An Island of Rainbows

The Isle of Lewis is a 3.5 hour ferry journey from Ullapool on the mainland. Ullapool is at least a five hour drive from Gretna Green so we stayed there to break up our ten hour plus journey from Warwick. Ullapool itself is a stop on Scotland’s popular North Coast 500 route and a town that certainly has tourist character with a nice whisky shop, a couple of craft gift shops, a cute bakery, a pricey fish & chip shop plus a good-sized Tesco! We got the 6.30pm ferry on the 23^rd October 2021 which incidentally was the only one that left Ullapool for Stornoway that particular day due to high winds. Unfortunately, my tasty Stornoway black pudding supper enjoyed in Ullapool was not so pleasant after a couple of tumultuous hours at sea!

The ferry arrives into the harbour at Stornoway and from there it was a short drive to our resting place at Lews Castle. The wind and the rain coupled with the darkness and not quite knowing where we were headed made for a dramatic journey nonetheless. Thankfully when we turned the last dark corner, the lovely Alan – who managed the Castle – came out to greet us. He was very much our lighthouse beacon! Lews Castle has been converted into beautiful apartments and when we arrived in our home for the next week we saw a lovely welcome basket which really helped us feel settled. We had also cleverly stocked up at the Ullapool Tesco because our first full day on Lewis was a Sunday and the adherence of the island to Presbyterian rules mean that shops are closed on that day. Although the largest Angling Club in the UK was happy to serve us a drink or two!

The Isle of Lewis is connected to the Isle of Harris making their combined mass the largest of the Hebridean Islands. It’s location off the North West coast of Scotland with exposure to the Atlantic brings wet and windy weather but there is also enough sunshine mixed in for us to see many rainbows during our eight day visit in October.

Stornoway

Things to visit within walking distance from Stornoway include Lews Castle and the Museum nan Eilean located there. The Museum offers a relaxed and friendly stroll through the island’s heritage and a celebration of the unique stories of the Outer Hebrides. There are significant historical items on loan including the famous Lewis chessmen which we saw here after visiting their site of discovery at Uig. The gift shop and café are also well worth a stop. The Iolaire Memorial is a walk along the coast from Stornoway and we learnt more about the tragic story of the 1^st January 1919 when we visited the exhibition hall at the Harris Distillery. Another must is a stop at either Charles MacLeod near Lews Castle or MacLeod & MacLeod in the town centre for the famous Stornoway black pudding which you will want to try and take home. We have a regular order that comes at least four times a year with a 14 inch full pudding for JD and I to work our way through!

Stornoway is also a great place for pubs. I promised JD a little crawl and we started at The Crown Inn with a ‘Cheeky Charlie’ cherry brandy in honour of Charles III (then Prince now King) who snuck out of his Gordonstoun boarding school one summer when he was 14 to visit the same establishment for one of his own! We moved onto McNeills – a lively pub by the harbour with live music and quiz nights which was, at the time, fully decked out for Halloween. Our pub crawl continued to take in the New Lewis Bar (very local) and the Criterion (a stop off for those travelling through Stornoway for work it seemed) and we tried to get into the infamous Clachan Bar after reading the intriguing Google reviews but sadly it was permanently closed. Our favourite stop for a drink remains the Stornoway Sea Angling Club with its claim to be the largest angling club in the UK. It had a lovely cosy bar upstairs especially after getting heavily rained on during our explorations.

The Beach & the Blackhouse

For the historical adventurer, the Blackhouse Village at Gearrannan is a must-see where you can learn about the village life that once existed all across Lewis. There is a completely restored interior of a blackhouse and even the chance to stay in one. You can also see a demonstration of the famous hand-weaving that earns the Harris Tweed orb – and if you want to buy some, you can’t go far wrong visiting the outlet at the factory itself in Tarbert. I also learnt a surprising amount about peat!

We took a walk from the Village across the cliffs to Dalmore Beach and it was a good job I made us a packed lunch as it took way longer than the couple of hours I had scheduled. (I think that was all the photo stops we had to make for JD!) As well as incredible natural scenery, it was a coastal walk that gave us all the weathers with strong wind, heavy rain, and glorious sunshine. We didn’t quite make it down to the beach itself but got a lovely view before heading back. We did then make a stop at Dalbeg to get a beach fix in. For the nature-loving adventurer Uig was also a spectacular beach with the chance to spot rare birds of all kinds including golden eagles as well as see the homage to the famous Lewis chessmen. Sadly, we didn’t get to the much talked about beautiful beaches of Harris so there’s at least one very good reason for a return visit.

Stiomrabhaigh

For the everyman adventurer, it’s worth a trip to the abandoned village of Stiomrabhaigh. I had read about it on a website somewhere so popped it on the list as a good three hour 10 kilometre round trip adventure you cannot reach by road. Neither the terrain nor the weather wanted us to stay dry and it wasn’t long before we were battling wind, rain, and marshy bog underfoot. JD was pretty miserable! But we still talk about it now as one of our favourite walks. The village itself has enough left in ruin to feel like the walk was worth it (we have done others since without that feeling of satisfaction!) and I also feel it’s an important part of history to pay reverence to. Plus the walk is a challenge to navigate, steep in places, and gets a Walk Highlands high bog rating – even on sunnier days! Thanks to Walk Highlands for the route and the local council for the way-marking posts which were like beacons of hope every time we spotted one.  When we came back along the fence it was funny to see rivers of water now running where the path had been thanks to all the rain that had fallen since we left the car!

