Our final full day on Skye took us to Fairy Glen.
This location is described as a Quiraing-like land slip in miniature. Small round-topped grassy hills with Loch and (ponds) in between.
Despite Skye having a history with fairies (e.g. Fairy Pools), Fairy Glen has no real stories but the unusual nature of the location has awarded it the nickname of Fairy Glen.
I took a shot of the main path from the car park.
I also took a shot from the bottom of the path to the main hill known as Castle Ewan.
Kathryn walked up to the top of the hill but having been underwhelmed by the location, I wandered back to the car. I took this shot after observing a lone tree up ahead.
A distinctive feature visible on many of the hills are the spiral paths, caused by visitors walking round the hills. I took the shot below to capture this detail.
Leaving Skye
We left our cottage in Skye with sadness as we had really enjoyed our time here.
Target Elgol
On the journey from North of Skye to South, we detoured to visit Elgol, which was a target location we didn’t manage on our last Skye visit in 2019.
The road to Elgol from Broadford is 14 miles and according to Google Maps takes only 31 minutes. However, some of it is single track and with stops for photos, it’ll take and feel a lot longer.
Only a few miles in, and there was some very interesting long grasses emerging from Loch Cill Chriosd. This Loch is apparently referred to s the ‘hairy Loch’ due to the amount of vegetation emerging from it.
As we were finally getting closer to Elgol, the weather had progressively been getting worse with mist descending down and that misty type of rain.
We parked up to overlook the harbour and I think the main honeypot scene was further up the shingled beach and behind the clifftop.
I know roughly what I was after but the mist would be hiding the background mountains which I wanted, and that misty rain has a habit of soaking you and your gear.
We waited for quite a while before inevitably having to give up.
While I was disappointed I was unable to get any shots from Elgol, and since this was an ad-hoc visit on our departure from Skye, we didn’t have all day to wait around hoping the rain and mist would clear.
I could in no way complain about the number/yield of awesome shots I had collected on this holiday.
Loch Slapin
We drove away with the winding long road to get back to Broadford. However, as we were a few miles in, the skies opened up and the light appeared and several shots came into view making us park the car to grab a shot.
Alongside Loch Slapin, there were awesome shots of the Loch with reflections of the mountains.
Another stop further down the road saw me grab this scene. I took a few shots here as there were so many parts of this location which were a delight for the eyes, I struggled for a composition that captured it all.
We made our way back to the main round leaving Skye and onto the mainland, but there were still photo opportunities all around.
Eilean Dolan Castle
We stopped at Eilean Donan castle and I took the first shot from the car park bypassing wedding guests as there was a wedding reception on at the time.
We then moved to the main visitor car park where I grabbed some more shots.
Despite visiting this castle in a drive-by back in 2019, like many locations in Scotland, it never ceases to be a delight to repeat the visit, and see them with your own eyes. There will almost certainly be a different composition or two to add to your collection.
Leaving the castle, we left in the knowledge that we were now much later than planned in our journey as we were heading to Dumbarton for an overnight stopover.
Corpach (Fort William)
Despite it being late in the day, I really wanted to stop at one of my favourite locations at Corpach where the shipwreck sits on the shore of Loch Linnhe.
We stopped off and I agreed to briskly walk up to the beach and grab some shots and get back within half hour.
I grabbed this shot for which I really like the curve in the leading line.
I had to do the shot with the water in the foreground…
I was pleased to get a few shots quite quickly, and the evening light was much more favourable than the two weeks earlier when we called by in the middle of the early afternoon bright sunlight.
Having got back to the car, it was now mid evening, and we’d driven well over 120 miles and spent several hours in the car, and we were facing a further long drive to Dumbarton.
After some debate, we decided we’d stay in Fort William so quickly found accommodation on our phones, booked up and decided to stay put. It felt extravagant but justified and just made sense.
We’d also be able to do more next day before leaving, and it would be squeezing even more out of this trip.
We wanted to visit a couple of shops, and I wanted to come back to the Corpach shipwreck one last time to grab some different shots.
Kathryn suggested I consider a sunrise early get up for Corpach. I was tired and my immediate thought was I can’t be bothered but it did make me think.
A quick check of the local times told me I’d need to get out of bed at 04:50 (gulp)!
Would it be safe on my own?
Would I be able to get up?
How much did I want those extra hours of sleep?
Would it be worth the effort? I’ve done this location before back in 2019 and it would be hard to beat that shot, so what’s the point?
Would I do it or not…?
Onwards and upwards…