A perfect day with Saucy Mary

Yesterday we were so lucky with a brilliantly sunny day, so we decided to go out and enjoy it - by climbing a mountain.

We climbed Beinn Na Caillich - the mountain that stands over Broadford. It's very steep and known to be dangerous unless the weather is completely perfect - any cloud at the top can make things very difficult. We knew there was still a little snow sitting on the top but figured that this would be the last chance we'd have to climb it before winter really sets in.

Beinn Na Caillich from the road to Broadford

Mish and the mountain

The steep road upwards



Snow near the top

It turned out to be quite a challenge. There's not really any path, so the first half of the walk is pretty much just fighting your way through the marshy heather. The second half of the walk is like climbing up a very steep and massive pile of boulders. But we were absolutely ecstatic when we finally made it to the top, and had an amazing view of both Skye and Scotland. Words cannot describe it.

Hamish and the Cuillin mountains



View of Kinloch Lodge from the top of Beinn Na Caillich

At the top of the mountain is a cairn that is said to be the burial place of the Norwegian princess known as Saucy Mary.
Me on the cairn

Hamish, the cairn and the little stone house thingee at the top

Mischief

The hardest part of the trek was actually the descent, which was really hard on the knees. We were pretty shaky by the time we got down!!

More snow!!

Woke up this morning to this view;

Snowflakes greeted us as we walked across to work, and we worked breakfast through the floating snow storm outside! It was so neat to watch, and needless to say all the staff (well, at least us non-scottish staff) are all terribly excited and hypo because of the snow (there was much dancing, singing and general bounciness). The sun is now out and its a gorgeous day here (after many cold rainy days). Apparently its quite early for there to be snow here, so I guess we're in for a cold winter!

The craziest part of this all is that we are pretty much right by the sea - snow down to almost sea level!!!!

Freezing cold in the caravan at the mo!

Thankfully, we are staying in Lord and Lady MacDonald's place for a few days where its nice and toasty.

More photos to come!
xxx Love R

Mud Trekkers

This is Kinloch Lodge from across the other side of the loch.

The other day Mon (Aussie who also works at Kinloch) and I went off on an adventure for the morning as we had half a day off. We walked down the road to the small town of Isle Ornsay and decided to walk across to the lighthouse there. No small feat let me tell you - but luckily we had come across at low tide, the best time to cross the spit of mud between the 'mainland' of Skye and the little island thingee that the lighthouse is on. It was a glorious, muddy hike, and we were very proud to have conquered it (a lady we asked for directions said it could not be done at that point in time, and certainly not without 'wellies').

Our challenging path

Victory!!

Me at the Isle Ornsay lighthouse

We stopped in at the local pub for a coffee on the way home, and met spitting bar guy. He spits into the sink while customers are there. Its weird.
The hotel at Isle Ornsay where spitting bar guy works.. :S

In other news - we are going to Finland for christmas!! Spending christmas itself in lapland, right up in the arctic circle (a real white christmas complete with reindeer, huskies and ice-hole-swimming!!!) and also a couple of days in helsinki and turku. Yay!!

Other than that, not much else is new - working lots at the moment which is good for the bank. Hope you are all well!!! Nobody has emailed me for a while - are you all still alive?? xxxx R

First Snow

We had the first snow appear on the hills of mainland Scotland yesterday! No wonder its so cold!!! In the afternoon we walked up the hill behind the hotel where there are really nice views of the mainland across the water from Skye...