The Journey North. Day 21.  Saturday 12th May 2018

From: Skye-Sligachan              To: Staffin Bay          GR: NG489685    Mileage: 45

We slept on single bunks last night. The first time in the lorry. This was because in case it rained again during the night. The water should run/drip straight down between the bunks into the washing up bowl. If the bed was made into a double the chances were we wouldn’t know it was leaking until it was too late.

The sun was up this morning but the Met had promised snow showers overnight and this am. It didn’t happen. We both used the hot showers on site. A surprise in as much as the campsite itself was quite basic but the water was hot, powerful, plentiful and free. On completion of our morning ablutions we departed the site but not before I managed a quick chat with the guy who had originally booked us in. I told him that we put in a good word for him yesterday, his day off, with the boss, when he came around to collect the money. It’s all cash here. No receipt as such, just a tag to put in your windscreen. I never saw either the boss or the staff member record any details in any ledger. Even the tag numbers were not numbered. £8 a head plus £5 a night if you wanted ‘leckie’. Must be one of the most popular sites on the island. Cash is King!

As we exited the slight incline from the campsite onto the A87 towards Portree there was a deluge of water from the roof area. It once again entered the truck. We stopped and began mop up operations. It must have been sat on the roof, puddled. It was soon dealt with.

Portree and the Co-op was our next stop. Rations. We had skipped breakfast this am in an attempt to get ahead of ourselves for the Northern part of Skye. Mike’s tum tum was rumbling and he could not pass by the cooked chickens, pies or jumbo sausages. A jumbo sausage £1-00 and a baguette for £0.80 took care of breakfast on our return to the van. (I had to spice it up with some tom sauce, lettuce and sliced tomato and put it on a plate for Miss Fancy Knickers though!)

The countryside here is spectacular as would all be on this peninsular. Our next stop was Uig. Here one can catch the ferry to two other Islands. I’ve never heard of ‘em and I suspect you haven’t either so I won’t bother mentioning them. (Tarbert and Lochmaddy) We wandered into the local pottery shop of which there were two. One was selling old copper Fortic cylinders converted to lamps. Wal was doing that years ago! The other shop was the Skye Brewery. We bought nowt in either.

Driving on, our next stop was the Skye Museum of Island Life. £2-50 each. No concessions! This was set around five crofts. One was inhabited and visited by the future king and queen of England in 1933 also on 'display' was their barn and sumat else. Together with a mock up of a shop a cobblers and blacksmiths.  The other six or so buildings were reconstructions of a blacksmiths shop, weavers and cobblers cottage and a village store. Selling considerably less than you would imagine or hope. The charge for their loos here was 40p. As is seemingly common with most other places Cornwall especially the council have shed responsibility for the WCs and given them to the parish. Signs asking for 40p donations (it costs £5000 pa to run the loos) fell on deaf ears or should that be blind eyes as far as Mike was concerned. As soon as loos close people will start using lay-bys as loos as they do in France!

We were now on the Northern part of the island at Duntulm. Pulling over, we were once again on the single track road system here, to allow a red Mustang, roof down to pass, it’s reg number read Nessie, we turned a corner and there was the ruins of Castle Duntulm.

However it was not on our visitors list today. We had a slightly more adventurous route to take. We found the car park at the head of the path to Rubha Hunish. This is the old Lookout post that is now a bothy. Ben Gardiner, one of our Canoe Cornwall pals had spent a night here in Jan 2018 when he did the North Coast 500 and recommended it. It was only a three mile return walk on an easy path.

This Bothy features in The Book of Bothies. A great coffee top table book if that is your sort of thing. Bothies are great. You tab into them and spend a night or two. All free. Bringing everything you might need. Everything. The down side is you might get there and someone else has grabbed all the bunk space. You need to be prepared to bivvy outside!

There was a gaggle of walkers milling around. I hadn’t travelled 1000 miles to have them in my photo shots so waited till they vacated. One of the women came from Plymouth! I am uncertain whether there was a resident ‘guardien’ or it was just some eccentric chap carrying out painting work. Our greetings to him on entering elicited no reply in any language and my smile and hopefully encouraging remarks did nothing to resolve the situation. We merely smiled and said “Catch you soon.” His broad Scottish accent would suggest he was a local. Perhaps unofficial ‘guardienne’. He was stooped and had a gammy leg. Mine’s been playing up as well.

This was a beautiful viewpoint. Yes we have Ex Coastguard Lookouts in Devon and Cornwall as well but strewth it was a stunning view. We took photos of Ben and Jess’s entry in the visitors book for the third January 2018. Entered our own details. The Stopporton’s Journey North Day 21. 12 May 2018. And took our leave. If the old man had said “I dinna suppose you have a wee bit o’ cheese about ye lad?” I would not have been surprised. See Treasure Island!

 

We found a spot for some wild camping for the night at Staffin Bay GR NG 489685. Fantastic evening sun bright and strong with tremendous views out over the bay to the North Atlantic where one could see shipping passing by. It was an occasion to break out the bubbly. This was to be the best campsite of the whole trip and in many respects one of the better days. Of course the sun shinning helps a lot!