Adding a splash of awesome: Isle of Skye

On Sunday Veronica and I got up rather early (7.30am, yes pa and brudda I know that is not early for everyone, but for me on a Sunday it is pretty early) to meet the bus that was going to take us around the Isle of Skye on the Best of Skye Tour. We got picked up and then headed up to Portree where we got a short stop to see the harbour and the famous coloured houses and to pick up a couple more passengers; there were 8 of us in total once we had all been collected.

We then headed up to the Old Man of Storr, which turned out to be a pile of rocks lol, Storr means big/prominent so am guessing some old man noticed them or claimed them (can you tell who didn’t read the full information board haha). Veronica and I walked up to the bottom of the main hill with all of the big rocks, I plan to come back one day as you can walk right up to them and all the way behind them which I would loved to have done but there was not enough time. The walk up took around 35-40mins and was pretty steep until you get to the rock clambering part of it which is way fun :) well way fun for me, Missie bumped the back of her head on a rock when she heroically saved me from a face plant so she didn't love the rock clambering part as much. The views we got were so wicked awesome it was worth the walk, the rest of the bus did not make it all the way up just some of the way, and I think they missed out on something pretty special. We not only got views of the rocks but also of the lakes down by the road, we took loads of photos.

After this we went to somewhere that had a lot of dinosaur fossils found around it and also had amazing views of the cliffs on the coast, cant remember the name of the place but it began with S so may look it up for you at some stage. Missie and I were way more into the taking photos of pretty places than we were of finding out where exactly we were lol. There were lots of stops throughout the day for photos so some places we didn’t even know where we were at all, just somewhere on the side of the road taking photos of pretty things.

After this we headed up to the Quiraing which is basically a really good view of Skye, its famous or something and also lots of tourists seemed to be there. There were a lot of walks around it so again would like to go back there one day and go wandering. We did the jump photo which is apparently tradition, not sure how to get it though as the guide took it on his camera lol.

We then went to Uig for a toilet stop (as the Isle of Skye is very religious no cafes or public toilets were open except for it seemed in Uig, there also were not many other bus tours as most drivers don’t work on a Sunday, ours was an atheist so was happy to work Sundays lol). We also went to the Isle of Skye brewery where the others all got to sample some Isle of Skye beer, I didn’t as they don’t yet make a gluten free beer but it is something they are looking into, yup I asked.

After Uig it was off to the Fairy Glen for lunch and more stories and climbing :) The Fairy Glen was also real pretty and there was a fairy circle which we walked into the middle of following the path round and round, left a token in the middle (I left a fern leaf) and made a wish then we had to walk out backwards round and round. It was actually which fun.

After this we drove to some thatched houses and a old school graveyard which had really nice views overlooking the sea. Then we got back in the minivan and drove to the ruins of a castle, another stretch of the legs to get to the castle ruins and take some cool photos. Got the story of how one clan had the castle then another took it but then one of their young daughters fell out a window and plummeted down onto the rocks and got washed out to sea so they thought they were cursed and moved leaving the castle to just ruin. Missy decided she wanted a closer look at the castle and she hopped past the fence for a look but then couldn't get back so I had to reach through the fence help her get back. By now it was getting darker and we were all pretty tired so did not mind that that was the end of the tour, we got on the bus and Rob (the driver who I forgot to mention) dropped us all off at our respective towns.

The tour was real fun and I would totally recommend Tour Skye for anyone looking to do a bus tour of Skye. Next time I will have a car so can go where I please and walk for as long as I want :) Somewhere along the way Veronica turned to me and said ‘wow have you ever seen so many sheep’, to which I responded with a laugh ‘I’m from NZ’. Lol she then laughed to and commented that she had asked that to the wrong person on the bus hehe.

After the tour Missie and I pondered if we wanted to go out for tea or just chill at the hostel as going out was an effort and we were tired and not sure if we were all that hungry. We decided that we would go out and we are so glad we did. We went to Café Sia and got ourselves a ham and cheese pizza and a cider, the pizza was amazing, there was no issue with us not eating the whole thing, it got inhaled hehe. Café Sia totally gets thumbs up from us :)

Tomorrow I am off to Inverness in the morning and will be there until Friday when I fly to Dublin. I plan to spend tomorrow afternoon chilling somewhere with wi-fi so I can post these posts I’ve just typed and also rest as its been a hectic couple days and I am doing another bus tour on Tuesday so that will probably also be quite full on.

View from hostel when got up

View while waiting for our tour to collect us

The famous coloured houses in Portree along the harbour

Seriously good reflection on the lake of the Old Man of Storr (aka the big rocks on the hill)

Another nice pic (ps there are a lot of pics in this post cos there were so many good ones)

Partway up to the Old Man of Storr

Old Mann of Storr

Us being tiny

View from up where we were looking back over the lakes

Missie wanting her solo photo

Partway down, photo just cos

Same as above hehe

The place I don't know what its called but had gorgeous views, this was looking north...

... and this was looking south

The Quiraing

The Fairy Glen, Missie thought we should stay here till we saw fairies

Same pic just with me sitting down for lunch hehe

The Fairy Circle, Veronica was walking the wrong way cos we hadn't been told the rules yet lol

I'm King of the World (on the big rock thing in the middle of the pic a couple above, and yes I yelled that when I got to the top to the laughter of the other people on the tour lol)