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This was the view from our hotel room in Fort William on Monday morning.
Ben Nevis is up there somewhere. Ben Nevis is the highest mountain in the UK. The summit is 4000 feet above sea level, and 4 miles from the shore. The last time I was there, there was snow on it. Fortunately, the weather was much nicer this time.
The object for this morning was to see The Jacobite steam train. That's one thing I was disappointed to have missed on the last trip - a steam train. I found a guide to photographers who wanted to photograph it on Glenfinnan Viaduct, from a couple of years ago. They recommended you be there before the train leaves Fort William, so you can find a place to park and walk up the hills. I'm not sure, but we might have gotten there by then, but the parking lot was full, and the overflow parking lot was full, and everyplace else was full, including the places that said you couldn't park there. We stopped in one of them anyway.
Church of St. Mary and St Finnan overlooking Loch Shiel
It was a church and it was Monday, so I'm pretty sure were weren't keeping parishioners out, but the lot was full and we were parking some people in. I stayed with the car while Cindy checked out the church, then I had her sit in it while I did the same.
St. Michael was mounted in the front of the building.
The bell was under a mossy canopy in the yard.
And then we went on. I was watching for a place to stop where we could see the train. I found the entrance to a gravel road with a large area to park outside a gate, and we walked up the hill.
There was a bridge below us! I walked down to it, but Cyn stayed on the top of the hill.
The bridge has a five-ton weight limit. I'm pretty sure the only thing that could get on the bridge that could approach that weight would be a small herd of cows.
I crossed the bridge to the other side, where the fence was much easier to get over, and walked up a little bit.
I waited quite a while before a commuter train came down the line. I'm not sure if there's a place with two tracks, where one could wait for the other to go by. If not, then this one had to get all the way back to Fort William before the Jacobite could depart.
Then I heard chugging in the distance. I actually grinned a little. It took a minute for it to come into view. I snapped off a couple of quick shots, and one turned out:
Whew!
Then we went on. We arrived in Airisaig at noon. I knew there were two or three restaurants there. But only one seemed to be open. A Monday thing? The Old Library Cafe said it opened at noon, but it wasn't open yet. We hung around a bit, and it finally opened. Nice place.
After lunch we drove further up the coast and stopped at a beach for a look around.
I think the peaky island is Eigg.
And then shortly came to Mallaig, to catch the ferry for Skye.
Mallaig is a working town, though it sees its share of tourists who pass through on their way to Skye.
It was the Lord of the Isles.
There were three passenger decks, including a lounge with a bar and a gift shop, a cafe sort of thing, spacious passenger seating areas and outdoor decks. We sat in the lounge with our backs to the stern of the boat, and overlooking the back of the autodeck (below). There were signs posted saying to turn off your car alarms. Cindy asked me if we had an alarm on our rental car. I said no. I'd never heard of alarms being available on rental cars. And certainly nobody at the agency told me about it or how to turn it off or on. After we set sail, the car alarms started going off. After a while, I decided that since I could see our car from where we were sitting, I'd look. Its lights were flashing. I hit a button on the fob, and the lights turned off and some of the noise from the deck stopped.
That's our dark grey Skoda, front of the middle-right lane.
Approaching Skye, Armadale Castle:
We were the second car off the ferry. We passed Torbhaig distillery. I wanted to stop in and see what was going on (they're in production, but too new to have anything for sale), but I also wanted to get where we were going, and it was probably near closing time. We kept moving. There were clouds and rain. Seems like it was an hour drive up to Portree (the biggest town on Skye). Maybe less. We needed food. I'd heard it was hard to find a place to eat in Portree. I'd have been willing to look, but I didn't see a place to park. We kept moving. I thought maybe we'd check in first, and I knew there were places to eat in Staffin, farther up.
Just out of Portree, I was surprised by a single-track road. I was already into it before I realized. There was traffic coming my way that I should have stopped and waited for. I couldn't back up because someone was behind me. I pulled as far off the road as I could - not very far - trying to avoid the holes that were deeper than my clearance, and the other cars got by me.
We saw a car park for an overlook.
There was a walk up to the cliff top overlooking the sea.
And a view back to some waterfalls cascading over rock walls.
The upper cascade
Closer to the falls, they had built a viewing platform.
We hadn't had sun since the morning excursion for the train, and rain on our drive up Skye, but the sun came out for us at the overlook. There were still clouds clinging to the hills behind us.
These are the mountains of The Storr (below). On the left is a low hill, with a needle sticking up from behind it. That needle is The Old Man of Storr, which you will see in a few days.
Soon after, as we got into Staffin, we saw a sign for a cafe, and stopped.
It was Columba 1400. They apparently do some kind of leadership training for (disadvantaged?) kids, and also have a cafe. It was good. And it turned out we ate there every night, because it was the only place on the island where we could get into. Our B&B host had told me that "the places in Staffin close at 8pm". This implied there were others, but there were not. Maybe a coffee/tee shop?
Our B&B was not too far away. In filling us in on the area, our host told us that you had to make reservations at all the restaurants in Portree, most of them at least a day in advance.
This is the view from our bedroom window. When we first got into the room, the setting sun was still on the mountains across the sound, but by the time I could get a picture, it was gone.
