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British Mensa Travel Special Interest Group |
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From
Skye to Lewis: a journey through the Hebrides by Insa Thierling The first day of my first longer cycling tour the train is late, the ferry is late, and the road leading north from Arrandale runs uphill. The term "travelling light" has never been associated with me, so I have to struggle. There is no chance of reaching Sligachan before dark, but tiredness overcomes me anyway, so I stop at a B&B in the middle of nowhere, which seems much nicer than an overcrowded youth hostel or a campsite. The next day is beautiful. I cycle around the rock of Mull, a route that offers marvellous views over the neighbouring islands. It is very hot for August, and I soon find myself sunburnt. The midges are pretty nasty here, too! The way to Portree is fantastic - it's downhill for miles and miles, and behind every corner the view gets more amazing. I have planned to spend a couple of days in Skye, hoping to make it to Dunvegan Castle. But I change my mind. There are moments when I feel deeply ashamed of my fellow Germans. Especially when, at 10pm, they choose to entertain the entire campsite with German language rock music. Why can't I have them deported to lbiza? There are just too many people here at the moment, so the next day I pack up and head towards Uig. The game "spot the local" soon becomes boring, because it seems to be a hopeless pursuit. To my utter surprise, in a supermarket in the outskirts of Portree, I hear someone speaking Gaelic. There is hope! After all, one of my reasons for coming here was to get some language practice. Against all expectations, it takes me only one hour to get to Uig, and after cycling for miles through beautiful landscape, backpackers storm the place and order massive amounts of tea and coffee. By the time we reach Lochmaddy in North Uist, it's dark. And it's pouring. To top it all, I lose my way, and it takes me half an hour to find the youth hostel. The shower is alive with mould. Yuk. The next morning brings more rain. But I am brave, and determined to make it to South Uist today. On the way I stop to see the chambered cairn of Barpa Langais, and Poball Fhinn (Finn's People), a very interesting stone circle that has fern growing all over its centre, but none at all growing on its outside. And there's a strange kind of feel to the place. I stop again at Clachan for some food, but as I leave the shop, the rain has worsened. I choose to wait under a sheltered bus stop, and a friendly local comes up and we have a chat. After 15 minutes or so I decide to go on after all. But I don't get too far, as after 3 hours of cycling through ceaseless rain, the water starts seeping through the seams of my jacket, and my so-called waterproof shoes give up the ghost - they are soaked through. Although it's only just 12:30pm, I stop at the next best B&B. I am dripping. The landlady is an absolute darling, lets me in and dries my stuff above the Aga. Of course, the sun is shining again within minutes of my arrival. The landlady searches the house and then finds me a pair of trainers so I can go out and cycle over the causeway to the small island of Baleshare. As I spot the next wave of rain clouds in the sky, I make my way back. There are loads of causeways the next day, as I cross Benbecula to South Uist. The landscape is beautiful. Somehow in these islands the grass is greener, the sky is bluer and the sheep are whiter. I soon reach South Uist (for Benbecula is flat!) whose Catholicism becomes immediately visible by quite a few statues of Mary. Unfortunately she doesn't hear my prayers for protection from the midges. By the time I reach the independent hostel in Howmore, I am well bitten. Tobha Mor is a former blackhouse with no hot water. There's a motley crowd of folks in the hostel including a brain surgeon and a guy from the Netherlands who teaches us Dutch swearwords, much to everyone's amusement. I also meet a very friendly German couple who have planned pretty much the same route as I. We'll see who makes it to Harris first. Everyone takes the next day off to explore the beautiful beach, the mountains and the old cemetery behind the house. The peace is only occasionally disturbed by a local youth racing his motorbike over the dunes. In the evening, we gather again around the small Morso oven in the kitchen, our only source of heat, boiling pot after pot of water for tea to keep ourselves warm. The next day is lovely, and the wind is in my back. Just before I reach Benbecula again, I stop to take a breath after some uphill cycling. But it is the landscape that takes a breath: it takes mine! I've never seen a pool as blue as the one I'm looking at now. It's the kind of view you want to keep in your memory rather than on a photo, so I leave the camera in the bag. I just can't stop looking and stand there for about a quarter of an hour. Before returning to the friendly B&B, I take a