Day 10 - 350km - back to mainland

Stuffin, where we currently are, is on NE part of the Skye so to see as much as we can, we decided to go to ferry in Armadale (Armadale-Mallaig route) on south of the island, and go there by west coast roads. Also, visit Neist Point lighthouse - most westernly point of Skye.

Half-marathon race

Phone booth in the middle of nowhere. There were no villages nearby.

As we were going more SW, the sheep were more frightened and road was getting more and more narrow.  

As we were going more SW, the sheep were more frightened and roads were getting more narrow...

... and more narrow

We tought about giving up if we don't see the lighthouse soon, cause road was getting really terrible. And there it was! Far away from us instead of infront of us. It seems that we took a wrong turn and drove on the uncharted road (makes sense now, doesn't it?). But, instead of a lighthouse upclose, we saw an eagle. Decision was quickly made not to go to lighthouse afterall, and go back to the main road.
 

Neist Point lighthouse far away from us

eagle

On a way back to main road we saw something that was made out of dirt and decided to take a photo of it. Only later we found out what it was for (see a post about Isle of Islay). Interesting thing about Scotland is that there are very few trees. All their hills and mountains are grass-only. I don't know is it because of so many sheep, to keep them fed, or was it always like that.

some interesting thing we decided to take photo of

all grass, no trees

Today is my birthday so we celebrated in a bar/restaurant we stumbled upon just around lunch time. There was a sign that said "The best whisky bar for 2015" so I guess we chose it well.

some of their whisky supply

 

food was delicious

And then we came to Armadale, booked a ferry ride to Mallaig and after few minutes we were on the way. There were moments, during this ferry trip, I felt like in Norway and looking at fjords. Other times it was pure Scotland experience.

Fjords? No, still in Scotland.

Almost immediately after arriving to Mallaig, we saw white sand beaches of Morar, next to the estuary of the River Morar. Since most of the beaches we saw so far were muddy, this was a nice surprise.

sand beaches of Morar

There are many viaducts for trains, maybe the most known is Glenfinnan viaduct - if you saw Harry Potter series, and remember the scene with steaming train, that's the one. Even today the steam train passes two times a day.

viaduct

Path lead us to Fort William, the most rainy part of Scotland, and Ben Nevis, the U.K.’s highest peak. Even here we were lucky enough to escape the rain, although clouds were above us all day.

About an hour later we found a camp near Oban and settled there for tonight. From Oban there are ferries for Isle of Mull, which we heard is worth visiting, but decided to skip it. Until the next time...

camp near Oban