The sad story of the village is one of so many across the Highlands. Stiomrabhaigh is one of over thirty ‘lost’ townships along the sea lochs and coast of Lewis. The 1851 census lists it as a village of 16 dwellings with a population of 81; but just seven years later, no one lived there anymore. The clearances, as they came to be known, started around 1750 and were the forced eviction of tenants from their small farms across the Highlands and Islands of Scotland due to pressure on landlords to generate greater incomes from their land – often because of their own substantial debts but also because of a greed for more with the changing nature of wealth and status in the mid to late 18^th Century. Stiomrabhaigh was part of the second wave of clearances in the early 19^th Century when compensation of some kind was more common and tenants were known as crofters rather than farmers. This was a change in status as villagers now often worked in other industries and farming was purely for their own subsistence. When the leases expired at Stiomrabhaigh, tenants were offered crofts in Leumrabhagh which is around five miles away. The residents mostly worked in the relatively prosperous herring trade but that suffered during the first World War and in 1921 they returned to Stiomrabhaigh to farm it once again. However, they were never recognised with formal crofter status back at their township and no road was ever built to connect them to the rest of the islands so, over the next twenty years, many families drifted back to Leumrabhagh. The last two families left at the end of the 1940s leaving the town as deserted as you will see it today.

I found this video on the Visit Outer Hebrides website and had to share it as it was filmed on a much sunnier day than our visit! Credit to Clisham Studio

Lochs and Lighthouses

Following our new everyman adventure obsession with paddleboarding, we looked to hire them for a spin out on one of the beautiful Lewis Lochs. The weather wasn’t our friend but finally on the last full day Dave from Grey Goose Kayaks contacted us to say we were good to go on Loch Cheois (or Keose) What an adventure! I was a bit shaky so up and down most of the time especially when my eyes looked into the depths of blackness under us but JD loved it and even got himself on their Instagram feed! Whether you are a beginner or more advanced, I highly recommend getting in touch with Dave at Grey Goose for guidance. When he called us the wind was still up but I am glad we trusted his advice and enjoyed a fab couple of hours on calm and still waters.

Our other obsession is lighthouses and Lewis has plenty to choose from! Harris does too but we only made it as far as Tarbert on the connected island. Even on Lewis we only made it to the Butt of Lewis but also had Tiumpan Head on our list – all saved again for our return trip. The Butt of Lewis Lighthouse is at the most northernly point on the island with nothing beyond the rugged coastline until you reach the Faroe Islands. Engineering by David Stevenson in 1862, it’s also in the Guinness Book of Records as the UK’s windiest spot! Three keepers were known to have lived at the lighthouse with their families until 1971 when the light was automated. It’s now remotely monitored from Edinburgh.

Stones and Stars

The Isle of Lewis will always hold a special place in JD’s heart as the location he first tried out his star photography skills. Lower Shader had come up on a website he’d seen as a good Dark Sky spot so that was where we headed. We are no experts but JD knew we needed something in the foreground to give context so we found some intriguing looking stones whose story I have since uncovered. The site we stumbled upon as good foreground is actually known as Steinacleit and is a prehistoric  enclosure that lay buried until the 1920s. Originally thought to be a Neolithic stone circle, it could also be a prehistoric farmstead. The fact we just stumbled upon a site of such historical significance is so typical of the Highlands and Islands and one of the things I love most about the area. If you see something you think has a story, it probably does and it’s up to you to do some detective work to find out!  

Anyhow, back to our virgin star photography experience! Firstly we arrived when it appeared dark but long exposure photographs told us it wasn’t dark enough so we waited 45 minutes for it to be pitch black. Looking up at the sky was surreal. I have never seen so many stars. JD’s photos are amazing but nothing captures what it looks like when you are there feeling wonderfully insignificant as the universe towers above you. To get the perfect shot, it was time for some fun and games light painting the stones with the torch to find the ideal amount and optimum angle. It turned out I had a knack for it so that was my job for the next hour while JD positioned and repositioned the tripod and I followed with the light. We have taken star photographs in Glencoe, Shetland, Islay, and even back home in Warwickshire but that first experience in a place so dark I couldn’t see my own hand in front of my face will always be the best.

So we may have stumbled accidentally upon the stones at Steinacleit but we made a deliberate visit to the Calanais Standing Stones as they are firmly on the map of the Lewis tourist. We’d enjoyed every other hotspot to ourselves, I guess because of the weather, so it was a surprise to see other travellers there! The stones predate Stonehenge and are estimated to be over 5,000 years old. The belief is they were erected as an observatory for early astronomy. If you are visiting in the near future, please check before you go as the visitor centre is closed until 2025 (it was closed when we were there due to our arrival time so that’s not a big deal) and the stones themselves are closing for conservation work in late 2024 (which would definitely be more disappointing!)

Comfort and Food

Most of the time we ate in our lovely apartment at Lews Castle but we did sample the local fare with coffee and cake at both the Museum café in the Castle and Artizan in town. We also had a wonderful meal out at Harbour Kitchen on our last night. But the best meal had to be pizza eaten from Crust, a takeaway from a shipping container at Achmore which we found after a long walk and pulled in on the side of the road!

We also made a stop on the way home at the Cluanie Inn, one of our favourites, which is part of the Black Sheep Hotel Group with two other sister hotels in the Inverness-shire area. The bread pudding is divine and the whole hotel has a comfort and style that is truly unique. I can highly recommend a stay there on your way to or from the beautiful Highlands.

Until next time ……