The Road to Elgol

The following day we stayed local, spending some relaxing time at our B&B. We took a drive down the road to the ruins of a 12th century church, and met a group of elderly ladies from Glasgow who had just walked the few miles from Broadford trying to get the bus. The day was very nice, and we continued on to a little cafe, in the middle of a microscopic town, and had some lunch. The owners had just planted flowers outside the door, but the local sheep thought they were a tasty snack, so every ten minutes they would run outside and scare away the sheep, who inevitably returned as soon as the human threat was gone.

Later that day we decided to drive to Elgol, a small town a few miles down the one-lane road that ran past our B&B. The road forked once, so we took the left, as we had been told earlier that day. We stopped at a beautiful seaside view, and took some pictures of the rugged landscape across the bay before moving on. Except - the road wasn't exactly kind. It was extremely rough and had some large rocks in the middle. So we sat and thought about it for a minute, but eventually concluded that, since this was the road to Elgol, clearly people used it regularly, because they lived there. And if these bumps didn't deter the locals, then they couldn't deter us!

After a few more meters we gave up for fear of damaging the car. Instead we decided to walk up the road a little ways and see what was at the top of the hill and around the bend. The higher we got, the worse the road got, until there were literally boulders sticking out of the tracks. We couldn't fathom how the Elgol locals traversed this treacherous path. Upon reaching the top we took some mother-daughter pictures, and met a man and his son, on their way fishing, who were watching a sea eagle wheel in the distance. Because they seemed to be locals, we decided to ask them if this was in fact the road to Elgol - and they laughed, because of course it wasn't; we had somehow taken a wrong turn on a road with only one wrong turn available.

After having a laugh about our "Road to Elgol", we turned back and found the real road, which was very lovely. It was a nice evening, and we saw plenty of sheep, both in fields and on the road. We even spotted a herd of extremely hairy Scottish cattle - spotted quite clearly, because they too were in the middle of the road. We reached Elgol eventually; it was a small town with just a handful of houses, much like the "towns"on our creative loop road from the day before. The drive back was just as pleasant, and we ended the day with a little picnic lunch in the living room of our B&B. Our last day on Skye was very pleasant; it was the first day in which we had no rain, and we were able to see the island for what it really was. It's really an incredible place, and it was a blessing to be able to spend these few days here.