Backpacking Trip: Day 35!

Day 35! Man I only have 4 days left – only 3 of actual sightseeing. So today was a full day tour of…..The Isle of Skye! This might have been one of my favorite days in Scotland so far. As we left around 9:00am the weather seemed pretty intimidating – so not the best start. We made our first stop after about 20 minutes at a river (one of two magical locations that we stopped at today). Supposedly if you placed your face in this river for 7 seconds, then you would become blessed with good looks for the rest of your life. I knew right away that Granddad had never visited this river on his visit to Skye, and as for me, I decided not to subject myself to 7 seconds of freezing cold water on my face since there isn’t much to be improved upon anyways. Okay, so we continued along the coast of the island and made our next stop in the town of Portree – the islands capital. Once I got off the bus I walked around the town for a bit and took some pictures before getting a sandwich and some pasta for lunch. Onward, our next two stops were both sightseeing spots. The first was a nice ridge overlooking the ocean, but once we had walked a good ways from the bus it began pouring rain, so we all ran back to the bus, but ended up soaking wet. About 5 minutes later we made the second sightseeing stop (and the skies were clear now) at some really nice cliffs on the coast with a waterfall. It was really nice and I got some good pictures. The next stop we made was probably the highlight of the day. It was a location called The Quiraing which is basically a huge plateau with cliffs and slopes that overlook the Trotternish Peninsula. It was quite a hike to get to the top, but once we made it up there it was amazing, and the views were great. It took about an hour before we got back on the bus. The next place we stopped at was the ruins of Duntulm Castle which is right on the tip of the peninsula. The weather was perfect by now, although a bit windy, but we walked all around, chased some sheep, and had some seal sightings. Afterwards we made our way to our second magical location. Faerie Glen, which, I guess, is how they spell fairy in Gaelic. The place had a very strange feeling, so I can understand how it developed its reputation as a magical location. There was a hill, and on top of it there were some castle ruins, and supposedly you are supposed to think of all the bad things happening in your life as you walk up the hill, and then on your way down you have to think of good things, and then all your problems will go away. Nevertheless, I walked up the hill and back down, but instead of thinking of good and bad things, I just took a bunch of pictures, so I don’t know if that will give me any luck, but we shall see. After that we began making our way back to Kyleakin for the night, but we made some photo stops along the way. At this point I was getting very close to finishing The Da Vinci Code so I was locked in reading that on the bus ride back. Once we got back I took a shower and cooked up some food, and that has been my day up to this point. C Ya!