The Isle of Skye
Red Skye at night, travelers delight. By Clare Llewelyn Riley.
I think of Skye in its colors. In the spritely greens of the moss that cushions much of the landscape and the harsher, more sandpapery green of grass tufting the hillsides. The ochre yellows of the dried grasses in the less moisture-ridden areas. The rich burgundy of the dried ferns creating sweeps of foliage the color of dried blood, dramatic and beautiful when seen against the tawny hills. The smokey gray of the rocks that adorn the mountain slopes and of the great cliffs that break through the greenery like scars. In the stark white of a certain fungus that clings to the rocks reminding me of snow and of the painted stone houses that dot the hillocks and harbors forming little villages of human solidarity amongst a landscape as foreboding as it is beautiful.
So marks my memory of the Isle of Skye a week after I first set off on a northbound train with three friends, a few backpacks between us, and a bag of food. After a ridiculous amount of card games and about five or six hours of traveling, we arrived at the last mainland town--Kyle of Lochalsh--where we rented a car and set off over a bridge and onto the Isle of Skye. My first images of Skye were of its eastern coastline to one side, the mountains rising on the other, and simple houses of white-painted stone intermingled between the two. That first afternoon we drove to Portree, the capital of Skye, and settled into the Bayfield Backpackers Hostel, our home for the next three days. The town of Portree, though probably the largest in Skye, consists of just a couple central streets and a quaint harbor. Bayfield Backpackers is a very pleasant hostel in the center of town with clean rooms and bathrooms, a large and well-equipped kitchen, and an attached common area overlooking the bay. Portree was really the perfect branching off point for the rest of our travels. Our three-day stay in Skye was marked by early days of hiking, driving from village to village on little country roads spotted with herds of sheep and cattle, and early retirements spent playing monopoly and cooking dinner in our hostel’s kitchen. Reflecting back, I can pinpoint three experiences you must not miss on any venture to the Isle of Skye:
The Quiraing, one of the most well-noted hikes on Skye, is situated along the Totternish Ridge which runs down most of the isle’s northeastern peninsula. This six mile loop takes you along the base of the ridge, climbs to the crest, and then backtracks to the trailhead along the ridge’s plateau. The first leg of the hike provides magnificent views of the lofty crags of the Totternish Ridge on one side. These rock-faces have formed in such a way they bring to mind the exalted pipes of a church organ. They create a system of long, thin folds--like a folded fan--which exude a sense of reaching, reaching towards the heavens perhaps, like cathedral ceilings. On the other side of the trail, reaches out a view of the countryside beneath leading to the sea and spotted with intermittent signs of civilization: the same white houses, a few roads here and there, and a lonely graveyard. The landscape is one of sweeps of tufted grass which seem to glisten from the dew that clings firm to their blades. A few small lochs, crater-like reflective pools, and tributaries of water, large scale nerve nets, break up the long stretches of greenery. The trail continues on so for sometime until it begins to climb upwards and to the crest of the ridge. The ridge’s shelf is like one ever-expansive pasture of ochre-colored grass which contrasts magnificently with the rich blue skies. Great expanses of sea are visible beyond and, below, a lower plateau turfed in grass of springiest green and cosseted by towers of menacing bluff is revealed. The hike continues along this shelf for some time before the flattened plateau begins to curve off and the trail follows a downwards slope towards the original trail head. The Quiraing provides an epic first encounter with the Isle of Skye, revealing the extremes of its raw and stark beauty.
Also situated on the Totternish Ridge, the Old Man of Storr is a great oval-shaped rock outcropping. It can be seen from the main road, but even more spectacular is seeing it right in front of you, precariously jutting out from the ridge’s heights. This is another looping hike about 2 1/2 miles round trip. The trek uphill first climbs through a thickly forested area. One section of the trail leads through a small grove of pine trees. Here, the ground is carpeted in a thick layer of pine needles and the tree trunks are covered in a bright green moss, creating an amazing image of contrasting colors and textures. Once the trail escapes the tree covering, the terrain changes to knoll-like formations covered in a mixture of moss and grass, shifting from yellow to green and interrupted by rumbling rocks, the same ones bearing the snow-like fungus. Eventually the path opens up onto a view of the craggy outcroppings of the Storr and the Old Man in his fine balancing act. The trail continues to the base of the Old Man. From here the views looking down upon the unfurling sea and the rest of the Isle are remarkable and more revealing than those seen from the Quiraing. From this point, you can circle around the backside of the Old Man and follow the same path down the hillside. This relatively short hike is one of views of incredible quality and well worth the upwards trek.
