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Wednesday : Overcast
Getting woken up early by kids yelling isn't the way I usually like being woken up, and its been happening a lot lately too. It probably was for the best as we had a big day on the road in front of us. We were heading over to Skye for a look and some lunch then up to the north west highlands.
We got packed and then had a nice somehow quiet breakfast in the timber kitchen, and we were on the road by 8:30. Nice drive this morning very quiet on the roads, we followed lots of lovely lochs and mountains, then things got a little louder when a couple jets flew by at loch level! Man that has to be the best job in the world! We stopped off for a break at Eilean Donan Castle. We had a good walk around taking some pics at another awesome looking castle positioned on a lake.
I must say a thanks to the kids for getting us out of bed and on the road a bit earlier this morning. Because just as we were leaving 4 or more tour buses pulled up unloading heaps of people, and my guess is that they were all heading to the same place as we were. So thanks to the kids for putting us an hour in front!
It wasn't a very long stop after the castle when we went over the bridge onto Skye, and it wasn't soon after that when we were struck with some beautiful looking scenery. Huge lochs with towering mountains above, with their peaks covered up with clouds and mist.
The roads were brilliant too nice quiet windy roads all the way to Portree the island capital. It's a pretty little town, it had a number of shops and a small market set up in the car park. Which did make it difficult to find a spot.
We continued onto to the port and fishing village of Uig, passing some stunning Glens, and cliffs. You can catch the ferry from here to go out to the western isles. We saw some signs for the Skye brewery that interested us more, and it had just gone midday so we thought why not! The signs unfortunately only lead us to a small shop, that mostly sold tourist trinkets, and a very limited range of bottled beer. That weren't even chilled! Bummer.
We followed a single track up the hill giving way to huge camper vans so that they could pass. Once up the top the track lead through nice farmland and we took a side road to some church ruins with view of some cliffs and the other islands out to sea. Yep this looked like a nice place to have some lunch, the sun even came out for us as well.
With lunch put away we made our way back off Skye and up to the north west highlands. We stopped off at a really nice village called Ullapool, I think Ullapool may be the first village we really like, a lot.
Ullapool is still not medieval, but it was nice and quiet and we finally got our beers, well Kim had a red instead. We then had a short walk through town, and picked some takeaway coffees. We also picked up a big piece of fresh locally caught salmon for dinner. Yum Yum!
We had another 38kms to go to our destination of Achiltibuie, and the scenery change again. It was just untouched green fields and lochs with these scattered hills and mountains that shoot up so steeply. Like they did everywhere I suppose, but up here there were very few trees so you could see for miles, which made it seem so vast.
It was a little difficult to find the hostel, the sign wasn't the best, and you could only see a small section of the roof from the road. There was no driveway too just a small sign saying that it was 1/2 a mile walk with an arrow pointing us in the direction down the fern covered track. It all sounds great! Until we realised that all the other cars parked here must be for the hostel too. We chose not to take our packs down just yet, just our toiletries and valuables because we knew that this was a very small hostel with separated female and male toilets and dorms so we wanted to suss out the situation first.
The hostel is truly in a picture perfect location, with nothing around at all, and the track leading down follows a little creek which leads out to the sea with views of the summer isles.
When we get to the hostel we are told that because of a young family was here, they needed the big 8 sleeper male dorm to put their two cots in. So I got told that I would be sleeping in a cupboard by reception with 3 other blokes. Yippie! The cupboard could just fit 2 bunk beds and a chair, so yeah no room for my pack that's for sure. Kim on the other hand was fine she had a nice big dorm with plenty of space.
The realization of our quiet couple few days were soon short lived, because in came the family! With their two very young screaming walkers. We had one look around after the mess and noise that they had created in the short time of them arriving back from the day at the beach. And we immediately changed from two to one nights stay. Haha! Now I know that Im sounding like a whinger but we were absolutely gutted that we decided to cancel a night. We had been looking forward this hostel since we booked it before we even finished work. Looking forward to the space and peace and quiet, and the walking which has now been cancelled. It's just amazing that we can't get away from people in this country, not like you can back home that's for sure. All our walks had loads of people on them. (Well except for Rowen) Even booking a hostel in the absolute middle of nowhere 38kms, an hour drive to the nearest town with a shop. We find it being booked out solid, but just to make it that little bit more crowded it had the kids, running around and hitting people in the family jewls. All our hostels except from the Rowen and Edinburgh hostels have had heaps of kids, I think that they are taking the youth in yha a little too literally, and we could deal with another night of kids. We couldn't even sit outside to get away form the little ones, because there were these insects flying around called midges and they bite a lot! Worse than mozzies!
So we fought for some space in the tiny kitchen and made our dinner. The meal that Kim put together made quite a few people jealous it was delicious! Especially when over half the ingredients were given to us by a girl at one off the previous hostels. Tastes better when it's free! The salmon was the star though it was so good! We couldn't do the washing up after dinner because of the lack of space, so we went for a walk to a nearby beach, that we got told was very nice. Yes it was very nice but I wouldn't call it a beach, more of where the water meets rock. It was very still and calm out on the water tonight, not as much as a ripple washed up onto the rocks. We watched a row of ducks pass under the lovely sunset out to sea, then followed the track around, back up onto the road and to the car to pickup a few more things.
We went back inside because the midges had gotten the better of us, and did the washing up. Kim and I needed a break from the conversations of the others in the cramped hostel dining room, I couldn't deal with it tonight I was too tired. So we said our good nights and went to bed. I spent the evening looking at the sea through the cupboard window in peace.
Soon I was joined by a very nice father and son and had a chat about our stay in the Uk before it was time for bed. I found out the reason why the Scottish highland towns and villages look recently built. It was because of the highland clearances back in the 18th & 19th centuries. The clans were forced out to the scottish lowlands by the landowners that were supported by the government to use the land for farming.
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