hike : The Birds In The Meadow

We didn’t climb any of the Cuillins I’m sorry to say, but we did get a cracking view of their glorious slopes as we walked through Glen Sligachan. Once out of sight of the hotel the landscape becomes utterly prehistoric – the volcanic mountains and sweeping, glacier gouged valleys should by rights contain roaming herds of ancient megafauna. Our growing suspicion that any moment we might spot a herd of wooly mammoth was unshakable.

The glen is crisscrossed by many small streams which run to meet the Sligachan river, and there they pool, creating miniature waterfalls over the rocks and boggy areas all around the path. Here large green dragonflies whirr and dance and fight, the only moving creatures (beside ourselves) for many miles.

The weather, as you can see, was blindingly sunny and as such not at all typical of Skye. A local had told me the previous day that it had been gloriously sunny for weeks, but that the mountains looked wrong in good weather and he was missing the cloud. The people of Skye appear to like their weather ferocious and gloomy, which from what I’ve heard is just as well.

We were very lucky. I’ve heard and read accounts of the Sligachan river as a raging monster, but in late May it barely tickled its banks, and the bogs and streams that criss-cross the glen were not nearly as impassable as they often are. The breathtaking slopes of Druim na Ruiage gleamed emerald and dun against a brilliant sky.

Across the glen to the right, the fearsome Black Cuillins tower over the almost dry river bed. Don’t be fooled by the picture – they are a hundred times more impressive than they look on my tame little blog, and if approached from Loch Coruisk to the south of the range they display a staggering hostility. Beloved by mountain climbers the world over, they are made of Gabro, a black volcanic rock which is so rough it will take the skin off your fingers. Apparently this is what makes them so wonderful to climb – it is almost impossible to slip – although as I will reveal in another post I proved the exception to that rule!

Our gentle amble doubled back to the campsite when we drew level to Marsco, a handsome and inviting red hill. The glen walk was so peaceful and idyllic that not even the super-fit hikers among us were tempted to go up it. If there are any keen walkers or climbers reading, I do know it is terrible blasphemy not to sample those delicious peaks and crags in weather so rare but we were new to the island, not all of us (and by that I mean me) were in full fitness for a proper climb, and here’s the real reason perhaps – the two hundred varieties of Single Malt Scotch Whisky in the hotel bar ensured a late and hungover start to every single day. Next time we go, we’ll have to be a bit more pure of body and get up those wonderful hills.