The Faerie Glen is best depicted by its given name. Found down a small country road from the northern town of Uig, this is a magical place. It beholds a strange, otherworldly, and mythic beauty. Driving up to it, you feel as if you have come upon a terrain out of a novel like The Lord of the Rings. Faerie Glen is an area of a number of cone-shaped hillocks. These hills are the same yellowish-green of those found at The Storr. But these are adorned with patches of ferns, turned burnt red with the coming winter. The hills are reminiscent of waves, as slight swaying ridges mark the hillsides. Wandering along the sheep paths that wind through the system of hillocks, you come across small groves of moss-hewn trees and rocks and a certain valley where visitors past have written with rocks on the grass. Faerie Glen is a landscape different from any I have seen before, teeming with moisture and color and mystical lore, it is a quintessential sight of the Isle of Skye. It is a manifestation of the wonder and awe that emanates from every last blade of grass on the Isle.
Coming back to St Andrews this week, I have found my mind wondering to the crags of the Totternish Peninsula, the forested alcoves of Faerie Glen, to the spacious kitchen of our little Portree hostel. While three days of hiking and immersing myself in the natural splendor of the Isle of Skye was the perfect getaway from university life, it’s been difficult readjusting to life in hall. I’ve found myself yearning for the more isolated quality of rural living and nature’s constant presence. While the Isle of Skye may be the perfect haven for a lover of the outdoors, be forewarned, you may very well not want to return to the more tame and cluttered aspects of town life.
I think of Skye in its colors. In the spritely greens of the moss that cushions much of the landscape and the harsher, more sandpapery green of grass tufting the hillsides. The ochre yellows of the dried grasses in the less moisture-ridden areas. The rich burgundy of the dried ferns creating sweeps of foliage the color of dried blood, dramatic and beautiful when seen against the tawny hills. The smokey gray of the rocks that adorn the mountain slopes and of the great cliffs that break through the greenery like scars. In the stark white of a certain fungus that clings to the rocks reminding me of snow and of the painted stone houses that dot the hillocks and harbors forming little villages of human solidarity amongst a landscape as foreboding as it is beautiful.
So marks my memory of the Isle of Skye a week after I first set off on a northbound train with three friends, a few backpacks between us, and a bag of food. After a ridiculous amount of card games and about five or six hours of traveling, we arrived at the last mainland town--Kyle of Lochalsh--where we rented a car and set off over a bridge and onto the Isle of Skye. My first images of Skye were of its eastern coastline to one side, the mountains rising on the other, and simple houses of white-painted stone intermingled between the two. That first afternoon we drove to Portree, the capital of Skye, and settled into the Bayfield Backpackers Hostel, our home for the next three days. The town of Portree, though probably the largest in Skye, consists of just a couple central streets and a quaint harbor. Bayfield Backpackers is a very pleasant hostel in the center of town with clean rooms and bathrooms, a large and well-equipped kitchen, and an attached common area overlooking the bay. Portree was really the perfect branching off point for the rest of our travels. Our three-day stay in Skye was marked by early days of hiking, driving from village to village on little country roads spotted with herds of sheep and cattle, and early retirements spent playing monopoly and cooking dinner in our hostel’s kitchen. Reflecting back, I can pinpoint three experiences you must not miss on any venture to the Isle of Skye:
- The Quiraing