turn to go and see Teampull na Trionaid (Trinity Temple), the ruin of a medieval monastic settlement. A sheep tries to steal my sandwiches, but I manage to scare it off. Later I find out that the landlady is a Gaelic speaker, but my hopes of having a nice conversation with her are destroyed by the arrival of two Swabians. But they are genuinely nice and I forgive them. The next day takes me back to Lochmaddy harbour. The landlady has arranged to have my luggage taken there by car, and cycling along the newly-built road without it is almost like flying! I meet the Germans from Tobha Mor on the ferry, and within a few hours we find ourselves in Harris. There is a mountain path from Tarbert to Rhenigidale, the remotest of the island hostels, which they are going to take. As it looks like rain and I don't know what sort of terrain this path leads through, I decide not to take a risk and choose the 13-mile road. The worst of uphill struggles lies before me. It's raining, to top it all. There is no B&B by the roadside, for this is the middle of nowhere. Fortunately, there are more frustrated cyclists around, so we push the bikes up together for a while. Then I say goodbye to them and take the turn to Rhenigidale. Another 8 miles! The Street plunges very steeply down to almost sea level - a test for my brakes, and they cope brilliantly considering the road is not only steep but also wet. Down in the valley, there is a turn. And after this turn begins the strip of a constant 12% gradient. It goes on for miles and miles. At every corner I try to cheer myself up by telling myself, after that turn there'll be a bit of level road at least. But it just doesn't happen. Until all of a sudden, the road slopes down with a gradient of 13%. At the end of it, there's the hostel. At last! And hurrah! - there's a shower, and a friendly Australian who makes me a cup of tea. Two hours later, my German friends arrive, dripping with water and sweat. We don't last very long that evening. In the morning, Fiona the Australian takes us on a tour of the island in her car. Harris is probably one of the most interesting Hebridean islands because of its contrasting landscapes. The west coast has an almost mediterranean feel to it. Were it not for the mountains in the background with the dark clouds above them, on a sunny day like this one might easily believe oneself in the Algarve. We just can't get over the beauty of Luskentyre Beach and take lots of pictures. Fiona takes us on to Rodel church, the burial place of many illustrious MacLeod chiefs and a famous Gaelic poet. There are some very interesting slabs. After lunch we make our way back to Tarbert by the east coast, which stands in an amazing contrast to the west. The landscape formed by oddly-shaped rocks looks an ideal setting for a Star Trek episode - which would do the island a lot less damage than the proposed superquarry! In Tarbert we say goodbye to Fiona who travels on to Uist. We take the mountain path back to the hostel in beautiful weather. Thank Heaven I took the bike along the road, or I would have got myself into some dangerous situations. After three hours of climbing, descending, climbing again, and striding through the heather, we reach our hostel again. Once again, we go for the "Special Rice" dinners that are found in every island backpacker's survival kit. The next day is a Sunday, and we spend it in peace and quiet, walking, drawing, chatting and making lots of hot drinks because the Morso is too small to heat the room properly. We realize that the people who run the hostel must be Catholic: they dry their laundry outside! A few miles further north, the more fervent advocates of Hebridean Calvinism would very much disapprove of these "heathen practices". On Monday morning we all set off for Lewis, and we arrange to meet again at the independent hostel in Garenin in two days' time. After looking at the map, I think I might not get as far as Stornoway, but somehow it works out in the end. Lewis is all purple with heather, which makes a lovely colour scheme with the green grass, the black peat, and the blue sky. Unfortunately, the blue doesn't last. By the time I reach the outskirts of Stornoway, my feet are wet again. After a long search, I find a B&B, and funnily enough the landlady knows quite a few Lewis people I know. She, too, is incredibly friendly, and lets me leave my tent in the house until I come back from Garenin. On the way there, I stop in Shawbost to see the school museum and to have a look at a knitter's shop a friend has told me about. It is a really hot day, and I am eternally grateful as Sandra, the knitter, offers me a coke and biscuits. Then I find that she has a blue jumper exactly the shade of that pool in South Uist. I don't care about further luggage, I must have that jumper! Sandra and I keep on chatting for over an hour and, of course, she, too, knows people I know. Slightly sunburnt, I reach Garenin in the early evening. The hostel is well in German hands, the "Special Rice" is