Day 3
A day of planned travel to a couple of far-off places, we were intrigued by the Callanish Stones and the history that are associated to them, so this was our first stop off of the day.
We pulled up at a smaller stone circle before we realised our error and then headed for the correct stone monument.
It was when we reached the Callanish Stones that we read that there are several smaller stone monuments located around this central stone monument.
The height and layout of the stones was fascinating, unfortunately the weather gods were being a tad unkind to us, no sun, just flat light and overcast skies, so no creative photos from this location today.
There is a shop and visitor center at the stones, although this was closed for refurbishment at the time of our visit, but there was a small café where you could purchase a warm drink and snacks.
From Callanish we headed for the Mangersta Sea Stacks on the western coast of the Isle of Lewis,
Our schoolboy error was not realising the time it would take to travel to and from this location, although the distance is only about 40 miles, it took us 50 minutes to drive there.
My research informed us that parking was sparse and the road narrow, however on the day we visited the wind was howling, rain battering down, hence not may cars about, so I was able to park in one of the small road-side parking areas, just big enough for one car.
Upon leaving the car, the short struggle over the moors to view the sea stacks was an eventful experience. The wind and rain were battering me full on, several times it nearly knocked me off my feet,
Once at the cliff tops the view was amazing, you can easily see why this place is so popular with the photography fraternity.
Unfortunately, I was unable to use my tripod to gain a suitable viewpoint as the wind was blowing this over, even me holding on to it was a fight and the tripod was vibrating quite significantly.
I found a couple of locations in some dips in the ground and kept the tripod low with its legs out as far as they would go. Even this set-up was a battle against the wind, then the inevitable happened, it began bloody pouring down. I was now using cloth after cloth to try and keep my camera lens dry, a loosing battle.
The images I took were not bad, they could have been special, but the weather conditions were against me.
After a hour or so, I gave in, packed up and retreated to the car, soaked and battered.
A link to more information about the Mangersta Sea Stacks can be found here.
On the way home we passed Loch a’ Mhorghain and witnessed something that I had not seen before, the wind was that strong it was lifting the water out of the lock and blowing it away with such force. I tried to get out of the car to photograph this phenomenon, but gave up as I could not open the car door against the force of the wind, so I improvised, I moved the car so that I could lower the window and get a snap of the event ?
We then retreated to the hotel to sample a couple of hours of their excellent hospitality.
Day 4
This was going to be a one location trip; we were heading to the Isle of Scalpay to see what the area looked like and to visit the Eilean Glas Lighthouse.
To get on the island we crossed the quaint road bridge, this is a single lane affair which is a recent construction to aid the islands transport links, Scalpay Bridge opened in 1997 and was designed by Halcrow Crouch. It replaced a bow loaded ferry as Scalpay’s link to Harris. Its design had to consider complex geology, environmental impact, climactic conditions, the lack of existing infrastructure and fit the natural beauty of the location. From here we viewed the unique houses on the island as we headed towards the lighthouse.
We came to the footpath towards the light house, so we wrapped up and began the adventure, the path is well appointed and relatively easy to navigate, with some amazing Moraines (mounds of poorly sorted till where rock debris has been dumped by melting ice or pushed by moving ice) on display, one near the lighthouse gained my attention as it reminded me of a dice
The lighthouse is within its walled grounds and forms a formidable structure on the headland. As you drop down towards the building the small quaint harbour comes in to view, walk a little closed to the lighthouse and a lovely bothy is found, this is well maintained with couple of chairs, books and a little tinned food on the shelves, a small wood burned would provide any warmth required.
We scrambled and explored the Lighthouse grounds, with the main interest being the sea, huge waves battering the shoreline. The lighthouse is now un-manned, but the people who used to work at these facilities must have been brave and hardy souls.
We had dark, very dark clouds heading our way, so we made the executive decision to begin the 1.5 mile walk back to the car, hoping that we got back before the clouds emptied their considerable contents on us.
The need for a little urgency on the return walk ensured we took a lot less notice of the surrounding landscape, we made it back to the car just in time, as we left the car park the heavens opened.
Another mid afternoon finish for us, so we retreated to the hotel for a well deserved meal and drink, followed by another drink, and another, and !!!