The Quiraing, one of the most well-noted hikes on Skye, is situated along the Totternish Ridge which runs down most of the isle’s northeastern peninsula. This six mile loop takes you along the base of the ridge, climbs to the crest, and then backtracks to the trailhead along the ridge’s plateau. The first leg of the hike provides magnificent views of the lofty crags of the Totternish Ridge on one side. These rock-faces have formed in such a way they bring to mind the exalted pipes of a church organ. They create a system of long, thin folds--like a folded fan--which exude a sense of reaching, reaching towards the heavens perhaps, like cathedral ceilings. On the other side of the trail, reaches out a view of the countryside beneath leading to the sea and spotted with intermittent signs of civilization: the same white houses, a few roads here and there, and a lonely graveyard. The landscape is one of sweeps of tufted grass which seem to glisten from the dew that clings firm to their blades. A few small lochs, crater-like reflective pools, and tributaries of water, large scale nerve nets, break up the long stretches of greenery. The trail continues on so for sometime until it begins to climb upwards and to the crest of the ridge. The ridge’s shelf is like one ever-expansive pasture of ochre-colored grass which contrasts magnificently with the rich blue skies. Great expanses of sea are visible beyond and, below, a lower plateau turfed in grass of springiest green and cosseted by towers of menacing bluff is revealed. The hike continues along this shelf for some time before the flattened plateau begins to curve off and the trail follows a downwards slope towards the original trail head. The Quiraing provides an epic first encounter with the Isle of Skye, revealing the extremes of its raw and stark beauty.
- The Old Man of Storr
Also situated on the Totternish Ridge, the Old Man of Storr is a great oval-shaped rock outcropping. It can be seen from the main road, but even more spectacular is seeing it right in front of you, precariously jutting out from the ridge’s heights. This is another looping hike about 2 1/2 miles round trip. The trek uphill first climbs through a thickly forested area. One section of the trail leads through a small grove of pine trees. Here, the ground is carpeted in a thick layer of pine needles and the tree trunks are covered in a bright green moss, creating an amazing image of contrasting colors and textures. Once the trail escapes the tree covering, the terrain changes to knoll-like formations covered in a mixture of moss and grass, shifting from yellow to green and interrupted by rumbling rocks, the same ones bearing the snow-like fungus. Eventually the path opens up onto a view of the craggy outcroppings of the Storr and the Old Man in his fine balancing act. The trail continues to the base of the Old Man. From here the views looking down upon the unfurling sea and the rest of the Isle are remarkable and more revealing than those seen from the Quiraing. From this point, you can circle around the backside of the Old Man and follow the same path down the hillside. This relatively short hike is one of views of incredible quality and well worth the upwards trek.
- Faerie Glen at Uig
The Faerie Glen is best depicted by its given name. Found down a small country road from the northern town of Uig, this is a magical place. It beholds a strange, otherworldly, and mythic beauty. Driving up to it, you feel as if you have come upon a terrain out of a novel like The Lord of the Rings. Faerie Glen is an area of a number of cone-shaped hillocks. These hills are the same yellowish-green of those found at The Storr. But these are adorned with patches of ferns, turned burnt red with the coming winter. The hills are reminiscent of waves, as slight swaying ridges mark the hillsides. Wandering along the sheep paths that wind through the system of hillocks, you come across small groves of moss-hewn trees and rocks and a certain valley where visitors past have written with rocks on the grass. Faerie Glen is a landscape different from any I have seen before, teeming with moisture and color and mystical lore, it is a quintessential sight of the Isle of Skye. It is a manifestation of the wonder and awe that emanates from every last blade of grass on the Isle.
Coming back to St Andrews this week, I have found my mind wondering to the crags of the Totternish Peninsula, the forested alcoves of Faerie Glen, to the spacious kitchen of our little Portree hostel. While three days of hiking and immersing myself in the natural splendor of the Isle of Skye was the perfect getaway from university life, it’s been difficult readjusting to life in hall. I’ve found myself yearning for the more isolated quality of rural living and nature’s constant presence. While the Isle of Skye may be the perfect haven for a lover of the outdoors, be forewarned, you may very well not want to return to the more tame and cluttered aspects of town life.