simmering away, clothes are drying on the pulley above the trusty Morso, and it all looks very atmospheric. But what is even more atmospheric is that night's sunset. [Of course, my camera made a black-ish mess of it.] One of the founders of the hostel has come to stay for the night. He's been coming here for many years, and he says he's never seen a sunset like it. Neither have we. The sea is turquoise and the sky is shaded in pink, orange and purple. There's a white ship on the horizon. It all looks like a kitschy postcard of the Caribbean, without the palm trees. We stand and watch in amazement until the sky turns black. The next day, I head for the Carloway Broch, then for the Standing Stones of Callanish. It's relatively early, and I only meet two friendly hippies who, like me, are soaking up the atmosphere of this ancient sacred site. But within 15 minutes, "all the energy is ****ed until tomorrow morning", as one of the hippies puts it, by the arrival of a German coach party who spill over the field and are forced to listen to their rather spiritless tour guide. The hippies run off while I take the last few pictures, always trying to avoid bits of multicoloured waterproof jackets sticking out behind the stones. The local archaeologist arrives with a group of Americans who keep on shouting how marvellous it all is, and disregarding the signs that ask visitors not to step onto the stones to avoid erosion; she puts them right onto the centre circle. I flee; on the way back I have to take shelter in the archaeologist's garage museum. On the walls, there are displays of the findings of her research (some of them slightly obscure, I find), and she also has a video of "Callanish through the Seasons" with a very soppy New Age harp soundtrack. Her American friends find it all marvellous. I make my way back to the Carloway village shop. The shopkeeper is very friendly and tells me to try the Gaelic radio station in Stornoway for some Gaelic practice. He gives me the address and the names of some people to speak to. Bless him! The next day, we visit the loomshed of the man who runs the hostel. He shows us how the famous tweed is woven, and we all buy pieces of fabric and socks knitted by his wife. The following day, I take the Pentand Road to Stornoway. It runs right across the island, and again it's all heather, lochs, and peat, and the clearest air one can possibly imagine. I breathe in as deeply as I can, hoping to preserve some of it to take back to the mainland. At the Stornoway B&B, the door is half open. As no one answers when I knock, I just walk in. That very moment the landlady comes out of the kitchen and says: "I've just been thinking of you, and here you are now!" Second sight exists. I leave my stuff and make my way to Radio nan Gaidheal. I am given a tour of the studios, and then I am let loose to speak Gaelic to people. Funnily enough one of the researchers recognizes me: "You were in Barra with the Celtic Society at Easter!" I'm invited again for the next morning's live programme. Fortunately, there is no time for me to be interviewed! But they talk to one of my lecturers over the phone, and when he's off air, I am handed earphones and a mike to speak to him. It feels rather surreal. Everyone is really nice, and Aonghas keeps making me one cup of tea after the other. Christine gives me the number of one of my favourite Gaelic poets [who invited me for lunch a month later and helped me a lot with my dissertation] after the other. Success! In the evening there's the farewell parade of the local Highland Regiment, which is to be disbanded. The place is crowded with people watching the kilted men playing their pipes and drums. The next morning I have to leave. I have just enough money left to get me back to Glasgow where, with two hours delay, I arrive at midnight. I fall asleep very fast, dreaming of heather and sunsets and sheep. Ferries: For trawling around more than two islands, Caledonian MacBrayne's "Island Hopscotch" tickets are ideal; they cost a lot less than a bunch of tickets bought individually. There are more than 15 routes to choose from. Accommodation: B&B'S cost between £12 and £16 per person per night, youth hostels charge between £3.50 and £5.50, except the one in Stornoway which is £7. If you don't insist on mod cons, try the independent hotels (£3.50 per night). Be prepared for very wobbly army beds and cold rooms. These hostels don't sound too comfortable, but they're actually very atmospheric and have a charm of their own. Single female
travellers: the most widespread crime is drink driving. That only happens
after closing time and around Stornoway. Avoid the place after 10pm and
don't go into a pub without a male companion. Otherwise, no problems.
By the way, Portree and Stornoway are pretty much the only places where
you'd have to lock your bike or your car. Everywhere else, people don't
even lock their front doors. Since she wrote this article, Insa has sadly passed away. Our thoughts go to her friends and family. |