Day 5 was going to be a biggie.
Off to explore the far north of the Isle of Lewis, in particular some of the beaches on the east coast, particularly Garry Beach, the Garry Bridge, and Traigh Mhòr Beach.
I was really looking forward to today as I have seen numerous photos of these places, and they look fantastic. Unfortunately, the weather gods were again against us, 40 to 50 mile a hour winds. Low cloud, with extremely heavy showers were forecast for most of the day, but you have to make the best of what you can, don’t you.
Traigh Mhòr beach is a fantastic lump of sand, a place you can easily get sand-blasted, and your photography equipment covered in sand, well, at least on the day I visited.
As the ride was well out, and still reseeding, there was no way that I was heading to the shoreline, so I grabbed a couple of wide shots and retreated to the car.
On to Garry Beach where my hopes of getting any decent images were not too high. However, the tide had turned by the time I got to the sea stacks, but unfortunately it was still some distance away from the stacks.
I grabbed some wide, close-up images of some of the sea stacks, with the dark sharp rock contracting against the lovely, patterned sands.
From here I made (the unwise) decision to walk along the beach following the waters edge to he northern most end of the beach. I soon retreated from the water’s edge, as I was being battered by the wind, several times nearly sent sprawling into the sands surface.
Once I got to the northern end of the beach, I found a couple of rocks which had waves circulating them, so I tried to capture the water flowing around these rocks, with limited success. I could not view the images on the back of the camera as this was soaked with sea water and sand. When I viewed these image slate, I was disappointed with them, as I had not managed to capture the flow of the water as I had hoped.
Disheveled, wet and covered in sand I retreated from this location to get back to the car, walking into the gale force wind, this was not a pleasant experience, I assure you.
Once back at the car it was a case of getting rid of as much sand as I could, a change of footwear and time for a cuppa.
Whilst sitting enjoying the warm drink, the weather really closed in, with the rain battering down. I made the decision to head back to the hotel and not visit the bridge to nowhere, a choice that I would later regret.
The previous two days had been extraordinary wind, which had resulted in the ferry form Tarbert to Uig being cancelled, as we stood there was no certainty that our ferry would run at 7am on the day of our departure.
Despite contacting the ferry company, they could not provide any indication if the ferry would run or not, but they would update their web site once any decision had been made.
So, as we sat enjoying another excellent meal in the Harris Hotel, we were pondering on our predicament, several drinks later, the ferry companies web site was telling us that the ferry was running, but at an earlier time of 6am.
This change meant that I was not going to have the opportunity to get back to the Garry Bridge to nowhere, disappointed, yes, but there will be another time.
Our concerns were now concentrated on the possible ferry journey back to Uig on the Isle of Skye. The waves had been of a substantial size during our trips around the islands, what would the crossing be like?
Our homeward journey begins with a early, very early alarm, as we had to be at the ferry terminal 40 minutes before departure, and we were worried what the volume of traffic would be as the previous two days ferries had been cancelled. So, here we were checking in to the ferry at 5.15am and being towards the back of the que of vehicles waiting to board the ferry.
Once on board the ferry we made our way to the rear of the vessel, found a couple of seats, had a cuppa and waited for the adventure to begin. Whilst the crossing was a bit on the rough side, we managed to cope with the conditions and were soon disembarking at Uig for the journey back to Fort William for our overnight stay.
Our Review of our first journey to the Isle of Harris and Lewis.
Firstly, the hotels we stayed in, the Caledonian Hotel at Fort William and the Harris Hotel at Tarbert were very good, the staff were fantastic at both venues, with our rooms being clean and the food good.
A special mention must go to the staff at the Harris Hotel, who were magnificent, nothing was any problem to them, and they provided lots of local knowledge to us during our visit.
The weather, obviously we can’t change this, but it was, shall we say, “not the best”, but this did not detract from what was a lovely holiday for us.
We did not get to some locations which we identified, this was partly to our ignorance of not realising the travel times on the island, and of course the weather did impact on this at times.
Will we, would we, go back to the Isle of Harris and Lewis, of course we will, but we will probably break the journey up more and allow more time to visit the areas we never go to this time.
Thank you for taking the time to read this article.
