The Camel Diaries

Diary of a Bus Spotter

As many of you know the Desert Rat loves transport (an unfortunately transport museums) so he was in seventh heaven spotting the many quirky old buses on Malta – here are some of his finds….

Back to the Mainland and Farewell to Scotland

We said farewell to the Hebrides early one morning and headed back to the mainland on a ferry. This was a large ferry and had special features such as shops, a bar and a pokies room. I gave the Desert Rat £1 to play on the pokies at 7.15am. By 7.16am he had lost his money and we settled in for the journey to Ullapool.

After having 10 or so days of glorious weather (apart from the gale force winds on Lewis), we were welcomed back to driving rain – that was the Scotland we knew and loved!! However, we didn’t let it stop us and we spent the day driving around the Assynt and Coigach areas. Not only did we have a couple of the best pies ever in Lochinver, we also got to see some absolutely stunning scenery.

The next day we headed back down to Edinburgh and begin the next part of our journey – Malta.

One Perfect Day - 5 Stone Circles, 1 Iron Age Broch, 1 Blackhouse Village and a Standing Stone

One of the main reasons we wanted to come to Lewis was to see the Calanais Stone Circles - a place I particularly had wanted to go to for many years. Apart from the gale force winds, the three stone circles on the west coast of Lewis lived up to all my expectations. There were hardly any other tourists around so we were able to walk around the stones by ourselves, which made the experience really special – quite different to sharing Stonehenge with hundreds of people!

Calanais 1

Calnais 2 – Cnoc Ceann a’ Ghàrraidh

Calanais 3 – Cnoc Fhillibhir Bheag

Lewis is covered in peat bog and there is no doubt that there are many archeological treasures under the surface. Neolithic sites are often found accidently when people dig the peat up to use as fuel. We stumbled across a couple of sites on our way to Calanais:

Achmore Stone Circle – not as impressive as Calanais but still quite significant!!

Steinacleit Stone Circle – this circle has a 50 foot diameter, making it a bit hard to photograph. In the centre is the remains of a Stone Age Burial Cairn.

Dun Carloway is an Iron Age broch. Brochs were tall timber round houses with an outer drystone wall for protection.

The Gearrannan Blackhouse Village was first built in the seventeeth century on a site that had been settled for at least 2000 years. Blackhouses were where the crofters lived. No one lives in this village anymore and it has been developed as a museum. We got to see first hand how Harris Tweed is made (though we resisted the temptation to buy the dvd!).

And finally, the Standing Stone - Clach an Truiseil

Sahara Gal

Drinking in Stornaway

Technically, Lewis and Harris are the same island, but are very different geographically. Where as Harris is mountainous and rocky, Lewis is made up of flat moorlands.

Stornaway is the main town on Lewis. We didn’t have high expectations as everyone we had spoken to on the various islands had pretty much nothing positive to say about it. It did feel like you were hitting a bigger city after the remoteness of the rest of the Hebrides but we had a great time. Our first night on Lewis we stayed a little further north than Stornaway but based ourselves there for the next couple of night.

Lews Castle, Stornaway

Stornaway Harbour

A highlight of our stay in Stornaway was the pub!! As you all know, the Desert Rat and I are partial to a cleansing ale so we parked ourselves in this pub, had a few ales and listened to the pub band which consisted of a couple of blokes singing and playing the guitar. When they discovered I am Australian, I was serenaded with a couple of classics including ‘I Come from a Land Down Under’. The locals were all pretty friendly – roaring drunk but friendly and none of them could understand why we had chosen Stornaway as a holiday destination! Anyway, we had a great night!! The pub itself had its own history, and we were very much amused by the little plaque out the front….

Needless to say, we were happy it had reverted back to old ways!!

Harris

Our next ferry ride took us away from the Uists to the next island Harris. Harris is spectacular. It is rocky, mountainous, boggy, rugged, misty and has the most amazing winding road which follows the east coast called the Golden Road (named so as it apparently was very expensive to build).

Views from The Golden Road

Our first stop was St Clement’s Church in Ròghadal, a 12th Century church which contains 3 wall tombs, all intricately carved.

We took the circular route around Harris which included the Golden Road and stayed the night at Scarista House on the western side, where we enjoyed an evening of fine food and wine. It would have been nice to spend longer on Harris and do some walking – maybe next time!!

Scarista House

Beach At Scarista

Dangerous Animals of Scotland

As the Desert Rat and I drove around the Hebrides and West Coast of Scotland, we came across many signs warning us of the dangerous animals roaming freely around the countryside...