Ben Nevis is up there somewhere. Ben Nevis is the highest mountain in the UK. The summit is 4000 feet above sea level, and 4 miles from the shore. The last time I was there, there was snow on it. Fortunately, the weather was much nicer this time.
The object for this morning was to see The Jacobite steam train. That's one thing I was disappointed to have missed on the last trip - a steam train. I found a guide to photographers who wanted to photograph it on Glenfinnan Viaduct, from a couple of years ago. They recommended you be there before the train leaves Fort William, so you can find a place to park and walk up the hills. I'm not sure, but we might have gotten there by then, but the parking lot was full, and the overflow parking lot was full, and everyplace else was full, including the places that said you couldn't park there. We stopped in one of them anyway.
Church of St. Mary and St Finnan overlooking Loch Shiel
It was a church and it was Monday, so I'm pretty sure were weren't keeping parishioners out, but the lot was full and we were parking some people in. I stayed with the car while Cindy checked out the church, then I had her sit in it while I did the same.
St. Michael was mounted in the front of the building.
The bell was under a mossy canopy in the yard.
And then we went on. I was watching for a place to stop where we could see the train. I found the entrance to a gravel road with a large area to park outside a gate, and we walked up the hill.
There was a bridge below us! I walked down to it, but Cyn stayed on the top of the hill.
The bridge has a five-ton weight limit. I'm pretty sure the only thing that could get on the bridge that could approach that weight would be a small herd of cows.
I crossed the bridge to the other side, where the fence was much easier to get over, and walked up a little bit.
I waited quite a while before a commuter train came down the line. I'm not sure if there's a place with two tracks, where one could wait for the other to go by. If not, then this one had to get all the way back to Fort William before the Jacobite could depart.
Then I heard chugging in the distance. I actually grinned a little. It took a minute for it to come into view. I snapped off a couple of quick shots, and one turned out:
Whew!
Then we went on. We arrived in Airisaig at noon. I knew there were two or three restaurants there. But only one seemed to be open. A Monday thing? The Old Library Cafe said it opened at noon, but it wasn't open yet. We hung around a bit, and it finally opened. Nice place.
After lunch we drove further up the coast and stopped at a beach for a look around.
I think the peaky island is Eigg.
And then shortly came to Mallaig, to catch the ferry for Skye.
Mallaig is a working town, though it sees its share of tourists who pass through on their way to Skye.
It was the Lord of the Isles.
There were three passenger decks, including a lounge with a bar and a gift shop, a cafe sort of thing, spacious passenger seating areas and outdoor decks. We sat in the lounge with our backs to the stern of the boat, and overlooking the back of the autodeck (below). There were signs posted saying to turn off your car alarms. Cindy asked me if we had an alarm on our rental car. I said no. I'd never heard of alarms being available on rental cars. And certainly nobody at the agency told me about it or how to turn it off or on. After we set sail, the car alarms started going off. After a while, I decided that since I could see our car from where we were sitting, I'd look. Its lights were flashing. I hit a button on the fob, and the lights turned off and some of the noise from the deck stopped.
That's our dark grey Skoda, front of the middle-right lane.
Approaching Skye, Armadale Castle:
We were the second car off the ferry. We passed Torbhaig distillery. I wanted to stop in and see what was going on (they're in production, but too new to have anything for sale), but I also wanted to get where we were going, and it was probably near closing time. We kept moving. There were clouds and rain. Seems like it was an hour drive up to Portree (the biggest town on Skye). Maybe less. We needed food. I'd heard it was hard to find a place to eat in Portree. I'd have been willing to look, but I didn't see a place to park. We kept moving. I thought maybe we'd check in first, and I knew there were places to eat in Staffin, farther up.
Just out of Portree, I was surprised by a single-track road. I was already into it before I realized. There was traffic coming my way that I should have stopped and waited for. I couldn't back up because someone was behind me. I pulled as far off the road as I could - not very far - trying to avoid the holes that were deeper than my clearance, and the other cars got by me.
We saw a car park for an overlook.
There was a walk up to the cliff top overlooking the sea.
And a view back to some waterfalls cascading over rock walls.
The upper cascade
Closer to the falls, they had built a viewing platform.
We hadn't had sun since the morning excursion for the train, and rain on our drive up Skye, but the sun came out for us at the overlook. There were still clouds clinging to the hills behind us.
These are the mountains of The Storr (below). On the left is a low hill, with a needle sticking up from behind it. That needle is The Old Man of Storr, which you will see in a few days.
Soon after, as we got into Staffin, we saw a sign for a cafe, and stopped.
It was Columba 1400. They apparently do some kind of leadership training for (disadvantaged?) kids, and also have a cafe. It was good. And it turned out we ate there every night, because it was the only place on the island where we could get into. Our B&B host had told me that "the places in Staffin close at 8pm". This implied there were others, but there were not. Maybe a coffee/tee shop?
Our B&B was not too far away. In filling us in on the area, our host told us that you had to make reservations at all the restaurants in Portree, most of them at least a day in advance.
This is the view from our bedroom window. When we first got into the room, the setting sun was still on the mountains across the sound, but by the time I could get a picture, it was gone.
