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We left the Isle of Harris in the north to visit Lewis in the south. Although they are not officially two different islands in geographical terms, it is really obvious when you see the contrasts in the landscapes. Our first stop was a beautiful beach, Luskentyre, which seemed to go on and on forever. We started a game of soccor with a very heavy sea boy but then gave it up in favour of a long walk down to the end. Max dipped his feet in the water (crazy man) and Danielle, Nick and I ran around taking photos of the beauty of the landscape. When we returned to the bus the hairy coo's were there to greet us, they are quite friendly and I even got a cuddle in before we left.
The water here is so clear you can see the bottom for miles, it is a stunningly beautiful contrast to the rocky and rugged mountainsides. From here we headed to the town for Tarbut where we visited the tweed shop and I bought a tiny hair clip. I am getting good at buying small souvineers. We boarded our ferry to hop over to Uig on the Isle
of Skye. On board I began to eat the remainder of yesterdays picnic - I had leftover cheese, (trust me this becomes more important in a moment, keep reading), anyway we were all seated in U and I've looked up to see about 8 guys and a girl sitting 5 metres away, and by goodness their collective gene pool must have been taken from the Isle of good lookers! However I had a mouthful of cheese, so to get the attention of the other girls in my group, I've said "hmm this cheese is soo tastey!" They immediately caught on, checked out the cute boys and we had giggly discussions using cheese as a uphamisim for a good 5-10mins and the guys in our own group couldn't work out why we were all discussing various types of cheese. Hilarious good fun.
We landed on the Isle of Skye and Carol played us some music from a band called Bog Fairy Bandits which was really well suited to the fairytale-like landscapes we were drivin through. One of my favourite movies, stardust was filmed almost exclusively in the Isle of Skye. Michelle Phiffer was said to say that standing on a
cliff edge here was a better facial than any other expensive facial she had in America. This was very true we realised when we got off the bus and walked the cliffs at Quiraing. The photos don't do the immense beauty of this place justice. I feel like I am using beautiful so much in this blog but the landscapes of the wild hills and hill country are so incredible. I would love to live here, except I am always cold. Carol says there is no bad weather here, only inappropriate clothing. I appear to have very very inappropriate clothing.
Carol told us the story of the Irish and Scotish giant. Basically the Irish giant came over to Scotland and decided he wanted the wife of the Scotish giant. She didn't want to leave so instead of letting them fight it out, she convinced her husband to dress as a baby and hide in the bedroom while she sewed 3 of his kilts together to hang on the clothesline. When the Irish giant came back to fight, he took one look at the huge kilt on the line and the massive baby sleeping and decided fighting the Scotish giant
wasn't worth it and went back to Ireland. I have included the pics where the giants kilts can still be seen today.
Our next photo stop was the old man of Storr. The story goes that a man and lady used to walk up to a hill of an afternoon occasionally to have a chat and chew the fat - so to speak. They didn't realise that they were in fact sitting near a fairy doorway and the fairies used to come out to hear their stories until one day the fairies spoke to them and told them how much they enjoyed the stories. They continued to walk up the hill together to meet for a chat until one day they decided they were getting too old to continue to walk up and share their stories with the fairies. The fairies were understandably upset by this and made sure that the old man and lady came just one last time so they could give them an appropriate send off. They were allowed special entry into the fairy realm fof their grand send off with a great feast and dancing and general frivolity. However when the time came to leave
they discovered they were stuck at the front door and turned to stone as the fairies could not bear to be parted from their friends.
Continuing the fairy stories, we visited the fairy glen waterfall. Here we would all be granted our wish if we could scamper up to the top of the waterfall, get a mouthful of water without using our hands, hold it in our mouths while we then climbed down the waterfall and get all the way back to the bus before swallowing it once we stepped inside. Hilarious good fun, and this time I managed to stack it in the mud. Stupidly I used my camera to break my fall and then spent 10 mins trying desperately to clean it up. I did however manage to get back on the bus without swallowing the fairy water. Maybe I should have wished for better balance! Haha
We had an afternoon stop in probably my favourite town in all of Scotland. It was so quaint. There was a gorgeous harbour, tiny houses of various pastel colours and tiny laneways filled with flowers. I also bought yummy cupcakes and cute jewellery, so it was a good afternoon
stop! :-) Our last stop before reaching the hostel was the Sligachan River bridge which sits in the shadow of a rather large mountian. Carol told us they have a fun run from the pub up to the top of the mountain and back down again every year in memory of a Serpa from Nepal (I think) who came over from the war with a Scotsman he had met and over a guiness they had boasted that Scotland had big mountains and the Serpa said "no way, I could do that in under an hour and be back here for a beer". The Scotsman never to give up a challenge that involved beer rose to the challenge and they both ran up to the top. True to his word the Serpa was back down again after 45mins and had a beer while he waited for the Scotsman to descend. Each year now they have a fun run up the mountain in his memory.
Our final night of tour was in the tiny town of Broadford. Nick, Robert and I grabbed some dinner and icecream for dinner before having a bonfire outside. Mark decided he was the wood official and
managed to cook up a bonfire so big we could hardly bear to sit in front of it (I later discovered I had burnt my shins!). We all roasted marshmallows and had smores while listening to two locals tell stories and sing traditional Scotish songs. They were a bit rough around the edges but hilarious good fun. It was a great night to finish together as a clan, but bittersweet also as we didn't want it to end.
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