish which included a delicious haggis as well as the usual suspects of bacon, eggs, sausages,mushrooms and grilled tomatoes. To start there were at least 6 varieteies of beautifully stewed fruits done by Charlotte ( the pears in star anise and ginger were to die for!)

Haggis! Yum 🙂

The rest of the guests appeared at 9am just when Neil and I were finishing up – a single, voluble American lady who came from Atlanta and two English couples who travel together every year. We had a brief chat with them before setting off. The weather was drizzly at this stage but we did manage to get a closer view of the Old Man of Storr as he hid his head behind a scarf of mist..

However by the time we reached Lealt Falls the wind was starting to blow with a vengeance.

Notice the purple at the top of the photo? It’s the heather that was blooming everywhere!

Further down the road at Kilt Rock and Mealt Falls it was getting worse but we did our best. To be honest I think its a bit of a stretch when they say the cliff here resembles a kilt!

Our next stop was supposed to be a drive up into the hills to see the rugged beauty spot called the Quairang. Its up a windy, narrow one-track road but the views are reputed to be worth it. However, by this stage we couldn’t even SEE the hills so we decided to give it a miss . We wound our way up the peninsula and passed a red telephone booth out in the middle of nowhere, I can only assume it’s for the use of the sheep!

Finally we reached the top of the Trotternish peninsula where we stopped by a lonely guy in a coffee cart for the short walk out to the cliffs to see ruined Duntulm castle. I decided to put my rain pants on but Neil figured he’d manage in his jeans – he regretted that later! At the carpark the win was fierec but as we walked out across the headland we experienced the worst wind I’ve personally ever felt, driving a stinging rain ahead of it. It was so bad it was funny! The only people silly enough to be out there was us and the sheep.

We could barely hear each other over the wind but we still managed a few photos and some video ( thank goodness my iPhone is waterproof) before fighting the wind back to the car. The walk out had been much easier as the wind had been at our backs but there were a couple of places on the walk back where I semi-seriously thought we weren’t going to make it!

Back in the car I peeled off my rain pants and Neil put the car heater on full blast to try to dry his jeans off.  After that we decided we’d had enough of outdoor activities so we missed out on the Fairy Pools and Neist Point lighthouse, both of which we’d seen some really love photos of. Oh well, we thought, lets head for Talisker Distillery, the islands famed whisky producer and maybe we can get on a tour. It was an hour to drive there through the rain….and when we arrived we found everyone else on Skye had had the same idea. There wasn’t a park within cooee anywhere! Sigh!

A little dispirited we headed back and stopped at Sligachan Hotel for a coffee and a Scottish Flapjack ( a sort of soft oatmeal biscuit) before dragging our dripping tails back to Portree. I’d accidentally left my reading glasses at the restaurant last night so we popped down there to collect them, walking past all the dripping tourists standing under awnings eating fish and chips out of a paper bag. I don’t think anyone was having a great day on Skye this afternoon!

We bet a retreat to the B & B and spent the rest of the afternoon trying to get our clothes dry , sorting out our photos and updating our blogs. As we’d missed lunch today we opted to head out for an early dinner, thinking we’d just try one of the pubs in town. We wandered into the Royal Hotel restaurant on the waterfront, the sign on the door said open at 5am but the place was as empty as a tomb and after we’d waited for 5 minutes and nobody showed up we decided to ytry alsewhere. Around the corner we opened the door of the Antlers Restaurant in the Portree Hotel and it was buzzing! This was definitely the place to be.  I was craving some chicken after not having eaten any for 2 weeks and when I saw the “Pan fried chicken breast with mushroom sauce and haggis bon-bons, my dining decision was made! It was wonderful and I thoroughly enjoyed my second round of haggis in one day.

We walked back to the hotel feeling a bit better about the day but Portree had one more thing up it’s sleeve to make up for the miserable morning. We were sitting in our room at around 8pm when the unmistakable sound of bagpipes wafted in the window. Charlotte had mentioned that  apipe band usually played in the town square on Tuesday nights but she thought the weather would put them off. Fortunately the Isle of Skye Pipe Band are made of stron stuff and a little drizzle wasn’t going to deter them! In fact by the time we got outside we found that the rain had stopped and a crown had gathered to watch the band march up from the bank building to the square where they put on a short and stirring show. It was such a nice way to finish the day, there’s something so very stirring about the sound of bagpipes…particularly in Scotland!